Eight months ago, the Downtown Economic Development and Historical Preservation Committee (DEDHP) of Wentzville was created by Ward 2 Alderman Chris Gard and installed by Mayor Nickolas Guccione through ordinance. Guccione appointed Chairman Gard and two other aldermen; Ward 3, Rick Stokes, and Ward 1 Alderman Cheryl Kross. Five citizens were appointed to the newly formed committee; Brad Beine, Jay Webber, Rebecca Krause, Deborah Bowman, and Leon Tow.
It is the object of the committee to promote economic development and preserve history within the core of Wentzville—a matter which has been ignored by city government for a half-century. Village center businesses and residents have been subject to stringent codes and infrastructure that is almost 100 years old. New businesses want to come into town, but seeing all of the hoops they need to jump through and decaying water and sewer lines they would need to replace at their cost, say "No thanks," and build somewhere else. A few believers have braved the financial disaster offered by Wentzville and rehabilitated old buildings in downtown only to be met with surprise after surprise and no help from the city. Owners of places like the Olde Towne Pub, the original bank building, The Marley Hotel, and the 1878 Sheirbaum home spent fortunes to open their businesses because they believed in Wentzville and are proud of its heritage. Progress is slow in bringing back an old town when the city government offers little or no interest, and incentive to help. This new committee can help with that problem.
Last night at the meeting of the DEDHP, the committee went through a list of projects that need to be funded in order to kick-start economic development in the downtown area. One major problem to bringing new businesses into downtown is parking, and they are going to recommend purchasing the Century-Link parking lot. They discussed bringing forward a plan for trees and shrubbery along the railroad tracks, a mural program, work on infrastructure, sidewalks, and mapping a historical trail with markers. I'm not sure which of these items will be brought to the board of aldermen but they are bringing some of their recommendations for funding to the March 12th meeting of the board.
Here's where a little back-story is necessary. Alderman Cheryl Kross resigned from the committee last month stating that she thinks there are too many aldermen on the committee. She wants to offer a change to the ordinance to have an all-citizen committee by replacing every alderman with citizens. Should this happen, the committee would be left with members who know little or nothing about where budget funding may come from, which projects are feasible, contacts, and processes necessary to achieve their project goals. In other words, it would slow down or stall the accomplishment of anything they want to bring forward. Their lack of city-knowledge would have them bouncing back and forth between the board of aldermen and their committee. Why would Kross want this to happen?
Last night Kross gave a flowery speech, paying lip service to citizens of Wentzville by saying how much value the committee has to the community, economic development of downtown, and how much she wants it to be successful. What a crock! Over the years, I've had numerous conversations with Alderman Kross where she's told me point blank, "I won't spend a dime of taxpayer money on the parking lot or any historic preservation in Wentzville." I always thought it funny that she forced her way onto the committee when I knew she didn't give a rats-ass about downtown. I figured she was just spying to find out what they were up to and at the appropriate time she'd quit the committee to vote, "nay" on anything presented to the board for budgeting. I was right again, she did quit, and now wants to gut the committee leaving it to die and rot right in the middle of historic Wentzville. Wow, imagine that, what a surprise!
Now she has Mayor Nickolas Guccione spouting things at his monthly coffee talk saying; "If there are any projects approved by the board of aldermen and funds budgeted, I will veto it!" He also said in a public meeting, "If there were a tie vote on the board allocating funds to the committee, I will vote against it!" Kross and Guccione are absolutely wanting to stop economic development in downtown and destroy the committee formed to accomplish that goal. Once again, Cheryl Kross is the bad apple, and Guccione should know better. He campaigned on seeing economic development in the village center—I guess that was just another campaign promise lie.
If my readers believe in revitalizing our historic center of Wentzville, now is the time for action. Businesses, organizations, and residents need to make calls especially to Mayor Nickolas Guccione and Ward 1 Alderman Cheryl Kross, or call or email City Hall, tell them you agree with the DEDHP Committee recommendations and want a vibrant downtown, tell them to vote "Yea," to the committee recommendations.
Calls need to be made to all of our elected officials, for your convenience here is a list of them and their phone numbers. The names in red are members of the "Unholy Alliance" and expected to vote against the DEDHP Committee recommendations, unless enough voters tell them otherwise.
