Construction of Flossmoor’s long-awaited Meijer superstore will begin by the end of April, village officials said Monday.
Mayor Paul Braun said plans for a groundbreaking ceremony are being formalized as work on the 192,000-square-foot Meijer store is set to begin. The store, to be built on the north side of Vollmer Road just east of Crawford Avenue, has been in the works for several years and will be Flossmoor’s biggest commercial project in decades.
Village Manager Bridget Wachtel, who is working with Meijer officials on a definite date for the groundbreaking, said plans for the store are under review by Flossmoor officials and an outside inspection firm, B & F Technical Code Services, of Hoffman Estates. That process is “going extremely well,” she said.
During Monday’s Village Board meeting, Wachtel and Finance Director Scott Bordui presented an analysis of Flossmoor’s fiscal projections for the next five years. The financial impact of the Meijer store will be “significant,” Wachtel said, especially since Flossmoor is facing a $450,000 budget deficit in the coming fiscal year and the possible loss of $470,000 in state income tax revenues that have been shared with municipalities for decades.
According to village projections, the Meijer store and other commercial outlets at the Vollmer Road complex will generate $530,000 in sales tax and $244,000 in property tax during its first year of operation. The store is expected to open in summer or fall of 2016 so the village will not receive those initial revenues until the following year.
With Meijer providing revenue, Flossmoor can expect “strong surpluses” in the village budget for the remainder of the five-year period that ends in 2020, the budget analysis states.
The analysis by village officials also speculates that Flossmoor, as a non-home rule community, could seek a half-cent increase in local sales taxes. That would generate an additional $265,000 from the Meijer complex. Flossmoor residents would have to approve a referendum authorizing the sales tax increase.
Site work for the project started last year. In addition, road work along Crawford has taken place and vacant homes adjacent to the project were demolished.
Besides the Meijer store, the plan also calls for buildings on two outlots, and a gas station. The development will wrap around the existing BP station. Two additional outlots will remain undeveloped as green space at the request of homeowners in the adjacent Ballantrae subdivision.
When completed, the Meijer store will be a 24-hour facility that will sell groceries and general merchandise and have a pharmacy and a garden center.
