Special Menlo Park council meeting planned on check-cashing Special Menlo Park council meeting planned on check-cashing (June 08, 2005)

By Rebecca Wallace

Almanac Staff Writer

After a string of armed robberies at markets with check-cashing services, the Menlo Park City Council will hold a special meeting on Thursday, June 9.

The hearing could end with the council ordering La Hacienda Market in the Willows neighborhood to immediately shut down its check-cashing operation.

The meeting, which begins at 7 p.m., will have two parts, Assistant City Manager Audrey Seymour said. In the first part, the council will discuss creating a regulatory ordinance that would require check-cashing operations to take dramatic safety measures.

Council members have spoken in favor of several measures, including requiring businesses to limit cash on hand and install a time-delay safe that would allow only a certain amount of cash to be taken out at a time. The law would apply to current and future check-cashing operations.

The council can create an urgency ordinance, which would take effect immediately, Ms. Seymour said.

The second part of the meeting will focus on La Hacienda Market, which is in a residential area and has been hit by several armed robberies recently.

City officials have said La Hacienda has been slow to comply with their directions to make safety upgrades, so the council may deem that a regulatory ordinance is not enough in this case. The council then may choose to declare the market's check-cashing operation a public nuisance and order it shut down.

La Hacienda officials have made some upgrades, including putting up a fence to block a possible getaway route through an alley behind the market.

Public comment will be taken on both items. The meeting will be held in the council chambers at 701 Laurel St. For a staff report, go to menlopark.org, click on "City Council" and go to the June 9 agenda.

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