9/9/25 Meeting
PUBLIC NOTICE
Please take notice that the Washington Avenue Corridor Community Improvement District will be holding a Board of Directors Meeting on September 9th at 11:30 am virtually via Zoom.
This will be an open meeting and all members of the public are welcome to attend via the above Zoom link or in person. A copy of the Agenda for this meeting is below:
agenda
I. Call to order
II. Approval of meeting minutes from 08/12/25 Board of Directors meetings (5 minutes)
III. Increase in special assessment rate for 2026 (10 minutes)
IV. Report on EZ Vape / 14th and Pine drug markets (10 minutes)
V. Report on meeting with Mayor Spencer on 9/2/25 (20 minutes)
VI. Downtown Forward / adjustment of agreement with Executive Director (30 minutes)
VII. Adjournment
meeting minutes
Date: 09/09/2025
Time: 11:30
Location: Virtual (Zoom)
The meeting was called to order at 11:33 by Executive Director Matt O’Leary
The following Board members were present:
• John Berglund, Chair
• Dan Pistor, Secretary
• Michelle Solie, Treasurer
• Craig Heller, Director
• Steve Stone, Director
• Jeff Campbell, Director
• Matt O’Leary, Executive Director
Also present:
• Brad Waldrop
• Jessica Shaw
II. Approval of Meeting Minutes – All approved the August meeting minutes.
III. Increase in Special Assessment Rate for 2026 – We are allowed to increase the assessment 4% annually per state law. After a lengthy discussion we increased it 2.7% to correspond with the current inflation rate. All approved.
IV. Report on EZ Vape / 14th and Pine drug markets – The unlawful detainer action is being filed this week. The owner (LB Brown Properties) declared the tenant in default of the lease for a variety of reasons. The 14th and Pine park is closed by Mayor which is better but we will have to see what happens after.
V. Report on meeting with Mayor Spencer on 9/2/25 – We had a recap of our meeting with the Mayor. The Deputy position is going to be the liaison with the group. The Mayor listed some of her key priorities. She wants to make key hires and build out her cabinet. Her main focus will be on city services. She also wants to crack down on nuisance properties. We conveyed 3 key areas along Washington Ave that we thought were an issue. Homelessness was also a discussion point. The Mayor is going to rely on House Everyone STL. Mandi Semple will likely be brought into STL to implement the Housing First model. She will prioritize housing over encampments. Thoughts were conveyed to her on the vagrant issue needing to be approached as a criminal problem instead of a homeless problem. The Mark Twain had 1717 calls for service in last 10 years. We discussed some ways to tackle these problems that are a combination of community and city actions. She will be reaching out to SLDC on help with Paul Brown. We talked about uses like vape shops being a problem with the solution being a special use zoning overlay. She would like us to work with the current citywide zoning effort. The importance of neighborhood orders of protection were also brought up.
VI. Downtown Forward / adjustment of agreement with Executive Director – 50k is proposed to contribute to Downtown Forward. This arrangement will reduce payroll to 100k. Matt would be working half for CID and half for Downtown Forward. Reasons to do this are compelling. Having Wash Ave CID on board will help contribute to Downtown Forward. This will shore up extra funds for Wash Ave CID. We will no longer have to worry about any action outside of the boundaries. Both orgs will have similar missions. Downtown Forward will have better position on holding city government accountable. Went over management contract. It’s a fairly standard situation like the CID’s relationship with DT STL years ago. The Wash Ave CID can terminate the contract under certain circumstances. Michelle brought up some concerns about how hours would be tracked and that we would be getting back what we pay Matt for. A follow up conversation would be had with Michelle after the meeting to discuss those concerns.
Prepared by: Dan Pistor, Secretary