“For once, let us have some say as to what gets built in our neighborhood,” pleaded Menomonee Falls, WI resident Mike Rusnak, testifying against plans by Home Depot to build a 112,000 s.f. store along Richfield Road. Home Depot has already been defeated twice in the neighboring towns of Brookfield and Waukesha (see separate entries below). “This part of town has been strangled with retail development in the last 10 years,” Rusnak said. “How is it that this corner of the village has suddenly become a regional shopping area?” 50 residents of this small village attended a public hearing on the Home Depot application, and 195 area residents signed a petition opposing the Home Depot project. The Village President told residents that the village could not deny the landowners the right to develop their property. The land, however, is zoned industrial, and Menomonee residents need only look to their neighboring towns to see two examples of failed Home Depot rezoning requests. The same Home Depot project site manager who lost battles in Brookfield and Waukesha is pushing the Menomonee Falls project. The Village President actually told residents that developers couldn’t be stopped from developing. “This is America, folks, this is not Nazi Germany,” he reported said.
Call the Menomonee Falls Village President, Joe Greco, (his number is in the book), and tell him that zoning is not a concept dreamed up by the Nazi’s. In fact, Wal-Mart has even begun developing stores in Germany. Mr. Greco’s village has the right not to rezone land–even for Home Depot. Last time we checked, Home Depot is still not a government mandate.
