Charles Landry

Wal-Mart attorney Charles Landry had 10 minutes to present his plan and three minutes to respond at the end.

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Landry announced site plan changes: The bar on College Drive has been purchased and the Great Wall Chinese restaurant will replace it in a new building at the corner, developers will spend more money for landscaping, Wal-Mart will not have any outdoor sales, there will be a bus stop on the development.

But from the get-go, Simpson went with Wal-Mart against the howls of chronic voters who live in Southdowns, appearing as a bag man to Wal-Mart attorney Charles Landry.

The analogy prompted an angry reply from Wal-Mart attorney Charles Landry, who said Wal-Mart got approval because the project met the city's requirements.

They had seen the proposal themselves; real-estate attorney Charles Landry presented it to the Southside Civic Association board nearly a month ago.However, several civic-association officials said they felt "frustrated" to learn only after the fact about a Tuesday Planning Commission workshop on the proposal.

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So does Wal-Mart's attorney, Landry, who is bringing people from the developer bankrolling the project, a traffic engineering firm proposing changes for College Drive, and the architect of the planned shopping center.

They won't be making a presentation at the civic-association meeting but might answer questions."I would have liked to show the membership the traffic modeling," Landry wrote in an e-mail.

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Wal-Mart and its attorney, Charles Landry, have become a lightning rod for this highly charged debate among frustrated citizens who hate the traffic and feel left out of the process.Some of the remarks have been nasty, and that is out-of-order.

But what are the real issues here?

The fact is, Landry is not here to defend or represent the city's interest.He was hired by the developer and is only responsible for following the laws and rules put forth by those in government.He claims Bright Meyers, the developer for Wal-Mart, has gone beyond the minimum requirements and compromised, spending thousands to satisfy numerous concerns.

Our elected officials and those employed or appointed by government have to answer to the citizens.You may not like your representatives, but you chose them to represent your interests, just like the developer chose Landry to represent his.

We are a nation of laws and rules,criminal, civil and zoning,and we must be consistent.They are created by you and me.That includes Baton Rouge's Horizon Plan, the blueprint to guide development in Baton Rouge.In meetings over the past seven years, few people have attended to update the plan.

It is a hard lesson learned about getting involved,or the price if you don't.

They had seen the proposal themselves; real-estate attorney Charles Landry presented it to the Southside Civic Association board nearly a month ago.However, several civic-association officials said they felt "frustrated" to learn only after the fact about a Tuesday Planning Commission workshop on the proposal.

The workshop was held on short notice.The Advocate got only a few hours' notice, not the minimum of a full day called for in the law.

The residents are afraid the hour-long pitch without them present to give their position gave the world's largest retailer a leg up.
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So does Wal-Mart's attorney, Landry, who is bringing people from the developer bankrolling the project, a traffic engineering firm proposing changes for College Drive, and the architect of the planned shopping center.

They won't be making a presentation at the civic-association meeting but might answer questions.

"I would have liked to show the membership the traffic modeling," Landry wrote in an e-mail.

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Real-estate attorney Charles Landry said Wednesday he represents Bright Meyers, developers from Atlanta who have an agreement to buy the 22-acre shopping center for an undisclosed price.

The developers will then spend more than $20 million to demolish much of the current Village Square, including the parking lot, and rebuild it beginning this summer, Landry said.

"It's a tremendous enhancement to not only the Village Square area but to College Drive as a whole," Landry said.

Business at the shopping center has been suffering for some time, especially since anchor tenant Service Merchandise closed in 1999.It had moved in as Wilson's in the 1970s.A Super Fresh grocery store closed in the shopping center the same year, and a Kmart closed across the road earlier in the 1990s.

Today, the faded outlines of the names of long-gone smaller businesses still dot storefront facades as reminders of the once-thriving beige and green shopping center.

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Landry said the developers had prepared designs to increase College Drive's traffic capacity and would give the city-parish some money for the burden the new development would place on the public infrastructure.He would not say what would be built or how much money would be tendered.

"I don't want to get into that right now because they're still being planned," Landry said.

He said the Bright Meyers proposal fits in the current zoning but would need site plan approval from the city-parish Planning Commission.

It's "a one-of-a-kind development for Baton Rouge" with open spaces, a facade incorporating brickwork and new columns, and improved landscaping along College Drive, Landry said.

"There's nothing about this Wal-Mart Supercenter that is typical," Landry said.

Landry added that the design breaks up the "wall-to-wall building" design the Village Square shopping center has had since its construction.Of the center's current tenants, only two outlying restaurants, an outlying bank and the Office Depot franchise would not undergo significant changes under the plan.

Landry said the purchase agreement had been reached, but the property manager at Village Square, Jak Kunstler, said the deal is probable but not yet done.

"There are certain things they have to do in a certain timeframe," Kunstler said, declining to elaborate."They seem to be very confident and very arrogant they can overcome all of those things."

Surprise announcement

Kunstler, who represents current Village Square owners Celia Katz and Marvin Jacobs, and the Village Square tenants were apparently taken by surprise when Landry appeared on a television news show Tuesday night to announce that Wal-Mart would soon come to College Drive, although the rumor had percolated for more than a year.
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"Neither I nor Katz-Jacobs had any idea that Charles Landry, the attorney for Wal-Mart, would make an announcement on television at this time.

