City Beat: BK&M back before City Council with new rezoning request

Ralph Duda: Attracting a tenant is tricky because corner is ‘hairy subject.

A controversial development site at Sunshine Street and National Avenue was in the running for a Trader Joe’s store, developer Ralph Duda of BK&M LLC told Springfield City Council at its meeting Sept. 23.

The company did a site visit at the University Heights neighborhood property, Duda said, but noted neighborhood protest signs spelled a deal-killer.

“I worked for about three months to get Trader Joe’s to add Springfield, Missouri, to their expansion city list,” Duda told council. “They added us – they did a site visit; we were in negotiations. When they did the site visit, they came down and saw all the signs that said ‘Save our homes.’ They backed out.”

A Trader Joe’s spokesperson would not confirm that Springfield was under consideration for a store.

BK&M was before council to seek a rezoning of 2.6 acres of property at the northwest corner of the intersection, where the company owns eight residential properties, including two vacant lots where the company demolished existing homes.

The city’s Planning & Zoning Commission most recently rejected a request from BK&M to rezone the property to a general retail district from residential. A conditional overlay district is included in the proposal, with the company voluntarily excluding certain uses, like gas stations or package liquor stores, and limiting building height and materials, among other conditions.

However, BK&M does not currently have a tenant secured for the property, and the exact use of the property if rezoning is approved remains unclear.

What’s more, attracting a tenant before the rezoning of the property is proving challenging, Duda told council.

“Right now, I can’t find a tenant because they know this is a hairy subject,” Duda said.

He said his current concept is for a skilled nursing or assisted living facility, which he described as “something that could complement the hospital,” meaning Mercy Hospital Springfield, which is located kitty-corner to the property. He said another option is a mixed-use development with multifamily residential.

Most residents of University Heights appear to remain in opposition to the rezoning. Of 31 speakers at the meeting’s public hearing on the rezoning, 18 neighborhood residents or representatives spoke out against the development, many citing uncertainty about what would end up on the site and the threat of further incursions into the neighborhood. One neighborhood resident, Cameron Rose, spoke in favor of the BK&M project. Rose said the corner is not viable for single-family housing, and he asked council to consider the reality that the property has, rather than what some may like to see there.

Rounding out the speakers were five members or representatives of the development team, led by Duda. 

Council is scheduled to vote on the rezoning measure and possibly overturn the P&Z rejection at its Oct. 7 meeting.

Objections persist
Evelyn Mangan, a 50-year resident of University Heights, expressed concerns about traffic that would flow into the neighborhood with a corner development and threaten its walkability. Her main concerns were with the city’s traffic plan, she said.

“I agree with Mr. Duda that he has made some progress – he has talked to people,” she said. “I’m one of them he’s talked to, and improvements have been made. Maybe we’re getting there.”

She said a senior residential facility would not generate traffic and might be a good addition to the neighborhood.

Resident Brian Fogle made a case for the preservation of a residential neighborhood, noting Federal Reserve data that puts the city’s homeownership rate at 42%, well below the 65.6% rate in the U.S. Also, 2023 Census Bureau data shows the median net worth of American homeowners is $396,000, he said, while net worth for renters is $10,400. 

“Owning a home is still the American dream and remains the largest single source of building wealth for a family in our nation,” he said. 

He added that addressing a shortage of housing is both a national issue and a council priority.

“In my opinion, the proposed development sends at best mixed signals for our commitment to housing,” he said. “University Heights is a stable neighborhood that has anchored that part of the community now for a century. Knocking down houses in strong neighborhoods is not what we need in our community.”

Jeff Carney, president of the University Heights Neighborhood Association, called University Heights a quiet, safe neighborhood.

Carney suggested uncertainty regarding the ultimate development was a sticking point and noted that in order to go along with any plan, he would need more details. Carney said he doesn’t trust anyone explicitly.

“I’m not opposed to a Trader Joe’s; I’m not opposed to a retirement village – anything that works,” he said. “But to say, ‘I can’t find a tenant because these people in University Heights are crazy’ – that doesn’t make any sense to me. I think that it would be a real possibility to build something nice, but boy, when you say a strip mall is going to be OK, well, it’s just not OK to any of us.”

It was uncertainty about the development that many members of the Planning & Zoning Commission cited when voting against it 6-2 on Aug. 22 – the third rejection by the body for BK&M.

According to past reporting, some P&Z commissioners’ objections were that the plan lacked detail. They also cited the lack of harmony with the neighborhood and concerns about conformity with the city’s comprehensive plan, Forward SGF.

The current rezoning request marks the first time the change is being considered under Forward SGF, the city’s newest 20-year comprehensive plan, adopted by council in November 2022.

Trader Joe’s prospects
Trader Joe’s is on the wish-list of many Springfieldians – a desire made even more acute with a Feb. 22 erroneous news report by the Springfield News-Leader, quickly corrected, that claimed the grocery chain planned to locate in the Queen City. 

In a Sept. 24 response to an email query from SBJ, Trader Joe’s spokesperson Nakia Rohde would not confirm that the company conducted a site visit in Springfield.

“We are actively looking at hundreds of neighborhoods across the country as we hope to open more new neighborhood stores each year,” she said. “At this time, we do not have a location confirmed in Springfield, Missouri.”

In a 2018 Trader Joe’s podcast episode, CEO Bryan Palbaum said the company gets a lot of requests for stores, and locations are granted based on factors like distribution – how far the nearest warehouses are located – and population.

“Population is really important,” he said. “We certainly have certain numbers of households that we think we need to have that can support a successful Trader Joe’s, and, well, when we get to those numbers and it makes sense, then we’ll open a store.”

There are 597 Trader Joe’s stores in the U.S. as of this month. Missouri has five locations, all suburbs of St. Louis, and Kansas City.

As previously reported in SBJ, analytics firm Numerator says shoppers with incomes of $40,000-$80,000 per year make up 45% of Trader Joe’s shoppers.

In Springfield, the median household income is $43,450, according to current Census Bureau data.

Real estate firm Lockehouse says the typical store size is about 12,500 to 15,000 square feet with 80 parking spaces, and sites range 2-4 acres of vacant land, making the 2.6-acre corner site at National and Sunshine viable, by company standards. Other factors in location are easy access in and out of the site and good visibility.