A Marathon Weekend | St. Louis Aims for the Brain with $160M Grant Submission | St. Louis a Vanguard for New Sickle Cell Treatment
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A Marathon Weekend
Amid a weekend of successful sporting events, the Greater St. Louis Marathon took center stage last Saturday, showing off the streets of St. Louis to 20,000 runners from all over the country. The weekend marked the 25th anniversary of Go! St. Louis, the nonprofit organization that presents fitness events throughout the region. And while thousands of people ran the race, it was a local man from Eureka, Missouri, who won the marathon.
The Bottom Line: From race weekend to college hockey, sports are expected to make a $40 million economic impact to the region this spring. Every safe and successful event like the Greater St. Louis Marathon builds on St. Louis’ reputation as a vibrant place to visit, live, and work.
St. Louis Hopes to Generate Brain Power with $160M Grant Submission
A regional collaborative effort hopes to secure significant funding that will help elevate St. Louis as a national hub for neuroscience research. Led by innovation hub BioSTL and neuroscience coalition Neuro360, a proposal for a $160 million National Science Foundation grant is intended to boost regional innovation.
"This competition is not institution against institution; it's about regions versus regions," said Donn Rubin, President and CEO of BioSTL. "It's about our ecosystem (and uniting) as a community. So, having you all together here, and having this vast representation of partners is really important, and it's an important message that we can send to the NSF."
The Bottom Line: In 2022, the St. Louis region succeeded in winning a $25 million, highly competitive federal Build Back Better Regional Challenge grant, thanks to a collaborative proposal that incorporated input from across the bi-state St. Louis metro. This effort to win the NSF grant replicates that collaborative success. When we all work together, we all move farther.
St. Louis Children's Hospital a Vanguard for New Sickle Cell Therapy
A new gene therapy to treat sickle cell disease has the potential to cure patients, and St. Louis Children’s Hospital is the first in the region—and one of the first in the nation—to offer it. The monthslong therapy program offers an alternative to other treatments, which only ease symptoms. This new therapy, approved by the FDA in 2023, is hoped to help patients not just survive, but thrive.
The Bottom Line: St. Louis is at the forefront of this lifechanging medical therapy, and will help set a global standard in treatment for sickle cell disease, which affects around 100,000 people in the U.S. alone.
The City of St. Charles broke ground last week on an $85 million City Centre Complex that will connect the north and south parts of town. Once complete, the complex will include a historical society, a senior center, and an arts and cultural center with restaurant incubators. Also last week in St. Charles County, Mercy—an executive-level GSL investor—broke ground on a $650 million, 483,000-square-foot hospital campus in Wentzville.
In the City of St. Louis, the $48 million second phase of the Delmar Divine will add 81 apartments and 14,666 square feet of commercial space to the successful mixed-use development. The project, which reimagines the former St. Luke’s hospital into a vibrant community center, connects the neighborhoods north and south of Delmar.
A delegation from GSL traveled to Washington, Missouri, in Franklin County for a GSL Chamber of Commerce Day to engage businesses, leaders, and policymakers in conversations about regional growth. Local small business owners from WEG Transformers,G H Tool & Die, Co., and Empac Group, Inc. joined the Washington Area Chamber of Commerce for the conversation.More.
After a corporate career that took her across the globe, Monica Lee returned home to open Spoonful Desserts, which offers up Korean desserts, drinks, and a palpable sense of community in Creve Coeur, MIssouri, and Edwardsville, Illinois.
