The levee district protecting a massive St. Peters, Mo., business park in the Mississippi River flood plain has filed for chapter 9 bankruptcy protection, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported today. The levee district has been unable to find a replacement for one of the project's two primary developers — Lakeside 370 LLC, a firm related to Gundaker Commercial Group. Lakeside 370 LLC withdrew from the project in 2012 amid lingering effects of the 2008 recession. The levee district has failed since last fall to make all regular interest payments due the owners of $33.9 million in bonds sold to buy the four-mile levee built by the city and to maintain it, and its bonds are in default.
