Closing Pearl; so high; noble Barron

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

By Jake Nichols

“September is one of my busiest months of the year with the Fall Arts Festival,” Sue Thomas told the council. Thomas has owned Wild Hands since 1998. “I cannot have that street closed in September.”

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-Thomas led a parade of business owners, including Frank Lundy (movie theatre) and Amy Vignaroli (Teton Tails), who were opposed to the city’s plan to close Pearl Avenue for most of September. Lundy expressed a concern that construction noise might wake someone out of dead sleep during the “Made of Honor” matinee. Vignaroli was pretty sure most of her customers were too puny to haul a 40-pound bag of dog food a few blocks.

But Thomas, she raged at the council. Enough so that Sean O’Malley’s plan to slip in the avenue closure along with some sidewalk on Jackson St. lost all traction. The road closure was necessitated by the latest development to sprout up downtown at the corner of Pearl and Jackson.

Doug Howard, representing the applicant for the proposed development, said he realized the scope of the inconvenience to Pearl merchants and the alleys they take deliveries in. “It is going to impact businesses and traffic flow. Out intent is to minimize that impact in every way we can,” he said.

“I’m very uncomfortable with the street being closed in September,” Mayor Mark Barron said. “I want to be mindful of the merchants trying to scratch out a living.”
Bob McLaurin was more blunt.

“Closing Pearl Street in September is a non-starter. Let’s sit on this and call a meeting with the applicant and the neighbors and see if we can hash this out.”

The council allowed Shaw Construction to start messing with the alley at 270 West Pearl, but a street closure in September was deemed undesirable.

Stage Stopped, Inc
The council showed some skepticism with Sadek Darwiche’s (Stage Stop, Inc.) proposed plan to turn the Wood’s Motel into a four-story, lodging-retail-housing-dining complex. When the town vacated the alley between the Wood’s Motel and the Stage Stop micro-plaza, which accommodates Teton Thai, it allowed Darwiche to nearly double his lot size to 19,900 square feet.

Darwiche’s pre-application conference was well presented and it was evident to the council that Sadek was intent on building a family legacy, as he called it, that would last for 60 or 80 years. The project was over-parked with two levels of underground parking and came with twice the required employee housing.

But more than once, Sadek and his father came dangerously close to making veiled threats. “Essentially, we are taking a large financial risk, when it might be smarter to just build condos and sell out,” Sadek hinted.

Jim, Sadek’s father, drove the point home again later. “It is not like a condo project, where it is a calculated investment and they will sell out for a profit in two years. If you don’t see this project as a benefit to the community, then we will still have our valuable land.”

Sadek put the onus on the council, saying the 8,000-square feet of employee housing was contingent upon the panel allowing his building to climb to an excess of 46 feet. Cut that, Sadek said, and he would build something more like “less than 2,000 square feet of employee housing.”

“I believe it’s going to be a really good-looking building,” Councilman Mark Obringer said. But he worried that future developers would insist on building higher than 46 feet as well. “I want this project to go through, but where is the extraordinary benefit?”
Mayor Barron also saw no extraordinary benefit to allow the project to fall under PMD classification and build out so high. Bob Lenz said he was excited to get a quality hotel in downtown Jackson but could not condone a four-story building.
The council sent the Darwiche’s back to the drawing board with the advice to scale back.

In other business
“She wanted to know how much money I had in my pocket,” Joe Steffen blurted during the public comment period. Steffen said he was being evicted from a senior residence.
“Can I at least stay for the rest of the month? I’m paid up until then.”

The tender situation called for a mayor of action and Barron did not disappoint.
“You can stay there, sir,” he said. “And our town attorney, Audrey, will look into the matter and see what your rights are.”

“I can’t afford no attorney,” Steffen said.
“You won’t have to pay,” Abe Tabatabai reassured the man.
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Closing Pearl; so high; noble Barron | Planet JH News Article: Council Chronicles

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