Last Updated 8:17 pm January 30, 2025
It’s not that a $85.55 Billion company like Anheuser-Busch needs corporate welfare. It just wants it.
For the third time in six years, I’m not digging back further, the Soulard based brewery since 1852, is asking for favors from the St. Louis City Board of Alders.
They are inclined to do so because they like the company’s lobbyists, the co-dependent unions , the campaign money. Good v. Bad public policy never enters the picture.
Board Bill 161, by Alder Cara Spencer, who is running for Mayor, gives the company
💰$41 Million in industrial revenue bonds for equipment purchase
💰10 years of 50% personal property tax abatement on the equipment and other
personal property
Per the Community Benefits Scorecard by St. Louis Development Corporation, the City’s corporate welfare umbrella agency, the brewery is located “in an area of high need and opportunity.” Soulard and adjacent Benton Park are affluent neighborhoods.
The company doesn’t need the help. It just wants it and feckless Alders will likely vote to give it to them, just like they always do for corporate welfare proposals.
The latest corporate welfare for the company will likely have its first vote at Board of Alders, the Perfection vote, on Friday, January 31st. Contact Board President Megan Green and your Alder and urge them to vote No on Board Bill 161.
The last meeting of the Board before Election break is currently February 7th.
Prior to the July 2008 InBev takeover of Anheuser-Busch, the brewery had 5,000 employees in the St. Louis area. By 2010, InBev had laid off thousands. A next door neighbor in Soulard was one of them. He was a third-generation brewery employee. Like his father and grandfather, he walked to work. Unlike them, he graduated from college and went to work for the brewery in a white-collar job. Our neighbor ended up moving to St. Charles for work.
In March 2019, Alders rewarded Anheuser-Busch with
💰$75 Million in industrial revenue bonds for equipment
💰 Two 5 years of 75%personal property tax abatement
The votes on Board Bill 177 are missing from the Board of Alders Votes on 2018-2019 bills. Sponsor of the bill was Alder Dan Guenther. He now works as Legislative Assistant to Alder Cara Spencer, candidate for Mayor.
In December 2019, Alders gave the company
💰$100 Million in industrial revenue bonds for, mostly, equipment purchase but also some real estate improvements
💰5 years of 50% real property tax abatement
💰5 years of 75% personal property tax abatement
💰Sales and Use Tax exemption on the purchase of construction materials
Sponsor of that bill was, again, Alder Guenther, who now works for Alder Spencer. The vote on Board Bill 155 was 22 Aye, 0 No, 5 Absent, 2 did not vote.
Alders still on the Board who voted for this 2019 corporate welfare: now Board President Megan Green, Pam Boyd, Brett Narayan, Cara Spencer, Tom Oldenburg, Joe Vollmer, Sharon Tyus.
Aside from Spencer running for higher office, none of these Alders is on the March or April ballot because it’s an odd numbered ward election and they represent even numbered wards or, in the case of Vollmer, not seeking re-election.
Aye votes no longer Alders but now working at the Board, in addition to Guenther: Marlene Davis, now Legislative Assistant to Alder Laura Keyes, and Christine Ingrassia, now Director of Operations for Board President Green.
Anheuser-Busch is located in Soulard but not a part of the neighborhood’s Special Business District (property tax funding private police and surveillance cameras) or Community Improvement District (sales tax for traffic calming, dog poo bags, trash pick-up…). Soulard CID recently sought inclusion of the brewery during its expansion petition drive but the brewery declined.
The company received a liquor license from the City for its Biergarten and now competes with Soulard and Benton Park bars and restaurants for customers. It contributes to neighborhood litter and safety issues but does not contribute to the neighborhood’s tax districts charged with providing additional services for such concerns.
In August 2024, Anheuser-Busch requested a $262,000 Missouri Sales Tax Refund.
In 2012, the City of Arnold and Jefferson County gave 20 years property tax abatement to Anheuser-Busch’s Metal Container Corp over objections by the local school district dependent on property taxes.
Anheuser-Busch doesn’t like paying taxes. But taxes pay for public services and it’s not the responsibility of everyone else to pick up the tab for public services used by a $85.55 Billion company
Tell Alders to make Anheuser-Busch pay their share.
Below: text of Gerry “Sunshine Gerry” Connolly’s letter to St. Louis City Board of Estimate and Apportionment (Mayor Tishaura Jones, Comptroller Darelene Green, Board President Megan Green) asking them to vote No on Board Bill 161. The Board of E&A voted 3-0 to support the corporate welfare.
Honorable Members of the Board of Estimate and Apportionment,
Request to vote NO on Board Bill 161. 1/29/25 Board of E and A meeting (agenda Item 2; bonds for Anheuser-Busch project)
Please vote no on Board Bill no. 161. The proposed incentive (Net Present Value = $1.19 Million fails the “but for” test. Anheuser-Busch simply doesn’t require the incentive to implement its project. At the HUDZ hearing on BB 161, Anheuser-Busch’s lobbyist constructed a flimsy narrative that A-B could select an existing A-B facility in another city for the project.
The procedure defined in Ordinance no. 71620 for SLPS to review the project was not properly documented in SLDC’s Developer Proposal Report (DPR) contained in BB 161. The DPR was not available to the public before the HUDZ Public Hearing; members of the HUDZ committee received the DPR via email from SLDC 13 minutes before the hearing started. The BOA has not been able to conduct robust due-diligence on BB 161.
A study cited by the Post-Dispatch estimated that a 30 second ad in the Superbowl costs $7M. The value of the tax break in BB 161 equates to 5 seconds of advertising time at the Superbowl.
Who loses out if BB 161 is approved? St. Louis Public Schools, the City of St. Louis (General Revenue) and multiple taxing districts.
Anheuser-Busch should pay its fair share in taxes, just like the majority of St. Louis residents and businesses.
I urge you to vote no on BB 161.
Thanks for your consideration.
Gerry Connolly
The Great State of St. Louis 