Courts: Land Grab to Cost West County Investors $1 Million

When a group of optimistic investors and developers, including some from West County, hustled property in 2006 to create a nightclub district in St. Louis, they may not have thought it would turn so pricey.

On Tuesday, an appeals court upheld a $1 million price tag on property seized under eminent domain from Opal Henderson. Henderson, her husband, and her sons had operated a junkyard there for nearly 50 years.

The eager group of investors and developers had ideas for nightlife along Broadway between Busch Stadium and Soulard—an area known years earlier as the Ice House District. The Great Recession hit in 2008 and may have been why the project stalled.

Regardless, $89,000 in interest has now accrued on the $1 million payout owed to the widowed Henderson.

"It's not a pretty place but it's a living for my children," Henderson said, according to a September 2006 St. Louis Post-Dispatch article by Jake Wagman.

The City of St. Louis, through a spokeswoman, claims the city does not owe on the verdict, but that the developers do.

Members of the group looking to jazz up the Ice District included Town and Country's Mayor Jonathan Dalton, an attorney. He claimed in his bio posted on the Lewis-Rice website that he was on the board of directors for the Ice House District Development District, LLC.

Other team members included Ballwin resident Gerald Mark Disper with his partner Daniel A. Schmitt and agent Cindy Schmitt of West County, and Creve Coeur resident Matt Librach who is part-owner of a building in the Ice District and owner of MBL Realty in Maryland Heights, according to a July 2006 St. Louis Business Journal article.

To recap, the group wanted to turn three blocks and maybe more into a strip of bars and nightclubs. The plans included taking over property owned by the Convent of the Scared Heart at 1119 - 1127 S. Broadway. This property was originally purchased in the early 1800s by Sr. Rose Phillipine Duchesne, who was later better known as Saint Duchesne.

When developers and the Convent couldn't reach an agreeable price, in a somewhat puzzling step the developers sued.

But the key piece of property for investors seemed to be Henderson's junkyard. They wanted it for a parking lot.

"There could be a bright future for this city and it doesn't include the continued operation of a junkyard," according to Dalton, in the September 2006 St. Louis Post-Dispatch article by Jake Wagman.

Disper refused to comment for the article.

The developers apparently convinced the St. Louis Land Authority to use eminent domain to get Henderson's junkyard property, and the property of the Convent of the Scared Heart.

City lawyers did not represent the Land Authority in the property fight, but attorneys from Lewis-Rice did, where Dalton is a partner.

Henderson apparently wasn't happy about the offer for her property. In 2010, Henderson's attorney Chet Pleban won a $1 million verdict. The Land Authority appealed. On Tuesday, November 29, the appeals court upheld the verdict.

If the case is subsequently appealed to Missouri's highest court, how long will that stall a payout? How will that help the Widow Henderson, who is already 82 years old?

This smells like a case of using big government to ride rough over the little guys—a widow and a saint. Are the rich getting richer here?

Pay Henderson the nearly $1.1 million.

John Hoffman is a former member of the Town & Country City Council and a guest contributer to Ballwin-Ellisville Patch.