Gravois Park Neighbors to St. Alexius Owners: Shape Up, or Else

The neighborhood association says the vacant south St. Louis hospital has become a nuisance

May 8, 2024 at 6:00 am
St. Alexius Hospital closed in August of 2023. Neighbors say it's become a nuisance.
St. Alexius Hospital closed in August of 2023. Neighbors say it's become a nuisance. PHOTO BY DOYLE MURPHY

A group of neighbors are threatening legal action against the out-of-state owners of the old St. Alexius hospital campus in south St. Louis if the problems plaguing the property aren’t taken care of in 60 days.

The letter from the neighbors accuses property owners Jeffrey Ahlholm and Lawrence Feigen of “willfully and maliciously” abandoning the buildings of the Jefferson campus of the shuttered hospital near Cherokee Street and Jefferson Avenue. The letter says the two men left a significant amount of valuable machinery and medical equipment on the premises, turning the eleven buildings into a haven for squatters and burglars. 

The RFT reported in September that the former hospital grounds saw 80 calls to police in the first nine months of last year alone. The buildings on the property total approximately 400,000 square feet of commercial space. 

"It's the copper," Ahlholm told the RFT last year. "Literally they will pass over taking other stuff that might even have greater value. But [copper] is what they know."

The neighborhood group of Gravois Park and Marine Villa residents say the real culprits are Ahlholm and Feigen. 

Their letter blames the owners for exacerbating problems on the grounds by allowing doors to go unsecured, as well as a bridge connecting two of the bulidings. The buildings themselves are marked by graffiti and shattered windows. Last July 4, a group of kids got into the building, went up onto the roof and set off fireworks there. 

The properties are a nuisance, the letter says, increasing crime in the area and weighing down the value of adjacent properties.

An attorney representing the building owners attended a neighborhood meeting last month and spoke of the building owners' good intentions, however, the letter says that their words ring hollow and that no corrective action has been taken at the site since. 

“As a whole, the Property looks like a post-apocalyptic movie set, more akin to an episode of The Walking Dead than a recently functional hospital,” says attorney Tara Rocque with the Washington University School of Law Interdisciplinary Environmental Clinic. Rocque drafted the letter on behalf of the Gravois Park Block Link Neighborhood Association. 

As rough as the buildings look from the outside, the letter paints a picture of what’s inside as even worse. “Slides of human tissue, images of disfigured infants and a preserved fetal piglet are strewn amidst heaps of abandoned medical equipment and splattered blood,” the letter states. 

Finally, the letter outlines 14 different ways the property is in violation of city ordinances, including its extended vacancy endangering public welfare. 

The letter is only the most recent example of neighbors banding together to take action against nuisance properties when the city can’t, or won’t. Last month, the neighborhood association in Downtown West won a major victory in shutting down the gas station known as the Murder Shell, using only civil litigation. That victory showed the power of residents when they’ve banded together and are backed by creative, and energetic, lawyers.

The Gravois Park association’s letter says that if the issues at St. Alexius aren’t abated by July 8, the neighbors will take legal action. 

“You should understand that the remedies in a civil legal action are much broader than those established for a code enforcement action and include injunctive relief, monetary damages, attorneys’ fees, and court costs,” it says.

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