Monday, May 15, 2006

Hats off to Wyandotte County

Hats off to officials in Wyandotte County who have told Cracker Barrel that, after just closing a store in KCK off I70, they will not be allowed to move to the hot new Village West development because the state issued Star bonds do not allow a company to move from one area to another if the second area has state supported incentives, such as these STAR bonds.

Granted, the law says they can't relocate there, but still it took some balls by Wyandotte county to hold firm on the policy. I am okay with cities and counties using incentives to lure a business there, but when you are just stealing them from another city in the same metro area, there is not much gain there except some extra coin in the pocket for the company that benefits.

Here is the link from the KC Star if you want to read it:
http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/local/14580611.htm

Malls bite the dust

Two of the area's shopping malls are on the way out. Blue Ridge Mall, once a great mall, is completely gone. A shopping center anchored with a WalMart supercenter is replacing it, I think it will probably open early next year. They have the old mall down and cleared now.

Mission Mall is being torn down as well, to make room for what looks to be a nice combo of shopping, offices and condos/lofts/apartments.

There are a couple of other malls just hanging on by a thread- Bannister Mall, almost nothing is left there and the surrounding shopping centers are also about done for. Metro North mall is not a whole lot better. The surrounding area is still okay, but the mall has very little left in it. That basically leaves Indpendece Center and Oak Park Mall is the major malls left in the metro, along with the Great Plains mall. Most of the new shopping centers in the metro are open air shopping centers, not malls.