Mayor: Nickolas Guccione - (636) 639-0353 (re-election April 2016)
Ward 1: Cheryl Kross - (636) 332-1907 (re-election April 2015)
Forrest Gossett - (636) 887-0895 (re-election April 2014)
Ward 2: Chris Gard - (636) 233-7399 (re-election April 2015)
Sonya Shryock - (636) 887-5549 (not seeking re-election)
Ward 3: Rick Stokes - (636) 887-3228 (re-election April 2014)
Michael Hays - (314) 630-4742 (re-election 2015)
More importantly, we all need to be at the Board of Alderman meeting of March 12, 2014 to voice our opinions during the "Open Forum," and address approval of the DEDHP Committee recommendations. Stop Mayor Guccione and Alderman Cheryl Kross from condemning our historic village center to another 50 years of our city government paying lip-service to the downtown residents and businesses. If they are successful at blocking progress, we need to remember Kross during the election of 2015, and Guccione in 2016.
The only way our elected officials know what citizens need or want, is to tell them. Call the alderman of your ward, inundate our mayor with emails and phone calls; it's the only thing he really understands. Wentzville needs this committee and it needs its government to support it—and us!
It is the object of the committee to promote economic development and preserve history within the core of Wentzville—a matter which has been ignored by city government for a half-century. Village center businesses and residents have been subject to stringent codes and infrastructure that is almost 100 years old. New businesses want to come into town, but seeing all of the hoops they need to jump through and decaying water and sewer lines they would need to replace at their cost, say "No thanks," and build somewhere else. A few believers have braved the financial disaster offered by Wentzville and rehabilitated old buildings in downtown only to be met with surprise after surprise and no help from the city. Owners of places like the Olde Towne Pub, the original bank building, The Marley Hotel, and the 1878 Sheirbaum home spent fortunes to open their businesses because they believed in Wentzville and are proud of its heritage. Progress is slow in bringing back an old town when the city government offers little or no interest, and incentive to help. This new committee can help with that problem.
Last night at the meeting of the DEDHP, the committee went through a list of projects that need to be funded in order to kick-start economic development in the downtown area. One major problem to bringing new businesses into downtown is parking, and they are going to recommend purchasing the Century-Link parking lot. They discussed bringing forward a plan for trees and shrubbery along the railroad tracks, a mural program, work on infrastructure, sidewalks, and mapping a historical trail with markers. I'm not sure which of these items will be brought to the board of aldermen but they are bringing some of their recommendations for funding to the March 12th meeting of the board.
Here's where a little back-story is necessary. Alderman Cheryl Kross resigned from the committee last month stating that she thinks there are too many aldermen on the committee. She wants to offer a change to the ordinance to have an all-citizen committee by replacing every alderman with citizens. Should this happen, the committee would be left with members who know little or nothing about where budget funding may come from, which projects are feasible, contacts, and processes necessary to achieve their project goals. In other words, it would slow down or stall the accomplishment of anything they want to bring forward. Their lack of city-knowledge would have them bouncing back and forth between the board of aldermen and their committee. Why would Kross want this to happen?
Last night Kross gave a flowery speech, paying lip service to citizens of Wentzville by saying how much value the committee has to the community, economic development of downtown, and how much she wants it to be successful. What a crock! Over the years, I've had numerous conversations with Alderman Kross where she's told me point blank, "I won't spend a dime of taxpayer money on the parking lot or any historic preservation in Wentzville." I always thought it funny that she forced her way onto the committee when I knew she didn't give a rats-ass about downtown. I figured she was just spying to find out what they were up to and at the appropriate time she'd quit the committee to vote, "nay" on anything presented to the board for budgeting. I was right again, she did quit, and now wants to gut the committee leaving it to die and rot right in the middle of historic Wentzville. Wow, imagine that, what a surprise!
Now she has Mayor Nickolas Guccione spouting things at his monthly coffee talk saying; "If there are any projects approved by the board of aldermen and funds budgeted, I will veto it!" He also said in a public meeting, "If there were a tie vote on the board allocating funds to the committee, I will vote against it!" Kross and Guccione are absolutely wanting to stop economic development in downtown and destroy the committee formed to accomplish that goal. Once again, Cheryl Kross is the bad apple, and Guccione should know better. He campaigned on seeing economic development in the village center—I guess that was just another campaign promise lie.
