Affordable housing developers are speaking out, saying that rules passed by the City of St. Louis one year ago are making it almost impossible for them to build new housing.
The culprit, Board Bill 155, was backed by labor unions and won unanimous passage at the Board of Aldermen last February. It requires that multi-family, commercial, and mixed-used projects worth $400,000 or more and receiving tax incentives from the city must meet certain requirements, including having 20 percent of work done by apprenticeship programs and 25 percent by women- and minority-owned contractors. All of that adds complexity and cost.
But the biggest problem for these developers is the requirements around prevailing wages. Affordable housing developers are used to paying the federal prevailing wage. “We all know that drill,” says Mike Duffy, executive vice president of Roanoke Construction. “We know how to comply.”…