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FEMA says LOMR is coming soon for St. Peters, marketing to get kick-start

By Jeannie Seibert

On May 27, St. Peters City Hall received a letter from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) announcing that it would issue a Letter of Map Revision (LOMR) for the Premier 370 Business Park project within 30 days.

The LOMR was requested by the city for the Premier 370 project. Before development could begin in earnest, the flood insurance rate map and flood insurance study report for St. Peters would first have to be updated to show that, because of the recently constructed 4-mile levee, the property is protected from flooding.

According to the FEMA letter, after the LOMR is issued “a 30-day comment period will be held to provide citizens and community officials with an opportunity to submit additional scientific data before the changes to the flood hazard information map become effective.”

The letter details other final steps that will be required to complete the process including the publication of legal notices and a 90-day appeals period.

The appeal period opens on the date of the second publication of the legal notice. During that time, affected property owners and other citizens in the community have the opportunity to submit technical and/or scientific data to support an appeal of the revision.

“This has been a long, complex road but the rewards to our city and our entire region are worth it,” said St. Peters Mayor Len Pagano.

“Very soon, we will see even more building trades workers at Lakeside 370/Premier 370 constructing facilities that will bring thousands of new, permanent jobs and millions of new tax dollars to our region as this more than $1 billion development is built out in the next 15 to 20 years,” Pagano said.

The significance of the LOMR to the developers of Premier 370, Duke Realty and Gundaker Commercial Group, is the ability to market the individual lots in the project as if they were located in any part of St. Peters, according to Board of Aldermen President Jerry Hollingsworth.

In an email, Hollingsworth explained, “We know we have lost one major tenant as we’ve awaited the LOMR, a tenant that would have been a 400,000-square-foot building employing around 500 fulltime new jobs.”

Earlier this spring Mayor Pagano said plans were scrapped for a Home Depot distribution center at the business park because a construction start date couldn’t be confirmed.

“We’re happy that FEMA has made their decision after carefully researching all the issues and all the technical components of the project,” Hollingsworth’s email said. “It’s now time to let the developers do what they do best and that’s fill the project.”

According to Mike Hejna, president and chief executive officer of Gundaker Commercial Group, “This notice from FEMA will kick-start our marketing that we already have in place.

“We’re ramping up very quickly,” Hejna said. “We’re very excited about that and it’s great news for the community.”

In a challenging economy, Hejna said the Premier 370 Business Park has been structured to be adaptable in order to meet the varying demands of potential users.

Gundaker is prepared to sell land out-right, build the required structure for the new business and either sell or lease it – whatever best meets the needs of the eventual tenants, Hejna said.

The upside to marketing Premier 370 is the project’s juxtaposition to convenient travel plus a solid employment market.

“The proximity of the project to I-70 and (I)-370 provides ease of access plus the close proximity to employment makes this a very exciting project,” Hejna said. “This is a challenging time in the real estate market but we’re passionate about this.”

Gundaker Commercial Group will be marketing some 3 million to 4 million square feet of the business park while Duke Realty will be responsible for filling out another 4 million to 6 million square feet over the next eight to 10 years.

The business park and the adjoining Lakeside 370 city park, and the protective levee, have been aggressively opposed by Great Rivers Habitat Alliance (GRHA).