Shenanigans on the Boulevard

by Dennis Evanosky

It appears that we have seen the last of Laurel Liquors. According to Councilmember Dick Spees, the Roberts family will demolish the small Mediterranean Revival building that first housed a Safeway Store in the 1940s, then Laurel Liquors. The adjoining buildings that were home to the Roberts' family tire business will also face the wrecking ball.

I had hoped over time to see a tenant at the very least in the Laurel Liquors building that fit the style and spirit of the Laurel Shopping District: something along the lines of Farmer Joe's or World Ground Café. The neighborhood fought successfully against any fast-food restaurant at the site. I was looking forward to sitting down to ribs at Everett & Jones when that establishment expressed interest in the site.

Putting a package together at the site proved fruitless. The Roberts family was not the only player in the game: PG&E also owns a portion of the triangle bordered by Interstate 580, High Street, and MacArthur Boulevard. The utility company's bankruptcy put a stop to the earlier sale to Everett & Jones' Dorothy King. Then, when the economy soured, King could not come up with the financing necessary to purchase the Roberts site.

They way I understand it, the PG&E portion of the triangle will remained a fenced-in part of the puzzle.

According to some neighbors, drug dealers and prostitutes began using the property. The Roberts family wants to get rid of this element and prepare the property for sale. The family owned a gas station there which later grew to Roberts' Tires. The gas station and tire company left their share of pollutants in the ground, pollutants that will cost the Roberts family about $100,000 to clean up.

I see no problem here. It is private property, after all. It's not what the family wants to accomplish, but how it wants to accomplish it. Rather than applying for what I believe is the appropriate permit and letting the public know its intentions, the family applied for and was granted an over-the-counter demolition permit.

To my understanding, this permit is meant for someone who wants to demolish a smaller structure on his or her property, something like a shed or a small outbuilding. In addition, the city does not allow a person taking out an over-the-counter permit to build any other structure in place of the one demolished.

On the permit is a question asking what the owner intends to put in place of the demolished structure. The Roberts family answered the question with "parking lot."

That's just what the Laurel needs at MacArthur and High: a parking lot.

When asked about this answer, one city official explained, "Well, they had to put something there." What if they had put "nuclear waste dump"? Would the city have ignored that with the same lame answer?

The family doesn't really want a parking lot, Dick Spees explained. According to Spees, the family just wants to move forward, clear the site, clean up the ground pollution, and prepare it for sale.

If that's the case, then the Roberts family needs to let the public know this. The family needs to be above-board about its intentions. The way the family has it planned now, neighbors could drive by on a given morning in the very near future and see the site with all its buildings intact. Then they'll drive by that evening and find the buildings gone without one syllable of public comment.

The city must step in and make the family follow the same procedures that others in this situation have to follow, posting a 30-day public notice of the demolition and inviting publiccomment. Calvin Wong, the man in charge of issuing the permit, told Spees' office that the city did not issue a normal permit because the structures are "substandard." Wong, responding to community pressure for an open, legal process, said he would look further into the matter. Glen Roberts, the Roberts family representative, was not available for comment.

In the meantime, the Laurel will soon sport another vacant lot (parking lot, excuse me), one to match the city property at the district's other "gateway." The question now remains, how will the demolition play out? Will we proceed above board, as we should, or on the shadier side of city politics?

Stay tuned.