Aggregator

Extreme Heat Belt (EHB) and Urban Heat Island(UHI) It doesn’t seem fair that the Midwest should be hit hardest by the heat of climate change, but that is apparently what is shaping up to happen.  Last year the First Street Foundation released its 6th National Climate Risk Assessment.  Among the dire predictions is an increase […]

The post Reforesting STL in the Era of Climate Change appeared first on NextSTL.

Green Door Art Gallery is pleased to partner with Bobby Lessentine, Financial Advisor, Edward Jones, in presenting Inspiration and Expression, The Art of MaryJo Clark.   The exhibit includes collage,

The post Inspiration and Expression: The Art of MaryJo Clark appeared first on Explore St. Louis.

Another Seattle sports team has announced a Pearl Jam Night. The OL Reign of the National Women's Soccer League will celebrate the grunge icons during their October 6 game against D.C.'s Washington Spirit. In addition…

Source

A 30-year-old pregnant woman was pronounced dead at the scene.

St. Louis' favorite cheeky gift shop is getting into the bar business. Golden Gems, the smart and feminist retailer that first opened its doors in 2018, announced its plans on Instagram last night. Owners Susan Logsdon and Amanda Helman indicated that it would be just two doors down from their shop on Locust, in Midtown St. Louis, and would be called Hidden Gem.

Ballot measures seeking to fund local libraries had mixed results Tuesday, with Cole County voters striking down a 15-cent tax increase and Taney County residents narrowly approving an 18-cent levy to create a public library. The votes come at a precarious time for Missouri’s libraries, as they have increasingly been pulled into the political scrum […]

The post Push for tax hikes to fund public libraries face mixed results this year in Missouri appeared first on Missouri Independent.

by Robin Urevich, Capital & Main, and Gabriel Sandoval, ProPublica

This article was produced for ProPublica’s Local Reporting Network in partnership with Capital & Main. Sign up for Dispatches to get stories like this one as soon as they are published.

The Los Angeles Housing Department has sent warning letters to the owners of 17 buildings meant for low-cost housing, demanding that they stop renting rooms to tourists in violation of city law.

The action follows a Capital & Main and ProPublica investigation that found 21 buildings, known as residential hotels, had advertised short-term rentals on travel websites despite a 2008 ordinance aimed at preserving residential hotels for affordable housing. Residential hotels mostly consist of basic single rooms and are often the only housing that many low-income, elderly and disabled people can afford.

The Los Angeles City Council will also soon consider a motion, filed last week, to require the Housing Department to report on its enforcement of the residential hotel law. The motion, in response to Capital & Main and ProPublica’s reporting, raises the possibility of creating a right for individuals to sue landlords who convert such housing without the city’s permission.

“I know very dramatically the impact of not having that enforced because that means more houses, more low-income units, that we as a city have to figure out how to build,” City Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who presented the motion, said in an interview. “It means more people on the street and more services and more costs and more human suffering.”

The motion, which was seconded by City Councilmembers Monica Rodriguez and John Lee, notes that as the city contends with rising construction costs for affordable housing and a shortage of landlords who will accept emergency or long-term housing vouchers, “the loss of residential hotel rooms to tourist units may be exacerbating our homelessness crisis.”

Much of the information that the councilmembers requested is already supposed to be reported annually by the Housing Department under the terms of the residential hotel law. But in the 15 years since the ordinance was passed, the Housing Department hasn’t filed the reports, according to agency officials and the city clerk’s office.

In issuing the notices to comply last month, the Housing Department cited violations of both the residential hotel law and the city’s home-sharing ordinance, which is meant to crack down on illegal rentals on sites like Airbnb. The department used both laws “to aggressively pursue compliance,” Housing Department spokesperson Sharon Sandow said in an email.

Among the hotels cited were three that were highlighted in our initial story: the American Hotel in the Arts District, and the H Hotel and Hometel Suites, both in Koreatown.

