ST. LOUIS 鈥 Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc., the new group merging the region鈥檚 traditional business and civic advocacy groups, faces a daunting challenge.
Uniting a region with a longstanding racial divide and plenty of political fragmentation behind common civic goals won鈥檛 be easy. Distrust of business and civic elites runs rampant these days. And local history makes residents perhaps even more suspicious.
But if there is a consensus, it is that 蜜芽传媒 is losing ground to other Midwestern cities.
鈥淲e鈥檝e got to up our game here,鈥 said Andy Taylor, executive chairman of Enterprise Holdings and founding chair of Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc. 鈥淚t鈥檚 very apparent that some of these other cities are ahead of us.鈥
Led by Jason Hall, former director of Missouri鈥檚 Department of Economic Development, Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc. has pledged to become more inclusive, allowing new, younger leaders and Black and brown voices who were excluded in the past to be part of a consensus-building body. Local leaders will be watching to see whether there is truly room for input beyond the voices of business executives who ran two of the groups being merged, the 蜜芽传媒 Regional Chamber and Civic Progress.
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鈥淎 merger of organizations charged with promoting and growing our region could be significant by pooling resources and coordinating strategic planning,鈥 蜜芽传媒 County Executive Sam Page said in a statement. 鈥淏ut for it to be effective, any consolidation must ensure that the historically underserved regions of our county are a priority when it comes to investment opportunities.鈥
The region鈥檚 two major business groups have lost clout in recent years.
The 蜜芽传媒 Regional Chamber, long the voice of area business interests, suffered a leadership crisis when CEO Joe Reagan was ousted in early 2018. Employees were jumping ship, complaining of a hostile work environment, and the chamber was running a deficit.
Civic Progress, historically the club of big area CEOs who could write checks to get things done, also waned in influence. It lost CEOs who ran Anheuser Busch, Monsanto, AT&T and big banks to corporate mergers and moves.
At the same time, unrest in Ferguson in 2014 brought national attention to 蜜芽传媒, making it a poster child for racial division as the Black Lives Movement began.
The area鈥檚 major initiatives, such as airport privatization and the Better Together city-county merger, were backed by a small cadre of political operatives funded by libertarian-leaning Rex Sinquefield and seen as an attempt to ram through big changes without widespread community buy-in. They failed.
鈥淐racks get filled by people with narrow agendas,鈥 Hall said in an interview last week. 鈥淵ou want to broaden the base of stakeholders.鈥
Whether Greater 蜜芽传媒 can fill some of the leadership void and build consensus in a fractious region remains to be seen, but area leaders are hopeful. Many say that Hall鈥檚 and Taylor鈥檚 commitment to 蜜芽传媒 can鈥檛 be questioned.
鈥淚 don鈥檛 know if it鈥檚 a good idea or not,鈥 St. Charles County Executive Steve Ehlmann, one of the area鈥檚 longest-serving political leaders, said of the new organization that combines five local civic groups. 鈥淏ut I know what we鈥檙e doing now isn鈥檛 working.鈥
Taylors step up
Taylor comes to the role as chair of Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc with a deep reservoir of local goodwill.
The Taylor family has long been among the most generous backers of cultural institutions such as the 蜜芽传媒 Symphony, Missouri Botanical Garden and Forest Park. Enterprise founder Jack Taylor, Andy Taylor鈥檚 father, was said to have overseen more than $1 billion in gifts before his death in 2016.
One of the last big successful civic ventures, the redo of the Gateway Arch Grounds, got over $100 million in funding from the Taylor family. Carolyn Kindle Betz, Taylor鈥檚 niece and the head of Enterprise Holdings Foundation, is chair and president of the Gateway Arch Park Foundation.
She also leads the ownership group for the city鈥檚 new Major League Soccer franchise, which is building a stadium downtown 鈥 privately financed with far less public subsidy than other sports stadiums. The Taylors were also behind the recent rehab of Soldiers Memorial, a downtown museum in the middle of the Gateway Mall that needed a facelift.
The family鈥檚 focus on the central city is strategic. Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc. will absorb Downtown STL Inc., the key booster for the area that gives many visitors their first impression of 蜜芽传媒.
鈥淔or 蜜芽传媒 to be as good as it possibly can be, you鈥檙e going to have to have a successful core, a successful prosperous core,鈥 Taylor said last week.
Arch to Park
One of the employees who left the Chamber during Reagan鈥檚 tenure was Hall. He previously worked as a lawyer at Bryan Cave before joining Gov. Jay Nixon鈥檚 administration.
Backed by Taylor and John Dubinksy, who led Mercantile Bank and helped get the Cortex tech district off the ground, Hall became CEO of a new civic group, Arch to Park.
Formed as a limited liability company rather than a nonprofit, Arch to Park鈥檚 mission was nebulous at first. It didn鈥檛 have a website. The LLC structure kept its funders obscured. Though insiders knew Taylor was a key backer, only recently has the organization disclosed that he was in fact the chairman. Other supporters included Commerce Bancshares Foundation, the charitable arm of the bank led by the Kemper family. David Kemper headed Arch to Park鈥檚 real estate fund.
