Home Depot sparks feud in the Chamber of Commerce Home Depot sparks feud in the Chamber of Commerce (February 08, 2002)

Chamber to poll members about Measure N support

By Bill D'Agostino

In a move sparked by a dispute among Chamber of Commerce Mountain View members, the organization announced this week that it will poll all its entire membership to find out what they think about Home Depot.

The move is a direct response to a few members' concerns about the organization's recent endorsement of the retail giant's March ballot measure.

Some members, however, feel that both this impending vote of chamber members and the chamber's endorsement of the ballot measure has been compromised by a potential conflict of interest within the chamber.

If measure N passes, it will allow Home Depot - which holds a long-term lease on the old Emporium site on El Camino Real and Highway 85- to build a large retail store at that location.

The home improvement chain claims the store will bring in as much as $500,000 in annual sales tax for the city, but opponents worry that the traffic - especially large truck traffic - will have strong negative impacts on the local community.

The announcement of the chamber's surprise endorsement of Home Depot angered members - including Bruce Bauer Lumber and Supply and Minton's Lumber and Supply - who oppose the retail giant, especially in light of the fact that the chamber suddenly and unexpectedly reversed its three year neutral stance on the issue without polling member businesses.

Members were also alienated by the fact that Astrid Thompson, the chamber's membership development director, is serving as community co-chair of the campaign to get Home Depot approved by the voters.

"That lit the fire under a number of people," said to Kay Mascoli, campaign organizer for Citizens Voting No on N, a group opposing Home Depot.

At the time the endorsement was made, Thompson said that her work with Home Depot - for which she is not paid - and her job with the chamber are separate and unrelated.

Julie Lovins, a chamber member who works as a language doctor, and the other concerned chamber members decided to take action against the endorsement by trying to use a chamber bylaw to get members to vote on the Home Depot issue and hopefully reverse the board's endorsement.

According to the bylaw, if 5 percent of members sign a petition to question a board decision, the chamber will poll all members to determine its position on the issue.

Although the group believed they had collected more than the amount of signatures needed to get the vote, the chamber told them that they did not actually have enough members sign on.

The chamber nullified six signatures because the signers were not members in proper standing. Two other signers had decided to rescind their signatures after supposedly talking with the other co-chair of the Yes on N committee, Art Takahara.

Members were suspicious that Takahara spoke to the the petition signers because the identity of the signer was supposed to be confidential.

Carol Olson, the chamber's CEO and president, said that Home Depot did not know who signed the petition but had merely been polling chamber members and found out the information on their own.

But Lovins said that she believes it's too big of a coincidence that Home Depot happened to talk to the petition signers the weekend before the chamber's board was going to meet.

Despite the shortfall in signatures, the chamber's board decided to go ahead with the vote during an emergency board meeting held on Monday, Feb. 4.

The chamber also estranged those members who oppose Home Depot by deciding that more than half of chamber members - not simply a majority of those who vote on the issue - will have to vote against Home Depot in order to reverse the chamber's endorsement.

"They set it up in a way which is totally unlike any other election," according to Julie Lovins, a chamber member who works as a language doctor.

Mailings for the vote were expected to go out this week and the businesses will have ten days to respond.

The chamber's board, Olson noted, knew they were making a controversial decision when they decided to endorse Home Depot. "They felt pretty strongly that it was the right thing for us to do," Olson said.