If my readers believe in revitalizing our historic center of Wentzville, now is the time for action. Businesses, organizations, and residents need to make calls especially to Mayor Nickolas Guccione and Ward 1 Alderman Cheryl Kross, or call or email City Hall, tell them you agree with the DEDHP Committee recommendations and want a vibrant downtown, tell them to vote "Yea," to the committee recommendations.
Calls need to be made to all of our elected officials, for your convenience here is a list of them and their phone numbers. The names in red are members of the "Unholy Alliance" and expected to vote against the DEDHP Committee recommendations, unless enough voters tell them otherwise.
Mayor: Nickolas Guccione - (636) 639-0353 (re-election April 2016)
Ward 1: Cheryl Kross - (636) 332-1907 (re-election April 2015)
Forrest Gossett - (636) 887-0895 (re-election April 2014)
Ward 2: Chris Gard - (636) 233-7399 (re-election April 2015)
Sonya Shryock - (636) 887-5549 (not seeking re-election)
Ward 3: Rick Stokes - (636) 887-3228 (re-election April 2014)
Michael Hays - (314) 630-4742 (re-election 2015)
More importantly, we all need to be at the Board of Alderman meeting of March 12, 2014 to voice our opinions during the "Open Forum," and address approval of the DEDHP Committee recommendations. Stop Mayor Guccione and Alderman Cheryl Kross from condemning our historic village center to another 50 years of our city government paying lip-service to the downtown residents and businesses. If they are successful at blocking progress, we need to remember Kross during the election of 2015, and Guccione in 2016.
The only way our elected officials know what citizens need or want, is to tell them. Call the alderman of your ward, inundate our mayor with emails and phone calls; it's the only thing he really understands. Wentzville needs this committee and it needs its government to support it—and us!
It's going to be interesting to see who votes no with a room full of residents watching. My bet is that Kross will postpone the recommendation.
ReplyDeleteWhy don't Kross and Guccione want to improve our downtown?
ReplyDeleteImprove our Downtown should be high on the Mayor's list of NEEDS for the city and high on Kross' list. My guess is that they feel there is nothing for them in improving the Downtown as most of the business are just fed up with the lip service the King and Queen of Wentzville give the owners that see right thru them for all their hypocrisy.
DeleteMayor Guccione and alderman Kross are dim of sight, they are not visionaries by any stretch of the imagination. They want instant gratification, not acylades thirty years from now for doing the right thing today.
DeleteI live in Cottleville and read this blog to see how far ahead of Wentzville our city has come. We fortunately had a Mayor and Aldermen who understood the importance of a vibrant historic downtown is to a community.
DeleteThe best decision they made was to build a beauyiful new city hall in our downtown, new businesses came and old ones flourished around it. Even people from the newly developed subdivisions love it and we enjoy a great number of Wentzville citizens coming to our town patronizing our quaint shops and restaurants.
It's difficult to understand why your Mayor would be against having Wentzville's historic center revitalized, leaving it to decay is deplorable. Perhaps he should take his nose out of politics long enough to come to Cottleville and enjoy our downtown hospitality. Maybe then he might understand the benefit of a historic center means to any progressive small city.
Because they both hate Gard and Stokes. If they say it's white, Guccione and Kross would call it black. In other words Guccione is a petty lying politician who doesn't have Wentzville's best interests at heart, and Kross has stripped her gears—if she ever had gears to strip.
ReplyDeleteI'm really sick of these two, I wish they'd go somewhere else and play their games.
Deletedo any of these people live in the village center?
ReplyDeleteHeck no. They live out as far from the city center as they can.They do not care what happens there. They only come in to town when they have political business to do or something that will give them the appearance that they care about what is going on in "Their City". In other words they show up when they have to show up.. Ptoi on them!..
DeleteOf course they don't live down here, this is a depressed part of the city. Guccione isn't going to give up his 3 car garage and inground swimming pool to live in a house that could be over a hundred years old. Or, it could be that there aren't enough union shops down here for him.
