The city has released a wealth of new information regarding a controversial proposal for a second Home Depot in town. Anything from projected sales revenue to factoring in competitors to quality of life issues, such as traffic, is detailed in a 146-page traffic study and 12-page fiscal analysis, both from outside consultants hired by the city.
Discussions surrounding the proposed Home Depot project at a public workshop last week got heated at times, but ended in a fairly civil manner. The city has decided to schedule another meeting at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 1.
Held Oct. 17, the meeting was hosted by the city’s planning, traffic engineering and economic development executives. Residents, including many who are vocal opponents of a plan for a second Home Depot, packed the Council Chamber.
The nearly four-hour affair began with a presentation by city Economic Development Fiscal Officer Emily Wagner, who explained details of a new financial report conducted by Pacific Retail Consulting (PRC) of San Ramon.
Some of the highlights of the study included new financial figures that the public had requested at the work group’s previous July 26 meeting. The work group was formed a few months ago after the City Council deferred final approval on the Home Depot project in an effort to conduct more studies on the plan and work together with city residents.
If a second Home Depot is built at Stanley Boulevard and Bernal Avenue in southeast Pleasanton, $18.5 million in sales will be brought to the city per year, according to Trevor Weeks, who is the president of PRC.
When it comes to tax revenues, the city could be looking at gaining $370,000 per year–sales and property taxes combined.
Another portion of the study included an analysis of how a new Lowe’s Home Improvement store, about to open in Dublin, would affect current home improvement stores in Pleasanton and how a new Pleasanton Home Depot would factor into the equation.
“There is room for more improvement stores in Pleasanton just based on the leakage data,” Wagner said, referring to the amount of money the city could be losing as a result of residents shopping at other home improvement stores in nearby cities.
“With Lowe’s coming to Dublin…the leakage is going to go up by $20 million–and that’s without adding a Home Depot here,” she said.
Other figures included a projected $200,000 loss in sales tax annually to Pleasanton as a result of the Lowe’s over the next couple of years.
Weeks also concluded that “despite the impact from Lowe’s and from the proposed (Home Depot) store, the projected annual sales are $32.8 million (at the existing Home Depot) and, therefore, are still considered good by Home Depot’s standards.” Another portion of the group’s study supports that claim, with an estimated 58 percent of the Johnson Drive store’s customers coming from the north, such as northern Pleasanton, Dublin and southern San Ramon. The proposed Home Depot would be built in southeastern Pleasanton.
The figures released last week contrast from previous studies by city staff. The current report projects the tax revenues at $370,000 annually, while the old report estimated $490,000. Regency Centers, the developer of the proposed Pleasanton Gateway Center, which is also planned to include a Longs Drugs and Starbucks, had even more inflated figures, projecting that the revenues would be $825,000. Wagner said the larger numbers could be because the company calculated revenues using a different model.
But despite what appeared to be a list of figures supporting a second Home Depot, audience members weren’t convinced of the new data.
“I think a lot of the premise is based on incorrect numbers,” said one man.
“The net gain to Pleasanton seems nominal,” added one woman.
Their concerns about the data ran the gamut–from TruValue Workbench (at Santa Rita Road and Valley Avenue) closing as a result of a new Home Depot and the shopping center having the same fate as the vacant Vintage Hills shopping center; to criticism that some improvement stores can’t be compared because their service levels are very different. Some found data on other California cities with two Home Depots flawed, saying many of those cities have different types of Home Depot stores such as Expo Design Centers. One woman said the consultant’s estimate of between $115,000-190,000 in the cost to city services (such as public safety and code enforcement) as a result of a second store, was conservative.
A question of adding a Yardbirds instead, which is a much smaller scale home improvement store owned by the Home Depot company, was discounted by the consultant because the revenue generated from a Yardbirds wouldn’t be enough to make it desirable for the company to build. Having a grocery store as the anchor tenant instead of Home Depot was also rebuffed in the data because the city has tried courting various supermarkets to no avail.
As city staff moved on to another contentious subject–traffic–the skepticism among audience members continued. While some asked why the city wouldn’t extend Stoneridge Drive to help alleviate traffic on Valley and Santa Rita (near where the Home Depot is proposed), city Traffic Engineer Mike Tassano said the extension wouldn’t be included, but would be decided after the city approves its General Plan update.
Included in the traffic study were factors such as 1) how a future California Splash waterpark expansion, 2) second Home Depot or 3) no additional Home Depot, would affect traffic in the area.
Tassano said a weekend traffic analysis, conducted by Kimley-Horn and Associates, shows that with or without the expansion to California Splash, located on Stanley and adjacent to the proposed shopping center site, and with or without the Johnson Drive Home Depot still in business, that there would be little impact on traffic in the region. He added that a third left turn lane from southbound Santa Rita going eastbound onto Valley would allow for quicker traffic signal timing, thus moving the flow of traffic better. That would be a mitigation funded by the Home Depot company if the project is approved.
A discussion about the third portion of the work group’s presentation is planned to be held at a future meeting, to be scheduled in the next few weeks, according to Planning Director Jerry Iserson. That discussion deals with Home Depot delivery trucks and truck routes as part of the project’s approval.
All of the data regarding the fiscal/economic analysis, traffic study and truck delivery/truck routes is available to the public on the city’s Web site, at http://www.ci.pleasanton.ca.us/business/planning/homedepot-wg.html. the next work group meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m. this Thursday at the City Council Chamber, 200 Old Bernal Ave.
