March 31, 2004

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Publication Date: Wednesday, March 31, 2004

Hardware store, meeting room plan approved, then appealed

By Rebecca Wallace
Almanac Staff Writers

If the heart of a city is its downtown, it makes sense that many Menlo Park residents have firm opinions about the pulse of Santa Cruz Avenue.

So a plan to put in a hardware store and a church meeting room at 700 Santa Cruz will have to please a lot of people to become reality. Even after a Planning Commission nod, its future is anything but certain.

The plan, proposed by the Menlo Park Presbyterian Church, squeaked out a skinny victory at the commission on March 22, with three members voting yes on a use permit for the meeting room, two voting no, one abstaining, and one absent. The hardware store needed no approval because the site had already housed a hardware store.

Later that week, though, City Councilman Paul Collacchi appealed the approval to the council, saying that allowing a non-retail use -- the meeting room -- in the prime downtown retail area is a broader policy decision best made by the council.

Many in the community are thrilled by the prospect of a hardware store back at the site where Menlo Park Hardware stood for 77 years. But the meeting room is proving to be a harder sell, especially in an economic slump when the sales tax revenue the city receives from businesses has lagged.

The 5,000-member church wants to have an Ace Hardware store fill the front 3,000 square feet of the 8,255-square-foot site, with a meeting room in the back for youth and young adult groups. Church officials say the groups have outgrown their space on the church's bustling campus at 950 Santa Cruz.

Originally, the church had planned a Christian bookstore at the front of the site, but changed the plan after residents clamored for a hardware store, church business manager Bill Frimel said.

Under the plan, the church would hold the master lease and the hardware store would sublease. An Ace store owner in San Francisco has signed a letter of intent to put in a store there.

The Menlo Park Chamber of Commerce is opposing the meeting room; chairman Rick Ciardella wrote in a March 22 letter to the Planning Commission that the area is meant for retail and that the meeting room "will destroy the fragile balance of our downtown."

Worries about traffic, teens

At the Planning Commission meeting, other local business people also spoke against the meeting room, saying that it could worsen parking and traffic troubles and bring in disruptive crowds of teens.

Commissioner Patti Fry also worried that it didn't make sense to have a hardware store that didn't reach all the way to the back parking lot, where many shoppers will park. Menlo Park Hardware had occupied the entire space.

Under the plan, store employees would be able to use the back door for unloading and stocking merchandise, but customers would use the front door.

"How can a hardware store thrive without rear access? Customers have to carry things," Ms. Fry said.

Commissioner Stu Soffer echoed the Chamber of Commerce officials, saying that 700 Santa Cruz is a "special site in the core of the business district" best used for retail.

Chair Bill Halleck, though, was enthusiastic. He said at national urban planning conferences he had seen how mixed-use projects can make a downtown lively, especially with a town meeting place.

"I am happy that we are working to revitalize the downtown and come up with compromises that work," he said.

Mr. Frimel told the commission that he also thinks the meeting room can be an active part of downtown, bringing in young people who will patronize local businesses, thereby helping to bring in sales tax revenue.

"Before and after the meeting they will be looking for a place to eat," he said.

Ultimately, Mr. Halleck, Lorie Sinnott and Kelly Fergusson voted in favor of the permit, Ms. Fry and Mr. Soffer voted no, Melody Pagee abstained, and Harry Bims was absent.

In hopes of alleviating concerns, the approval included a host of conditions. The church agreed to annually pay the city $16,510, the estimated amount that the 8,255-square-foot space would generate in sales tax revenue if entirely used for retail. Whatever sales tax revenue is generated by the hardware store would be subtracted from the payment.

In addition, the meeting room's hours were limited to Tuesday and Wednesday evenings and Sundays, with no more than two events permitted per month outside of those hours. The church must also submit a "youth supervision" plan to minimize loitering, and a traffic circulation and drop-off/pick-up plan.

Dee Skaar, manager of the Lamp Gallery at 628 Santa Cruz, had expressed worries about teens generating trash and blocking the sidewalk, but after the meeting said she thought the conditions could help. "They need supervision outside to ensure that kids are going into the meeting," she said.

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