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E-mail
conversation between Jeremy Flores and
Commissioner Tomas
Regalado Monday, April 11, 2005
From:
Regalado, Tomas (Commissioner)
[mailto:TRegalado@ci.miami.fl.us]
Sent: Monday, April 11, 2005 2:00
PM
To: Flores, Jeremy
Subject: RE: Please help Coconut
Grove
Dear
Mr. Flores,
You
are preaching to the choir. I have
opposed Home Depot in the Grove since
the idea surfaced. The reason I did (and
I was the only no vote on the commission
when the issue was discussed) is because
I represent the West Little Havana area
where the SW 8th Street Home
Depot is located. Unfortunately, that
Home Depot was approved before my time
but I have been suffering the
consequences.
Home
Depot is not a good neighbor. They have
huge trucks with merchandise (at 3 AM)
on SW 11th Street and SW 30th
Avenue (residential areas), and when
they have tent sales they tell the
employees to park in the residential
areas and of course the hours of
operations. As you may have read in the
media, the Mayor wants the Home Depot,
the administration wants the Home Depot,
and the area commissioner also wants
Home Depot.
I
believe the issue with this store is not
the design or the trees. The issue is
the hours of operation, the kind of
merchandise they sell, and the amount of
traffic it generates. I am sorry for the
Grove, I know what is coming, but they
won’t listen to me.
Sincerely,
Tomas
Regalado
-----Original
Message-----
From: Flores, Jeremy
[mailto:jflores@midship.com]
Sent: Thursday, April 07, 2005
4:14 PM
To: Regalado, Tomas
(Commissioner)
Subject: Please help Coconut
Grove
Dear Commissioner
Tomas P. Regalado ,
By now,
I know you as well as many of your
colleagues have heard many points
of view and opinions regarding Home
Depot's attempt to build a big box store
in Coconut Grove on the corner of Bird
Road and 32nd Street. I know you have
personally been involved in much of the
prelimary process and negotiations
between the city, the residents and Home
Depot. I am writing this letter in hopes
that you will help keep Home Depot out
of Coconut Grove or at least limit
its size..
It
was the small village lifestyle and laid
back atmosphere that brought me and my
family to Coconut Grove from up north
several years ago, and it would be a
real shame to see so much of this
lifestyle diminished by having Home
Depot come to the old K-Mart location on
32 Street and Bird Avenue. This is a
quality of life issue Mr. Winton,
something that we care for very much,
and we as Groveites, decent,
hard-working tax payers, do not want to
sacrifice this just to have a huge mega
store and all of its problems coming
into our neighborhood. We are aware of
Home Depot's expansion plans, which
would mean they would take over the
grocery store and the pharmacy as well.
Imagine your community suddenly without
a grocery store, replaced by a huge
warehouse that brings loud noise,
traffic 24 hours a day, shopping carts
and trash everywhere, and increased
crime: this is a REAL quality of life
issue. This is exactly what has happened
to many other areas in Miami where Home
Depot has set up shop, we have seen and
heard about this first hand from the
Home Depot on SW 8th street and we DO
NOT want that to happen to our
community.
As
you are aware, on March 17th, Home Depot submitted
plans for their usual monstrous
133,000 square foot box wharehouse, that
would literally dwarf the current
building that used to house K-Mart
of 73,000 square feet. Us the residents
showed up in force and pleaded for the
city to cap the zoning to 70,000 square
feet, however despite our
collective efforts, the cap was not
pushed through. We now hear
lipservice from Home Depot
representtives that they will indeed
build a smaller, village-friendly
store with a Key West look,
but then why would they apply for
their monstrous 133,000 square foot
design??? These are lies from them in an
effort to sneak past our objections and
I am sure you agree with many of us that
their true intentions are not being
stated in their latest comments.
We,
the Coconut Grove residents, ask
you Mr. Regalado to consider
the real impact to the residents of the
Grove by allowing this Home Depot into
our community. We don't need it, we
don't want it and that space could be
much better served by say a Target store
or a variety of smaller stores that will
benefit our neighborhood in a much more
positive way. At the very least,
we ask you to please stand up for our
community and limit the size at the next
commission hearing. Next time you
are in the Grove, I ask you to look
around and remind yourself of the true
sense of a village community and close-knit
neighborhood that is unique to the
Grove and how much that would be
affected by allowing Home Depot in.
I
thank you for your time in reading this
letter and hoping that you will consider
our position when discussing with other
city officials involved in this decision to
say NO to Home Depot in the Grove or
at least limiting the size of same.
Respectfully
yours,
Jeremy
Flores
Gifford
Lane
Miami,
FL 33133
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