DeleteI have operated a small business in downtown Wentzville for almost 15 years and am very unhappy about the lack of attention our government pays to our village center. Mayor Lambi always promised he's do something like build the new city hall here but that was just a lie.
ReplyDeleteI voted for our current Mayor because he promised he'd fix up downtown. From what I've seen, this new committee is focused on helping residents and business owners like me and start working on rebuilding the area. Even though my loyalty to our mayor has drifted, when he formed this committee, I thought he was really going to accomplish something he promised voters like me that no other Mayor has. Instead, from what I read now, it looks like he's no different than Lambi. If this committee isn't allowed to do what our mayor promised it would do, It'll be a cold day in hell when I ever vote for him again. I'm really getting fed up!
People better show up to the meeting before March 12th or this topic will not be on the 12th's agenda! Watch the dispicable duo try and nix this presentation and committee with as small an audience as possible.
ReplyDeleteI agree we need to revitalize downtown and it has been a struggle but to state we need more parking may not be the right circle to focus upon. We have Wabash Days every year and people find parking places. Yes, they may have to walk a few blocks but we all need exercise. If we use our vacant ground on parking lots, we loose potential businesses that could have built there. Someone please look at the bigger picture. We need businesses not parking lots! By the way, I listened to Alderman Kross resigning from this committee and she did not state she believed the committee should be aldermenless; she stated 3 were too many when all other committees only have one. Please start telling the whole truth if you want to regain any credibility with your blog.
ReplyDeleteWatch tomorrow nights meeting and see how the bill to restructure the committee comes out. The committee will be aldernmanless, just like the parks board. She rushed a first reading so they can have second and final reading on the 12th, the same day the committee will be giving their recommendations. If the Bill passes, and it becomes an all private citizen committee, most of the committee members will resign. She is destroying any chance of Wentzville having any meaningful economic development downtown. She shouldn't have quit when resigning from the committee, she should have resigned from the Board of Aldermen!
DeleteI agree that the downtown area needs to be revitalized. Wentzville did a disservice to business owners when they chopped off the parking to make a 3rd lane that is rarely used. So parking is a major issue. Ehll's & Thiemann's Carpet are the only downtown storefronts on Pearce Blvd. business with adequate parking. Even City Hall has parking issues. You have to practically hit the building to park in front of Computer Paramedic. Who wants to carry their computer 3 blocks to get exercise?
ReplyDeleteLook how nice the Hapkido studio has made their appearance. I think the city needs to devote more maintenance to the downtown area, also. Use the street sweeper more often. Let violators of city and traffic ordinances pay their fine in mandatory community service hours to Wentzville polishing things up in the downtown area, working with the business owners. Some of the buildings and sidewalks need to be pressure washed occasionally.
The things that have been done are really nice and kudos to the business owners that make and keep their property nice and appealing.
I'm not sure there is a visionary person in Downtown business district. IF there ever was he/she would have gotten the bandwagon going several years ago and kept it going until its' voice was heard and something started to happen. It really too late now. A couple of folks got up in meetings and tried to show what other towns have done to vitalize their downtown area but maybe they too were bogged down by our true lack of enthusiasm and COMMITTMENT. Quit relying on the city to make it happen businessmen.
ReplyDeleteAct like the NIKE logo and "MAKE IT HAPPEN".
The Mayor should really be pushing this if he wanted it to happen and it is obvious he doesn't because there is nothing in it for him right now. But wait until it gets closer to HIS election and then see what happens. He'll be charming up every vote he can muster and then some. Until then it will be business as usual for the Mayor unless there is something in it for himself and his puppet from Ward #1 Cheryl Kross. They go hand-in-hand now.
If the CEO of a business/ corporation/ city etc. Is incompetent in executing his duties the Board of Directors/City Council/ Aldermen have an inherent obligation - by their oath of allegiance to the business /corporation/ city - to give a vote of NO CONFIDENCE to the CEO and have the CEO removed from his position by unequivocal mandate. If our Aldermen do not move forward to do this then maybe it is time for the Alderman to rethink what their obligation to the city is all about and exit stage left. And who is the BULLY, Mr. Mayor???
ReplyDelete