What's up with John Steffen giving money to Republicans? What a sell out. Guess he has to reciprocate for all the goodies he's getting from the MO Housing Development Commission.

If I were Steffen I would too, his biz depends upon those tax credits. Most Developers will help out the Republicans to stay in good graces, as long as there are tax credits on the line.

Thanks to Steffen's cozying up to Blunt, he screwed nonprofits and other developers out of tax credits from the Housing Development Commission. He's using some of those credits for a phony project that involves building a new McDonald's. Public money for an unpopular project that is driving people out of the city (look at the for-sale signs in Keystone Place), but he bails out his failed project and gets lucrative tax credits.

How could he not finish Keystone Place in the first place? Maybe he can't figure out how to build anything that involves decent design and doesn't rely on subsidy. He sounds very Republican to me!

What large scale development in the city of St. Louis doesn't rely on some kind of subsidy? I would be interested in the building addresses.

I take you are not for the repealing of the Historic Tax Credit subsidy. Or maybe you are.

At Keyston, the City was the biggest risk taker.

Historic Tax Credit is not a subsidy.

What Steffen did to other loval developers is terrible, especially when it ended up involving that stupid McDonald's plan.

If he could actually build an attractive new building maybe people wouldn't be so mad....

Well, he has more problems than I thought................ My issue is that John Steffen seemed to be a VERY good friend of the Democrats - his companies donated over $185,000 to Democrats during the 2004 cycle and now he's abandoning everyone to kiss up to the Republicans. (Except ofcourse his hand puppet Mike McMillan - then again, maybe McMillan won't mind the hand).

Sarah Steelman sits on the MO Housing Development Commission and I understand that he's already secured support for a future project from the Board. Obviously, this fundraiser is payback for her support of his projects. I guess Jennifer Florida's campaign finance reports need to be checked out too. For that matter - probably all of the Aldermen's reports need to be gone over with a fine tooth comb.

My big problem with this, how are the small non-profit neighborhood housing corporations able to obtain funds to development when for profit corporations like Steffen's entities are able to dump tens of thousands of dollars into politians campaigns? Non-profits cannot compete. I think it's a serious conflict of interest for developers to be able to raise money for members of MHDC.