Hardware store may return to downtown Menlo Park Hardware store may return to downtown Menlo Park (March 17, 2004)

** Joint project with Menlo Park Presbyterian Church could include hardware store in front, meeting space in back.

By Rebecca Wallace
Almanac Staff Writer

In the fall of 2001, a downtown institution, Menlo Park Hardware, closed after 77 years, to the lament of many in the community. Now a hardware store may be coming back to the now-vacant space.

City officials have been holding meetings with representatives from the Ace Hardware company and with an owner of an Ace store in San Francisco who is interested in opening another franchise in the empty Menlo Park site at 700 Santa Cruz Ave.

David Johnson, the city's business development manager, has been in the meetings and said he was optimistic that an agreement would be reached soon.

Ace isn't the only one with an interest in the site, which most recently held IMG Home, a discount rug and furniture store. Officials from the Menlo Park Presbyterian Church recently filed plans with the city to fill the 8,255-square-foot space with a Christian bookstore in the front and a meeting space for church youth and singles groups in back.

City Manager David Boesch has expressed concern about the plan, saying that such a prime downtown retail space should be filled by a business with broader appeal. In response, Bill Frimel, the church's business manager, pointed out that Menlo Park Presbyterian has 5,000 members, many of whom would prefer not to drive to Mountain View or San Carlos to the nearest Christian bookstore.

Last week, though, Mr. Frimel said members of his congregation were voicing interest in both a bookstore and a hardware store.

"If someone wants to open it (a hardware store), we would still entertain that as a back-up," he said.

One possibility is that the church could still use the rear 5,200 square feet in the building for its meeting room, and a hardware store could occupy the front 3,000 square feet that face Santa Cruz Avenue, Mr. Johnson said.

Representatives from Ace and from the church have been working on details of how such a plan could work, such as how a wall could be built to divide these two areas and how the building costs would be shared, Mr. Johnson said.

When Menlo Park Hardware's owners closed their store in 2001, they said they couldn't swallow a large rent hike. While Mr. Johnson did not give specifics about how much rent a new hardware store owner could pay, he pointed out that rent would certainly be lower with a store using only 3,000 square feet of the building.

For his part, Mr. Frimel said the church was prepared to pay rent of about $2 a square foot and that he expected the bookstore could bring in $1 million annually in the sale of books, gifts and tapes of Christian music and services.

While a nonprofit organization might not have to pass on a percentage of its sales tax revenue to the city, the church would have a bookstore owner run the store as a for-profit operation, and therefore the store would contribute sales tax revenue to Menlo Park, he said.

Opening a hardware store at 700 Santa Cruz would not require a use permit because the site has already been used for that purpose, Mr. Johnson said.

The bookstore plan would require a use permit. At this point, it's scheduled to come before the city's Planning Commission on Monday, March 22. Planning commissioners will have to decide whether the store and meeting room would be an appropriate use of the site and how they would affect the neighbors.

The church is also holding an open house at 700 Santa Cruz on Tuesday, March 16, from 5 to 7 p.m. to display its plans for a bookstore and meeting room, which include adding new bike racks, plant trellises and landscaping.

Mr. Johnson said church officials are "smart" to hold the open house; even if they decide not to pursue the bookstore plan, they would still need support from the downtown merchants for a meeting room, he said.

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