WEBSTER GROVES — Residents of this suburban community are pushing back against a planned psychiatric health center on the site of a K-12 academy that they believe would add traffic and make their neighborhoods less safe. The not-for-profit mental health provider, KVC Missouri, wants the property at 303 N. Gore Ave.
to add a hospital that would take in hundreds of children and keep them overnight. KVC runs a K-12 therapeutic day school there that provides a range of community-based services. The academy will still be running if they rezone the property.
More than 40 residents came to a recent city planning commission meeting to oppose the idea. Webster Groves resident Julie Cohen, whose home is two doors from the site, said she worries about safety. Cohen said police caught a juvenile from the academy in her yard while her kids were playing nearby.
The incident traumatized her kids, she said. "I tried my hardest to shield my kids from these terrible past stories my neighbors have," Cohen said. "I can't take back that incident of the kid being apprehended in my yard, but if they continue to feel this way, I am going to have to look to move elsewhere.
" A KVC Missouri spokesperson said the organization has no connection to the youth or incident described. Julie Cohen's husband, Jared Cohen, said he spoke with a Webster Groves police officer who said there was an incident in March between a teenage girl with developmental delays and a teacher that left the teacher with severe he.