DELLWOOD, Mo. — Out of town when the Ferguson unrest erupted August 2014, Kurt Barks watched demonstrators damage his West Florrisant business in neighboring Dellwood, Compete Auto Body & Repair, during national news coverage.
"They flipped a car over in front, tried to burn down the building, and kind of attacked everything they could put their hands on," Barks said.
In the weeks that followed, "Ferguson" became a national shorthand for the shooting of Michael and the unrest that followed. When it came time to rebuild, Dellwood was left out of the conversation.
"Dellwood almost left its identity through this," Barks said. "It was just assumed if you are on this side of the river — even five to ten miles away from here — you were still Ferguson. That stereotype that was created by people for financial gain or whatever it was, it really hurt the community."
Mayor since 2013, Reggie Jones agrees.
"Even though the damage happened overnight, it takes longer than that to recover," Mayor Reggie Jones said.
Jones said rebuilding was tough, but they did so — in part — with a $7M bond issue, money that allowed Dellwood to rebuild city hall, pave every street in the city and put up new signs. Jones said beautifying the city rebuilt property values.
"We told them, in order to bring the city back, you're going to have some skin in the game," Jones said.
One person who straddles the Dellwood-Ferguson city line is Cathy Jenkins. A Dellwood resident — "My street had actually gotten paved, and it looks great. It looks like a whole new street," she said proudly — she also saw the effects of 2014 on her Ferguson business.
"Before Mike Brown, I had three menus," she said. "I had a breakfast, lunch and dinner menu. I opened at 6, and I closed at 10 p.m. After Mike Brown, I was open at 11-6."
Like Barks, Jenkins was able to stick it out and now reports improvement on both sides of the Dellwood-Ferguson line. Just this year, she extended hours to bring back a dinner service.
"It's gotten better but it took time," Jenkins said. "It took time. It was like breathing through a straw underwater. It is nice to finally come up and take a deep breath, you know."
Barks said his auto body shop is still recovering five years later.
When it came time to replace the broken glass windows along the street-facing side of the front office, he didn't choose anything so fragile. Instead, there are solid walls.
"We spent about a $110,000 rebuilding and remodeling, but we lost about a $1.5M in revenue over the next 18 months," Barks said. "It put us in dire straights to where we almost went out of business."
They were able to recoup some costs with insurance, sending employees and customers to their other locations while they rebuilt.
Not every business, he acknowledges, had that option.
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