Author Archive

Coeur Loyal, LLC is poised to close  next week on the purchase of the building on the site in Ladue where the historic Busch’s Grove once stood.  Restaurateurs Carmello and Frank Gabriele, owners of Il Bel Lago in Creve Coeur, will create a classic restaurant with a coal-fired pizza oven neighboring a Clarkson Jewelers facility.  Other tenants are being sought. Hensley Construction, Inc. will transform the structure into the mixed-use, 13,000 square-foot property.  The Gabrieles are managing partners of Coeur Loyal, LLC.  The cost for conversion of the property is about $4.5 million. A Nov. 1 opening is planned. The historic Busch’s Grove opened in 1897.

Former St. Louis Planning & Zoning chairman Doug Morgan is being quoted online (www.TakingCareOfFolks.com) using his former title as chairman of the Missouri Employers Mutual (MEM) insurance endorsing the business consulting services of former MEM president and CEO Dennis Smith. Morgan proclaims, “His (Dennis Smith’s) leadership was invaluable in helping the board with strategic and long-range planning necessary to ensure a sound financial footing.”  Morgan and Smith were side-by-side at MEM for more than a dozen years, until Smith’s exit in 2009 and Morgan’s resignation this year.

Glenridge Elementary School kindergarten teacher Susan Carter has landed a berth as one of the top 12 educators as a first-place winner in the PBS Teachers Innovation Awards.

Cool Down St. Louis, the regional energy assistance and public education charity, which is the summer program of Heat-Up St. Louis, Inc., has received $300,000 in grants to help seniors and the disabled purchase air conditioners or help pay utility bills of those qualified in low-income households via AmerenUE.  Monies are also provided by the Missouri Foundation for Health, a philanthopic organization whose vision is to improve the health of people in the communities it serves. To that end, Dr. James Kimmey, president and CEO of the Foundation for Health, was presented the Community Leadership Award by Dr. Janes Knight and St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay. Others chipping in big bucks have been: the Utility Tax Fund for the City of St. Louis; Hardee’s and Vatterott College.

LEFT TO RIGHT DR. JAMES KNIGHT; DR. JAMES KIMMEY MAYOR FRANCIS SLAY

Former mass communications prof at SIU-E Jack Shaheen is currently co-hosting with Robert Osborne TCM’s “Race and Hollywood Arab Images,” a film series each Tuesday and Thursday this month. Shaheen is the author of 300-plus publications and author of five books of which his most recent is “Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People.” An Oxford research scholar and onetime CBS news consultant on Middle East affairs, Shaheen has also worked with producer Jeffrey Katzenberg on the animated movie, “The Prince of Egypt.”

Co-founder of Balaban’s (now Herbie’s Vintage ’72) with her late husband Herb, Adalaide Cash Balaban, who’s now calling the Second City her home, sez, “I have a button from the Blue Max CC – the gay motorcycle club.”

A settlement of $92 million has been reached with JP Morgan Chase for an anti-competitive scheme that “defrauded municipalities and not-for-profit agencies between 2001-2005.”  Koster said in a release that $65 million will go for restitution to affected state agencies, municipalities, school districts and not-for-profit entities nationwide, that entered into municipal derivative contracts.

The burning question is would you pay $300 a ticket for the second row in the Fox orchestra pit to hear an 84 year-old singer?  If so, that’s what the tariff will be to hear Tony Bennett sing “I Lost My Heart in San Cholesterol on Nov. 16. Would you open a restaurant on nutty streets as Walnut and Chestnut? Would you buy a condo on Forest Park Parkway near the sprawling Barnes-Jewish campus and drive to Illinois to work each day over a bridge which tolls for thee – a few bucks a week in tolls? Would you enjoy hearing Michael Feinstein accompanied by the St. Louis Symphony?  Well, that will happen come May 13 at Powell Hall. Then, there’s conservative state Sen. Jane Cunningham, who has launched a campaign for re-election in 2012. . .State Treasurer Clint Zweifel has awarded $200 million in low interest loans during the first half of 2011. . .And, Jeff Smith has been dubbed assistant prof of politics and advocacy at the New School of Management and Urban Policy in New York.