Arch to Park was initially described as a strategic real estate fund, and Taylor said it still oversees about $180 million meant to invest in riskier real estate ventures that can make a difference. For instance, Arch to Park helped acquire key parcels at the corner of Delmar Boulevard and Euclid Avenue as part of an $84 million plan by Kevin Bryant of Kingsway Development to pull the Central West End鈥檚 strength north of the city鈥檚 infamous Delmar Divide.
Arch to Park also began to take a more assertive role in civic affairs. The STLMade branding campaign to promote civic pride is just an extension of Arch to Park, according to STLMade鈥檚 website. Its billboards are prominent along area highways.
Leading the STLMade campaign was Lee Broughton, a former Enterprise marketing executive married to Andy Taylor鈥檚 daughter, Chrissy Taylor, who took over as Enterprise CEO this year.
鈥淛ason, because of his political experience and his love for 蜜芽传媒, said, 鈥榊ou know what, there are a couple other things we can do here,鈥欌 Andy Taylor said of Arch to Park鈥檚 expanding role.
Beyond the STLMade campaign, Arch to Park began funding major planning initiatives, such as GeoFutures, a strategy for leveraging the region鈥檚 mapping and geospatial talent as part of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency鈥檚 new western headquarters being built north of downtown. And it helped fund a recently released strategic plan for downtown.
Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc.鈥檚 initial agenda will be guided by a region-wide strategic plan being led by economic development expert Bruce Katz of New Localism Advisors.
鈥淚 do have a bias toward community-engaged planning,鈥 Hall said. 鈥淚 just think we went for way too long without that kind of effort, which was not healthy.鈥
Attorney Jerry Schlichter, one of the founders of entrepreneurship support organization Arch Grants, said he鈥檚 confident the new group will have a strong entrepreneurship focus, given Hall鈥檚 background. Hall helped build up and still chairs Missouri Technology Corp., a state-backed startup funding organization.
鈥淚t鈥檚 a superb role for Jason, who鈥檚 demonstrated for years he鈥檚 a top caliber thinker and doer,鈥 Schlichter said. 鈥淗e understands the importance of growing new companies and new industries and doing it in a diverse and inclusive way.鈥
Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc. pledges to better unite the region behind what Hall said will be an 鈥渁ctual agenda.鈥 Hall has roots in Illinois, having grown up in Granite City, which could lend itself to better collaboration between the two sides of the Mississippi River.
鈥淚 think it鈥檚 a very positive move and I鈥檓 in full support,鈥 said St. Clair County Board Chairman Mark Kern, who said he was kept informed of the process. 鈥淕etting all these organizations merged into one is a great idea.鈥
Airport privatization
Hall was most recently in the public eye last year as an opponent of the Sinquefield-backed effort to privatize 蜜芽传媒 Lambert International Airport. Privatization supporters said it had the potential to raise hundreds of millions of dollars for a cash-strapped city to make catalytic investments, but 蜜芽传媒 Mayor Lyda Krewson pulled the plug late last year.
Enterprise could have seen big impacts on its rental car business at the airport, and 蜜芽传媒 might have become a model for other U.S. airports, the bread and butter of the rental car industry. Hall has maintained that his opposition was to the lack of community consensus and that many business leaders were concerned about the initiative.
Others, though, saw the episode as Taylor and Hall showing they could bring in groups like Civic Progress to kill initiatives they didn鈥檛 support.
Those involved have moved on and welcome Greater 蜜芽传媒鈥 effort to unite the region.
鈥淭he deep fragmentation of the 蜜芽传媒 region has been a hindrance for too long,鈥 Krewson said in a statement. 鈥淚t鈥檚 to our city鈥檚 and region鈥檚 collective benefit to have our renowned economic development partners come together to form one, unified group.鈥
Just last month, Sinquefield cut ties with the political organization he funded, Pelopidas, spurring the firm鈥檚 demise and the departure of the lobbyist who led it, Travis Brown.
鈥淭he creation of Greater 蜜芽传媒 Inc. is a great first step in bringing the region together,鈥 Sinquefield said in a statement.
The question will be whether Greater 蜜芽传媒 truly unites its disparate parts. The last big economic development union, merging some city and county functions to form the 蜜芽传媒 Economic Development Partnership, hasn鈥檛 moved much beyond that. The city still has its own group, the 蜜芽传媒 Development Corp., and former County Executive Steve Stenger鈥檚 attempts to make sure the Partnership was closely controlled by county government played a major role in his indictment.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 the fear here, even if we bring all these organizations together we鈥檙e still in silos,鈥 said one local civic and political insider.
Ehlmann is hopeful. As a Republican, he said he鈥檇 like the GOP-dominated legislature in Jefferson City to do more for the 蜜芽传媒 region. The perception by some is that Kansas City always brought a more unified agenda to the state capital, Ehlmann said, giving it more success in accomplishing its priorities.
鈥淢aybe it鈥檇 be a lot easier to do if we had one organization speaking for everyone,鈥 he said.
CIVIC MERGER: As five 蜜芽传媒 civic groups make plans to combine their efforts, David Nicklaus and Jim Gallagher discuss what was wrong with the old, fragmented approach. They say the new structure looks good, but the proof will be in what the merged group can accomplish.