The American’s owner, Mark Verge, said he’s hired an attorney and will discuss the matter with the Housing Department. “Our argument is we are a hotel,” said Verge, who previously said he had been unaware of the American’s residential designation. But he added, “Whatever they come up with will be fine.”

Becky Hong, the Hometel’s general manager, said in an email that the hotel has submitted documents to the city in response to the notices. Neither the H Hotel’s owner nor its manager responded to emails or a call for comment. Previously, the H’s manager said the hotel hasn’t accepted long-term residents since 2019 and has asked the city to remove its residential designation.

All three hotels continue advertising rooms to tourists on their websites.

The citations and the City Council motion are the latest fallout from Capital & Main and ProPublica’s reporting. In July, Mayor Karen Bass asked the Housing Department to investigate the 21 residential hotels in our story and report back on how to improve enforcement efforts.

Blumenfield’s motion also requests that housing officials recommend ways to strengthen the ordinance and asks the department to identify potential funding sources and additional resources needed to enforce it.

The Housing Department has pointed to short staffing as one reason it has struggled to enforce the residential hotel law. But Blumenfield, who chairs the council’s budget committee, said the agency hasn’t requested additional funding for enforcement.

“Nobody’s ever come to me and said, ‘We don’t have the money to enforce our residential hotel conversion’” law, he said. “Now that I’m aware of it, I’m going to do what I can to make sure that it does get enforced.”

Blumenfield’s motion has been referred to the council’s Planning and Land Use Management Committee. If approved, it will go to the full City Council for a vote.

Variously known as Tipton Electric Company, Tipton Appliances, Tipton Centers Inc., and Tipton Supercenters, Tipton was a St. Louis-based retail store specializing in home appliances and electronics. It had aspirations of going national the way Best Buy and Circuit City

The post What happened to Tipton Appliances appeared first on The Silicon Underground.

A St. Louis judge issued an administrative order for 16 sheriff's deputies to immediately stand down from their jobs, stating that they were not hired following standard procedures. Presiding Judge Elizabeth Hogan issued an order Wednesday naming 16 deputies who she said were hired without following requirements of state law, including completing applications and background checks and submitting references to the 22nd Circuit Court's Personnel Committee for review and interviews. The order said…

If you are an artist who makes "kindie rock" — that trendy portmanteau for "kid" plus "indie" — you need to have your finger on a child-sized pulse. For Mark Pagano, known to young music lovers across the St. Louis region as the kindie rock singer-songwriter Marko Polo, that part comes naturally. "I spend a lot of time with kids," he says — including his two sons, who begin fourth grade and kindergarten this month, and the students he works with as a teaching artist in the St. Louis Public Schools.

Hundreds showed up for the opening day of the Illinois State Fair on Thursday, but some were surprised to find that a lot of the rides were closed. The Illinois Department of Labor shared that due to the heavy rain on Wednesday, they weren't able to finish inspecting the rides.

We’ve documented in detail how the series of mergers (AT&T—>Time Warner—>Discovery) that created the Warner Brothers Discovery entertainment empire may just be one of the most destructive, pointless, and incompetently managed “business” transactions in modern media history. Since its beginning in 2016, the absurd saga has generated hundreds of billions in debt, saw more than 50,000 […]

The Mid-America Carpenters Union's Apprenticeship Program is holding its first graduation in over 20 years Friday.

Missouri’s public universities told state lawmakers Thursday that a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling ending affirmative action won’t affect their undergraduate admissions. The June 29 ruling decreed that colleges can’t consider race when deciding if to admit a student. Missouri’s Joint Committee on Education, led by last year’s chair Rep. Doug Richey, R-Excelsior Springs, held a discussion of this change and invited the state’s public universities to comment. Richey, who is running…

The 4th annual 'Tunnel to Towers Holes Fore Heroes' Golf Classic tees off Friday in Waterloo, Illinois.