19 November 2019 / 6:45 PM / Missouri Foundation for Health

MEETING MINUTES

6:49 pm Meeting called to order (Vincent Chewning)

FPSE Neighborhood Business

6:49 – 6:50 pm Announcements (Community)

• Vince: A GM would like to share an update today regarding Drury on the west side of the neighborhood. We’ve also scheduled Drury to come speak at our December 17th meeting. They’ll talk about their plans and their engagement process and we encourage you to come and bring your questions. That same evening we’re planning a holiday party starting at 6pm.
• Vince: The Infrastructure Committee learned that the new playground equipment for Chouteau Park is sitting in a warehouse, waiting to be installed during warmer weather. 
• Audio recordings of meetings will be posted to the site, in addition to the typical typed minutes.
• The 17th Ward FDR club is hosting a meeting with Lacy Clay Thursday at 7:00pm at Chroma.

6:50 – 7:00 pm Crime and Safety Report (Ed Slade, SLMPD Liaison)

• A packet of safety tips were passed out.
• Office Slade gave a PSA to be aware of credit card skimmers at gas stations and inside of convenience marts. 
• There was an increase in burglaries and larsons from vehicles are still high. The burglaries run the gamut everything from the residential to rebagging properties. The trend seems to be going up. This will be addressed by the new Major assigned to the South Patrol, Sean Days, and the new Captain, Christie Marks. They took over Monday.
  • Captain Marks was a Lieutenant here in the second district for five or six years and she knows the ins and outs of the neighborhood. Slade notes that he’s sure she’d love to come to talk at a Neighborhood Association Meeting.
• Officer Slade is a fan of the Ring cameras that people have installed on their front doors. They have been helpful to catch porch pirates. Currently, the police department doesn’t have the ability to tie those cameras into police cameras, but that might change. 

7:00 – 7:01 pm Treasurer’s Report (Adelina Mart)

• In efforts to cut down on trees, five treasurer’s reports were printed out. They are also available online, so you can always have the most up to date version and histories, as well as the current member list.
• $40 of dues and donation came in last month, and paying out $20 from National Night out.
• Must be a dues paying member to vote this evening. You can donate by cash, check or Venmo. It’s $10 per person per year.

7:05 – 7:10 pm 2020 FPSNA Board Nominee Introductions

• Dan Doelling: Current Secretary. Has been in the neighborhood for over a year and a half now. Since taking the position, he has updated the website, increase the Neighborhood Association’s social presence with the distribution of the information within the neighborhood. Over the coming year, he hopes to continue working on increasing the communication, the transparency and the engagement within the neighborhood.  
• Vince Chewning: Been in the neighborhood for 2.5 years. Current President and running for president. We’ve had three overarching goals: engagement, transparency and communication. We try to make sure that we’re communicative every month, sometimes multiple times a month with everybody. We’ve tried to work with the organizations within the neighborhood to push some of the concerns, whether it’s Drury or making sure that communication is happening between Park Central Development and the Neighborhood Association. We think we’ve seen that communication increase. Other concerns included the neighborhoods who have been here for a long time and making sure that their voices are heard and that engagement is happening. We think we’ve made some strides in all of those things. He wants to continue on that foundation.
• Adelina Mart: Been in the neighborhood for two years now. Fortunate to work with the Board, plan these meetings, keep our books in order. Has the Association set up on Venmo and trying to move towards more electronic methods. 
• Don Devito: Running for treasurer. Been here since 1993 and has raised his whole family here. Knows every issue going on in the community.Says if you want to be an Association that as  voice, you need experience on the Board. He picked treasure because he really wants to work on home repair; something that gets somebody’s furnanced fix or a roof repaired without being code violated. Especially when we have $75M in development and thinks that overdevelopment will hurt the people around the them. That’s why he thought he’d help as treasurer, to raise funds.
• Dan Scott: Handed out a picture of current Board. Thanked the current Board for saving the Neighborhood Association from dissolving. He is running for Vice President and wants to keep up the good work for our neighborhood.
• Sarah Wilson Mangapora: Was the Neighborhood Association President the year prior to the current Board. Echoes the Dan’s statements that this Board has done a phenomenal job. thankful of the board. Is interested in  running for Vice President this year.
• Tom Charleville.: Is the current Member at Large. He has been the neighborhood since 1976. His family used to have a coffee company called Rose’s Coffee and then he owned Thomas Coffee, which he sold 11 years ago. He’s also on the board of the Backstoppers and active with the police and fire departments. Is really involved in this neighborhood and it’s very important to him. He can’t believe what the board has become now and says it’s really exciting. We’ve had events for Halloween and Easter parties that were very successful. Hoping for another Fall or Winter party for the kids and the families. He’s running Member at Large again.

