The St. Louis County Port Authority today will begin doling out $4 million received from the River City Casino, with most of the money going to organizations in Lemay.

But the man who represents that area on the County Council is displeased with the way the money is being distributed.

Steve Stenger, D-Affton, said Tuesday that the Mideast Area Agency on Aging, one of eight nonprofit groups to apply for grants and the only one turned down, should have been first in line to get money.

"This is a group whose major purpose is feeding and helping seniors who can't care for themselves," Stenger said. "And these grants left these elderly people completely out of the picture."

As part of its lease agreement with St. Louis County, River City's parent company, Pinnacle Entertainment, pays $4 million a year to the Port Authority. For the first five years, three-fourths of that will fund projects — both for-profit and nonprofit — in Lemay. The other $1 million will fund projects elsewhere in the county.

The MEAAA had requested $270,000 for a new senior center in the area.

Port Authority board member Greg Hayden said the center was turned down because it had not identified a location for the new center.

"We didn't want to give them that grant if we weren't going to be sure they'd stay in Lemay," Hayden said.

The board told the same thing to Patricia Hoeft, MEAAA's director of senior centers.

Hoeft said Wednesday: "We've been serving seniors in Lemay for 23 years, and it was pretty distressing to hear that the Port Authority thinks we might abandon these people. The fact is, we wanted the money so we could expand our services and improve our facility to help more people."

Among the big winners to be announced today are the Lemay Baseball Association and the Missouri Civil War Museum.

The baseball association had asked for $109,000 to repave the parking lots at Heine Meine baseball field. It got much more. The seven members of the Port Authority board voted to give the association $326,408.

"We are absolutely thrilled," said Marge Mesplay, who directs concessions at the field. "We were just hoping for the $109,000."

Hayden, who owns Luxemberg Realty, said the board voted to give the group the extra money after a county committee visited the field.

"They identified some other needs there," he said, citing fencing and bleachers.

The field last got an upgrade in 2003, when the St. Louis Cardinals charity, Cardinals Care, funded new lighting and a digital scoreboard.

Stenger said upgrades to the baseball association should not have taken priority over the senior center.

"I'm all for maintaining and supporting Heine Meine, and I understand that the Lemay Baseball Association is a fixture, but feeding seniors has to come first," he said.

The Missouri Civil War Museum said in April that it needed $250,000 to finish work on the building to open by April 12, 2011, the 150th anniversary of firing upon Fort Sumter at Charleston, S.C., that started the Civil War.

The group applied for, and got, $500,000 in Port Authority grants for the work.

"This grant will get the building in perfect, habitable condition and let us set up the exhibits," Mark Trout, the museum's chairman, said Wednesday.

The organization already owns artifacts for display. It already has raised and spent more than $1 million since 2002 to restore the building, which was built in 1905 as the gymnasium for soldiers at Jefferson Barracks.

Stenger said he wished he had been consulted before the authority made its decisions.

"You would think that the best course of action would include consulting the person who represents 150,000 people in south St. Louis County," he said. "But I had no input whatsoever in this process."

Hayden said that the board would consider seeking Stenger's input in the future.

The group will begin accepting submissions from other Lemay groups in October. The next round of grants will be announced early next year.

He encouraged the MEAAA to reapply. "This is the beginning phase," he said. "We're still feeling our way through."

The Port Authority was created in the 1980s, and its primary function for many years was to redevelop the old NL Industries site along the Mississippi River. It is now the site of the casino, and the port authority continues to own the land.

As part of Pinnacle's 2004 agreement with the County Council to get the casino site, the company agreed to give about $4 million a year to nonprofits in the county.

Tim O'Neil of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.