New Trader Joe's Store Likely Dead

By Jorge Casuso

Jan. 7 - A new Trader Joe's store derailed from the fast track to approval after Planning Commission Chair Kelly Olsen raised a series of concerns, has reached a dead end that likely will kill the project, The Lookout has learned.

The store at the old Goodyear site on 12th Street and Wilshire Boulevard was widely viewed as an anchor that would boost neighboring businesses and take pressure off of the popular Pico Boulevard outlet, the chain's busiest store in Southern California.

But a key change required by City officials, who turned down the project in November, has made the redesign untenable, store officials said.

"It made it difficult, if not impossible, to operate the store at that location," said Doug Yokomizo, vice president and general counsel of Trader Joe's.

"It is officially dead at this point," said David Forbes Hibbert, the architect hired to redesign the former auto repair shop.

The sticking point is the location of the proposed loading dock, which currently is on a residentially zoned parking lot, Hibbert said. To abide by the City's zoning code, Trader Joe's would need to relocate the dock to the commercially zoned lot.

This, however, would require chopping off approximately 900 square feet from the back of the building and relocating it to the area planned for storage, Hibbert said. The storage area would then have to be moved to a basement level, a costly and impractical proposition vetoed by store officials.

"They couldn't live with that," Hibbert said. "That was the killer."

Hibbert believes that Goodyear's commercial use of the portion of the building located on the residentially zoned lot likely required a variance that would allow its continued use. But neither the current owner nor the City could produce the 30-year-old records.

"I wanted to see what the variance was that allowed them to build that section of the building in the first place," Hibbert said. "For some reason, they allowed it then."

Suzanne Frick, the City's director of Planning and Community Development, said that there is a chance a variance was never granted.

"If we don't have a copy (of the variance) being granted and the owner doesn't have it, there's a chance it was never granted," Frick said.

Frick said that Trader Joe's had not responded to the changes proposed in planning staff's Nov. 15 letter, nor had they pulled the application for the project. She reiterated the code requirement: "They've got to keep all the commercial activity on the commercial part of the property."

The issue did not come up until Planning Commission Chair Olsen raised several questions about the project in an August email to Frick. The concerns delayed what appeared to be a swift administrative approval of the project.

"Back in the summer, the reading I was getting was that we were getting our AA (administrative approval) any day," Hibbert said. "Everything seemed on track. Then the emails started and things started looking different… All of the sudden code interpretations were a little different."

Olsen's questions, and his seeming opposition to the project, gave Trader Joe's officials, who still needed Planning Commission approval for a Conditional Use Permit to sell alcohol, reason for concern.

"Trader Joe's doesn't like controversies of any kind," Hibbert said. "They figured if Kelly Olsen was giving them so many problems coming in, they would have a difficult time with the alcohol license."

Olsen, who repeatedly declines to talk to The Lookout, did not return a call for comment.

Trader Joe's could still seek a variance or a text amendment, but that entails a lengthy process with hearings before the Planning Commission and City Council.

"The property owner has not been collecting rent since the July 4 weekend," Hibbert said, adding that the lease for the Goodyear site is contingent on the City's approval of the project and that it is unlikely the owner would agree to a lengthy delay.

Although the project is opposed by some residents who live near the site, Trader Joe's officials point to a poll of nearly 500 customers of their Pico store that shows almost unanimous support for the new outlet. The store, they contend, would give shoppers on the north side of town an alternative to the mainstream and high-end food retailers that dot the densely populated neighborhood.

Customers on the north side likely will frequent a New Trader Joe's store opening up at the site of the old Bristol Farms in the Country Mart on 26th Street and San Vicente Boulevard, Hibbert said.

The store, which is one block outside the Santa Monica border in Brentwood received quick approval and will reap tax dollars from Santa Monica residents, who will have a longer drive to make, Hibbert noted.