7:10 – 7:13 pm 2020 FPSNA Board Vote

• Election ballots were handed out.
• Results: 
  • President: Vince Chewning (25 votes)
  • Vice President: Sarah Wilson Mangapora (20 votes)
  • Secretary: Dan Doelling (27 votes)
  • Treasurer: Adelina Mart (23 votes)
  • Member at Large: Tom Charleville (27 votes)
• New board will be instituted in January.

7:13: 7:15 pm Call for hospitality members (Zen)

• The hospitality organizes events like the Halloween Carnival, the Ice Cream Social, Happy Hours and the like.
• Call for folks on to join the hospitality team
  • Could use volunteer time to help put things together. 

7:15- 7:17 pm: Proposed cost of member dues (Vince Chewning)

• • Adelina: We wanted to bring up for discussion a proposed change in the data that we currently have, which is $10 a year per person
  • In service for mixed income neighbors and because $10 could be a barrier, the Neighborhood Association is proposing a sliding scale for dues: a $10 suggested donation with a minimum of $1, that would be instituted in the coming calendar year.
  • You can continue to pay dues at anytime.
  • General Member: Thinks it’s a great idea for bringing new people in.
  • Dan Scott proposes that the Board add more visibility for donations at meetings to raise revenue to do more events. 

7:17 – 7:46 pm: FPSNA Board “Code-of-Conduct” Discussion (Community)

• Vince: The Board wanted to make sure that we had something in place that keeps the Board accountable. There are other items in the bylaws, but we wanted to call this out very explicitly to try to bring this as a model for ideally what a neighborhood organization look like and what accountability and what things they should do or shouldn’t do as a Board. We want to make sure that general members have confidence that the Board is working for your best interests. We Board will vote to add this as an amendment. We want to open it up for discussion if anybody has any concerns or questions. The next part of this process will be the Board takes the feedback, addresses changes will then vote to add this as an amendment. 
• GM: How will you go about disclosing being a member of other groups?
  • Vince: Members would make sure that’s clear upfront so people have a frame of reference of the member’s participation in different organizations if it’s relevant to the business at hand.
• It was asked if Board Member’s sits on any other board or organization, how would that be disclosed – at every meeting?
  • GM: It might be appropriate when there is money involved. 
  • Adlina: Wwe do have that in our bylaws the ability for both residents and businesses to become part of the neighborhood association. If a business wants to be part of the neighborhood association, they give $10 in dues, and then they designate a person that is representative of that organization. We do delineate and clarify that some people may be part of our neighborhood association that are here representing the business and not necessarily a resident.
    • In Sarah’s case, she’s representing herself as a resident and not a representative of Tarleton.
  • GM: Suggests that if a business has business in front of the Neighborhood Association that that would be the time the person would identify themselves as having conflict and recusing themselves from that business.
  • GM: Can the Board add their any of their other neighborhood organizational position to the website?
    • Vince: The Board will discuss and vote upon this.
• GM: On point 6: Any examples that come to mind?
  • Vince: We looked at other organizations and felt like this was in the interest of transparency, making sure there’s faith and trust in how we’re representing the neighborhood, but there isn’t a current example relating to this point that we can provide.
  • Adelina: As a Neighborhood Association, we try to be neutral on those things and just provide a forum. And so I don’t assume that it will come out very often, that is, that we’ll take a position or anything like that. But even I think in providing a forum for some issues, it might be better that somebody else may be on the board leads a discussion. So if Vince has a conflict, maybe he can recuse himself even from leading that discussion or introducing a speakers. It sets a best practice for transparency.
• GM: On point number 8, how do you define staff?
  • Vince we do not have staff but there are neighborhood organizations that do. 
• GM: Proposed the Board adds “guests” and “invited speakers” to point number 8.
• GM wonders if point number 8 is trying to make all five members of the Board really just hospitality people to where you don’t have a show in opinion.
  • Vince: No. Our purpose is to have a neutral forum – a place where information can be discussed, engaging the community, fostering community. So these don’t detract from that. You can do those things and they aren’t exclusive.
• GM: Point number 8 turns the Board into pretty weak. The concern is around the interpretation of the phrase “Speak with one voice,” 
  • The Board will rewrite point number 8 to better reflect its intention: That once the Board makes a majority decision, that the decision is the direction moves going forward and is carried about throughout all interactions… that the speak with continuity and consistency. 
• GM: What’s the procedure if somebody breaches the code of conduct.
  • Vince: If a member does not fulfill duties… GM: What you have is mob rule. The general body meeting in which removal from office will be discussed and voted upon at least one month prior to the meeting. At that meeting, the board may present statements in an effort to retain the position. Then it’s voted upon by the general membership.
• Vince on point number 8: There’s the public, at the meeting voice, and then there is a private voice. And there’s the concern that this means that the board can’t speak privately about their feelings on it?  I think that’ what board talked about was “does this mean I can’t have my own personal opinion?” The answers was that we want to have a meeting that the Board is not arguing with each other about the decision that was made that we’re moving forward and keeping it productive.
• GM: Suggesting that we consider removing the phrase “Speak with one voice” from the beginning of point 8. 
• If language of the Code of Conduct is revised, the Board will send out updated copy and discussions will take place in January 2020, which after the Board of 2020 will vote on approving it.

