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ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ may have missed a chance to build a Major League Soccer stadium and lure a team, but developer Paul McKee still managed to score.

The push to win an MLS team earlier this year gave McKee’s NorthSide Regeneration and its primary lender, the Bank of Washington, more leverage over the city.

To help pay for the proposed stadium, the city needed McKee to agree to let the city use a portion of the tax-increment financing revenue generated from development within his 1,500-acre NorthSide Regeneration TIF.

In exchange for that concession, NorthSide received over a year of extra time to begin work in the massive redevelopment area first approved by the city in 2009. Under his agreement with the city, signed in February, McKee now has until September 2018 to commence at least $5 million worth of development.

In addition, the city agreed to give NorthSide the chance to buy or lease the Missouri Highways and Transportation Commission land that was to be the site of the MLS stadium. The city has to at least try to finalize an option to purchase the land, even without the MLS team, and then offer it to NorthSide, according to a copy of the February agreement obtained by the Post-Dispatch.

While voters rejected a key portion of the stadium’s financing plan tied to a higher use tax, the efforts to try to win a soccer stadium, hashed out in the waning days of former Mayor Francis Slay’s administration, tied ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ even closer to McKee and a lender that holds some $50 million of his debt.

Just a year earlier, the Slay administration had turned to McKee to help land a major economic development prize, the future western headquarters of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. The NGA and its 3,100 jobs was seen as a potential game-changer for part of north ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½.

McKee, who had spent over a decade assembling land north of downtown, was sitting on part of the 100-acre site that appeared to be the most suitable for the NGA — and the one that the federal agency ultimately chose. While there was growing impatience at the lack of development in McKee’s NorthSide Regeneration footprint, which had been authorized to use up to $390 million in future taxes generated within the site, city officials didn’t want any more controversy than necessary.

So , while reaffirming McKee’s role as the lead developer around the site.

To get the land, the city agreed to pay $5.3 million to McKee’s primary lender, the Bank of Washington (about $3.9 million more than McKee had paid for it), and to hand over some McKee debt from another bank, Corn Belt Bank and Trust (the city had bought that for about $7 million). In addition, city development officials also agreed to strengthen their partnership with McKee and write in protections for the Bank of Washington.

But the city promised the federal government more than just a piece of dirt to build a walled-off campus. They promised new development and infrastructure in the area, the NGA needs for its workforce.

So, in the agreement signed in January 2016, ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ negotiators set some deadlines in the city’s reaffirmed partnership with McKee: Within a year of the NGA announcement, finalized in June 2016, NorthSide Regeneration, or a designated subdeveloper or purchaser, had to commence at least $5 million worth of work within the NorthSide Regeneration area.

Also, that agreement provided that the city could hire other developers to begin working the site around the facility in March of this year.

Those provisions — the deadline and using other developers — were changed when the soccer stadium became a new priority. Not only does McKee get 15 additional months to start work, it’s now harder for other developers to acquire McKee property for other projects.

The city had already agreed that if it needed NorthSide land for other projects, it would pay NorthSide’s acquisition and other costs, plus 15 percent. And if the two sides eventually void their development agreement and the city tries to buy back the land it had sold to McKee, the Bank of Washington gets to keep its liens on the property.

ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Development Corporation Director Otis Williams, who led negotiations for the city with McKee and the Bank of Washington, said the timeline for NorthSide to start development “is still ticking.â€�

NorthSide does not have any leverage over the city now, Williams said. An agreement to use part of the NorthSide TIF revenues from NGA employee taxes to finance site preparation is secure, he said, and the city “is in full control.� Now, he said, the city just needs some redevelopment “wins.�

“We will be working with the current developer to ensure something will happen in a timely fashion,� Williams said. “Right now we just need to work through the final stages of discussions. Again, we don’t have a gun at their head, they don’t have a gun at our head. But we do need to get to the finish line.�

Hesitant lender

Just last month, McKee representatives were back before SLDC, , Cedar Rapids Bank and Trust, a small Iowa bank.

It was to be the first project to tap McKee’s large NorthSide TIF, finally breaking ground now that an anchor was coming to the area and legal questions about the TIF had been resolved.

Last year, the SLDC board approved NorthSide for $5 million in new market tax credits and the Board of Aldermen authorized $2.8 million from the TIF district. The city also agreed to a $300,000 low-interest loan.

But the bank still wanted an extra loan reserve before committing to lending $10 million for a gas station and grocery complex at Cass Avenue and Tucker Boulevard. The extra tax credits would be turned into cash to satisfy that reserve, McKee’s representatives said.

The SLDC board balked at authorizing more New Markets Tax Credits for the project, questioning what the funds would be used for and the $19.6 million price tag for the gas station and grocery.

McKee’s NorthSide Regeneration and another entity registered to an associate who has worked with McKee on NorthSide already own the land. McKee’s attorney Darryl Piggee, representing a development group that includes McKee’s wife and other partners, has said the $3.4 million price to buy the land is “the release price for the lender,� the Bank of Washington.

The city has structured the deal to help pay for road and other improvements at the intersection. As taxes were diverted to the TIF over the years, McKee’s NorthSide TIF has slowly accumulated about $1.8 million in its fund. A special payment from the TIF for up to that amount would be made to help cover infrastructure costs should the deal go through.

But the proposal has not yet been resubmitted, and city development officials say they are in the process of renegotiating and getting a better explanation on the project’s expenses.

“It was more a concern on what the funds were going to be used for,� said Williams, the SLDC director.

“There had to be more definition on that. And also the overall cost, particularly on the acquisition side. At this point, there’s no light at the end of this tunnel unless there’s a good explanation for the expenditures.�

‘I will meet the deadlines’

Still, the city is signaling it will do all it can to help NorthSide.

The new administration of Mayor Lyda Krewson, which took over after the NGA agreement and the MLS amendment with McKee were negotiated, indicated it hopes McKee can pull it off.

“They are the designated developers, and we very much want them to succeed,� said Linda Martínez, Krewson’s deputy mayor for development. “Those are our agreements at this point in time. I’m hopeful they will meet those agreements, and hopefully more.�

McKee, for his part, said both and a health center project planned for the land where the Pruitt-Igoe housing complex once stood were advancing.

Those planned projects will be started and completed as required, he said, and they will more than satisfy the development thresholds promised in his agreements with the city.

In an email, he said there “were some city cooperation issues� that kept him from activating the TIF for his projects until after the NGA announcement. He indicated he will have more details on those projects, and the MLS stadium site, in the coming weeks.

“I will meet the deadlines,� he said. “Not an issue.�

McKee’s NorthSide is also part of another proposal to begin building housing northeast of the NGA site, just west of Old North ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½. It is being led by developer Telesis Corp. of Washington, D.C., and financing has been promised by the AFL-CIO’s Housing Investment Trust.

, but both Telesis and the Housing Investment Trust told the Post-Dispatch they are still committed to housing development near the NGA.

While the city waits for McKee to start work to meet his commitments, Williams said there are still other opportunities for redevelopment.

Its planning effort, which covers about 3,500 acres around NGA, is ongoing. The city and other developers, , are advancing an initiative to rehab the area surrounding the Preservation Square housing complex north of downtown.

“While NorthSide is key, and NorthSide Regeneration is key, all of our eggs are not in that basket,� Williams said.