Wal-Mart questions
continue
By JERRY BARCA, Home
News Tribune from the Web, May 8, 2005
EDISON, NJ -- The township and
Metuchen have reached an agreement in a lawsuit over proposed construction of a
Wal-Mart, but questions remain about how the big-box retailer came to town.
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JASON TOWLEN/Staff photographer
A sign at the
site of a proposed Wal-Mart in Edison has been defaced. |
Edison Mayor George Spadoro and
Metuchen Mayor Ed O'Brien confirmed last week they had settled their differences
regarding the construction of a Route 27-Interstate 287 interchange near the
Wal-Mart site. It was Edison's apparent disregard of plans for the
interchange — which seemed a deliberate affront when it approved the Wal-Mart —
that prompted Metuchen's suit.
Like Metuchen, some Edison residents were surprised by the Wal-Mart approval,
which seemed to take place overnight. Critics of the development have
called it a back-door political deal.
The Wal-Mart development, which includes a bank, restaurant and another
retailer, was approved the first night it appeared on the Planning Board's
agenda in November.
Area residents were caught off guard by the swift approval and then met with
labor unions to discuss ways to fend off the store. The December Planning
Board meeting turned into a shouting match about Wal-Mart.
Councilman Robert Diehl, who four months earlier voted to rezone the property,
cast the lone Planning Board vote against Wal-Mart.
"When we rezoned for general business we didn't know Wal-Mart was going in
there," said Diehl, who is up for re-election this year. "We didn't know
something the size of Wal-Mart was going in."
But the Arkansas-based retailer and the New Jersey developer who brought the
142,000-square-foot big-box store to the township, had been discussing the
project for a few years, according to Mia Masten, Wal-Mart spokeswoman.
And, the developer had been under contract to buy the land since 2000, according
to a realtor who handled the transaction.
The land Wal-Mart will be built on had been on the market since the mid-1990s,
said Herbert Tanzman, the sellers' agent and senior vice president for Weichert
Commercial Brokerage.
Tanzman said the transaction had been under contract for five years and the zone
change sped up the deal.
Edison Township Attorney Louis Rainone said the zone change was part of the
master plan, which was approved by the Planning Board in August 2003. The
change became official when the Township Council adopted the zoning map in July
2004.
In between these two votes, Garden Homes of Short Hills purchased two swaths of
the Wal-Mart property for $4.02 million in January 2004, according to township
records.
The Wilf family owns Garden Homes, which used the name K&K Developers and Edison
Route 27 Associates LLC on its Planning Board application.
Garden Homes refused interview requests for this story.
Since 1997, the Wilf family and limited liability companies established by
Garden Homes have given at least $126,363 to Democrats throughout the state and
at least $26,000 to New Jersey Republicans.
Since 2000, Garden Homes and its subsidiaries have donated at least $19,000 to
the Middlesex County Democratic Organization.
In the past five years, Garden Homes has given state Sen. Bob Smith,
D-Middlesex, at least $9,000. Smith represented the Wilfs' Wal-Mart
application before the Edison Planning Board. He also represented a
developer's application to build the Honda motorcycle dealership in Metuchen.
The Honda dealership is just north of the Wal-Mart property and it abuts the
Metuchen portion of the planned Route 27-Interstate 287 interchange.
Smith did not return telephone messages requesting an interview for this report.
But in an interview last week, Spadoro did talk about the history of the planned
interchange.
He said he had discussions with Metuchen about plans for the interchange four
years ago. He said he never saw any design plans until Metuchen filed the
lawsuit in January.
But Spadoro sent a letter to the state Department of Transportation in October
2001 lauding conceptual plans for the interchange. In the letter, Spadoro notes
the engineering firm that prepared the plans for Metuchen. According
to the letter, the plan called for "a conventional cloverleaf" in Edison and
another in Metuchen, a description closely resembling plans the Home News
Tribune obtained from Metuchen last week.
Spadoro closed the 2001 letter writing the "plan has been discussed with the
governing body ... and is supported."
Even if Spadoro did not see the plans he wrote about, the mayor could have been
notified about the interchange by an Edison engineer.
Township Engineer Henry Zanetti was the private engineer on the application for
the Honda motorcycle dealership on Route 27 in Metuchen.
David Hoder, Metuchen's engineer, said the motorcycle dealership developer was
given conceptual plans for the interchange.
Zanetti declined comment for this report and referred questions to the
administration.
Spadoro said he did not think Zanetti had any involvement in the Wal-Mart
project and would thus be unaware that the design encroached on the vision for
the interchange.
For Wal-Mart, coming to Edison seemed logical. The company's 12,500
employees make it the seventh largest employer in the state. Even though
there are Wal-Marts in North Brunswick, Piscataway and Woodbridge, company
officials feel the market will support another store in Edison.
Jerry Barca: (732) 565-7306;
jbarca@thnt.com
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