Special Presentations and Discussion

7:40 – 7:50 pm FPSNA Member Drury Development Update (M. Browning)

Hello,

My name is Michael Browning. I am a part of a group of neighborhood residents who have been advocating for neighborhood engagement in regards to Drury Corporation and its properties on the northwest side of FPSE.   As many of you are aware, we have been working since March to gain more transparency about what is being planned for those properties. 

Since I last gave an update, a couple of things have happened:

• In August, Washington University/WUMCRC pulled the RFQ for the MODOT land, and informed all bidders that they will not be selling the land at this time. They additionally conveyed that if in the future they do re-issue the RFQ, any future proposal would require neighborhood support.
• Shortly afterwards, Drury requested to meet with our group and members of the Development Committee.   
• Last Tuesday night, we met with Tom Milford, the Director of Development for Drury Corporation, Tim Breihan from H3 (consultants of the neighborhood’s Form Based Code), who is consulting for Drury, and Mark Rubin from Koman Group.
• What we learned.
• • While they don’t have specific plans at this time they were firm about two things:

• • • They want to build a hotel – this would involve the land currently owned by WashU.  

• • • In order to build a hotel, they would need to build an access road along Kingshighway; this would most likely result in a realignment and opening of Oakland Ave to Kingshighway  

• • • A side consideration: the plan may include additional housing in the form of apartments, which is where Koman might come in, but that is to be determined.  This was included because of the RFQ considerations.

• • Currently, they do not have a Plan B. They don’t know what would be next if they cannot build the hotel and access road.

• What happens next?
• • During the meeting, we urged Drury to engage with the whole neighborhood: 

• • • See if there is support for their hotel and access road.   

• • • If there is enough support for that, we argued that they should participate in a longer, more involved input process that would be similar to the process used to design the Form-Based Code.

• • Drury agreed to more neighborhood engagement. That first meeting will occur December 17th.  

• • • As I understand it, the Drury’s will present a basic idea of what they want to do, and seek neighborhood support for it.  If there is support to go forward, they will outline what they see as a fair process to receive neighborhood input.  

• • This will be your chance to hear from the Drury’s themselves, and to tell them what you think.  This will also be your chance to ask them questions. Feel free to ask about their properties, the state they have kept them in for the past decade, and what they plan to do with them if they don’t build their hotel.

In addition, if you haven’t already, think about what you would like to see in an engagement process.  This is an extraordinary opportunity to have a voice in how development is done in FPSE. But that voice is only yours if you claim it.  This is arguably the most visible corner of our neighborhood to those who live outside it. We strongly encourage you to come out on December 17th to make your voice heard.   

Questions?

• GM: What is Drury’s motivation to engage with the community?
  • • Michael: Our group has been pretty effective at engaging WashU and helping them understanding the damage Drury has done in the neighborhood. 
    • GM: They wouldn’t build if they didn’t have the WashU land.
• GM: This is something that can really set a precedent. We have a really unique opportunity before a vote is taken to make our voices heard, and we need to take advantage of that because the future of our neighborhood depends on the projects like and and what we say about them. Hopes everybody realizes how powerful this is and encourages everybody to be here because it can impact everybody one way or another.
• It was requested to share Micheal’s June presentation regarding the Kingshighway/Drury developments. That can be read here: https://www.forestparksoutheast.com/june-2019-minutes/ 
• GM: Has the group meeting with the Drury’s already come up with questions? 
  • Michael: We are trying to stay on the side for arguing for neighborhood engagement. 
  • Vince: When he was at the meeting, Drury asked what we wanted to see, but the group was adamant on not providing that feedback because that group is not representative of the entire neighborhood. We wanted to make sure we get them in front of the neighborhood and to show us your engagement process and solicit the neighborhood for their feedback on it.
• GM: Is Koman coming to this meeting?
  • Vince: We’ve requested that they bring any potential residential partner they’re working with to this meeting.

8:00 PM Adjournment (Vincent Chewning)

You can listen to the recording of this month’s meeting on Anchor and wherever you listen to your podcasts.

You can download this month’s meeting minutes below.