Setbacks and hope in Metro East as America’s oldest Black town fights for its survival

BROOKLYN — The brick building at Madison and South 5th streets is still vacant, still boarded up, still tagged with faded gang graffiti.

For the second time in as many years, it’s been slated for a $2.5 million makeover, courtesy of the federal government, that would transform the building — once a grocery store and, later, a skating rink — into a community center for this historic town of 650 people across the Mississippi River from St. Louis.

And once again, the project has stalled, its future uncertain, amid partisan spending battles in Washington, D.C., and the looming threat of a government shutdown.

“This is a good example of an important community project being held hostage,” said U.S. Rep. Nikki Budzinski, a Democrat whose district covers Brooklyn and who included the community