"This was totally without our permission."

Kunstler offered to serve as a real estate agent for any of the stores unable to find space in the reshaped shopping center.

"The development will have a very limited amount of space available to current tenants," Kunstler wrote."The lease rate will be in the high teens and on a first-come, first-served basis."
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Landry said plans are still so formative he does not know which of the current tenants would be in the new center, besides Office Depot and the outlying restaurants and bank.He said the developers had begun negotiating leases with Coffee Call, Radio Shack and Classy Nails, among other tenants.

Back then, Charles Landry- a Jones, Walker attorney who is Wal-Mart's counsel in Louisiana- predicted construction would begin in the summer of 2003.But the site is still vacant, and Landry now says Wal-Mart does not foresee breaking ground until late this fall.

Landry reports that the sole reason for the delay has been environmental concerns over an "outparcel" near Wal-Mart's site.An outparcel is land near a core development that is bought on the cheap prior to construction, and then sold or leased at a huge premium later on.Outparcels let big destination retailers like Wal-Mart cash in on the real-estate windfalls that they create by increasing customer traffic in an area, an effect that could be capitalized upon by speculators or other developers.Many big box projects now rely on outparcels to maximize their numbers.

The outparcel that is holding up Wal-Mart is Kokomo's Lounge, a shuttered night club on the site of a former truck stop.Landry says it has the type of problems typical for retired truck-stop properties, such as underground fuel tanks and other petroleum-related soil contamination.

"Wal-Mart is extraordinarily cautious when confronted by environmental issues," he adds.

Wal-Mart has a purchase agreement that is contingent on the current owners cleaning up the problems.Wal-Mart will not move on the larger project until it acquires the outparcel, which it plans to sell or lease out.

Landry says the state Department of Environmental Quality will probably issue a permit by September, and the cleanup will take about 30 days.
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"After numerous meetings with residents and property owners, Wal-Mart took some dramatic steps to address their problems," Landry says.Those included adding 16 acres of buffer-space facing the subdivisions behind the site and "extensive landscaping" along Old Perkins.
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For his part, Landry is aware that some neighbors are still upset, but is confident that "the vast majority of people in the area just want the store to open so they can start shopping for less."
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Back then, Charles Landry- a Jones, Walker attorney who is Wal-Mart's counsel in Louisiana- predicted construction would begin in the summer of 2003.But the site is still vacant, and Landry now says Wal-Mart does not foresee breaking ground until late this fall.

,,Landry reports that the sole reason for the delay has been environmental concerns over an "outparcel" near Wal-Mart's site.An outparcel is land near a core development that is bought on the cheap prior to construction, and then sold or leased at a huge premium later on.Outparcels let big destination retailers like Wal-Mart cash in on the real-estate windfalls that they create by increasing customer traffic in an area, an effect that could be capitalized upon by speculators or other developers.Many big box projects now rely on outparcels to maximize their numbers.

,,The outparcel that is holding up Wal-Mart is Kokomo's Lounge, a shuttered night club on the site of a former truck stop.Landry says it has the type of problems typical for retired truck-stop properties, such as underground fuel tanks and other petroleum-related soil contamination.

,,"Wal-Mart is extraordinarily cautious when confronted by environmental issues," he adds.

,,Wal-Mart has a purchase agreement that is contingent on the current owners cleaning up the problems.Wal-Mart will not move on the larger project until it acquires the outparcel, which it plans to sell or lease out.

,,Landry says the state Department of Environmental Quality will probably issue a permit by September, and the cleanup will take about 30 days.
...
,,"After numerous meetings with residents and property owners, Wal-Mart took some dramatic steps to address their problems," Landry says.Those included adding 16 acres of buffer-space facing the subdivisions behind the site and "extensive landscaping" along Old Perkins.
...
,,For his part, Landry is aware that some neighbors are still upset, but is confident that "the vast majority of people in the area just want the store to open so they can start shopping for less."

Back then, Charles Landry- a Jones, Walker attorney who is Wal-Mart's counsel in Louisiana- predicted construction would begin in the summer of 2003.But the site is still vacant, and Landry now says Wal-Mart does not foresee breaking ground until late this fall.
...
Landry says it has the type of problems typical for retired truck-stop properties, such as underground fuel tanks and other petroleum-related soil contamination.

"Wal-Mart is extraordinarily cautious when confronted by environmental issues," he adds.

Wal-Mart has a purchase agreement that is contingent on the current owners cleaning up the problems.Wal-Mart will not move on the larger project until it acquires the outparcel, which it plans to sell or lease out.

Landry says the state Department of Environmental Quality will probably issue a permit by September, and the cleanup will take about 30 days.
...
"After numerous meetings with residents and property owners, Wal-Mart took some dramatic steps to address their problems," Landry says.Those included adding 16 acres of buffer-space facing the subdivisions behind the site and "extensive landscaping" along Old Perkins.
...
For his part, Landry is aware that some neighbors are still upset, but is confident that "the vast majority of people in the area just want the store to open so they can start shopping for less."