Nordstrom workers urge council to OK move to Gateway

It was probably the best-dressed group ever assembled for a public hearing at City Hall.

Wearing the spiffy threads commonly hawked at Nordstrom, several dozen of the retailer's 280 Salt Lake employees begged the Salt Lake City Council Thursday night to let them stay in business by moving to The Gateway.

"I promise you we'd make you proud" if Nordstrom was allowed to open at Gateway, said Maureen Andrews, a 21-year Nordstrom employee.

The employees added a human element to Thursday's public hearing on an otherwise technical zoning issue. In July the Boyer Co. petitioned the city to change its zoning and allow large stores like Nordstrom and Target to open at Boyer's sprawling mixed-use development three blocks west of Nordstrom's current home at Crossroads Plaza on Main Street.

The council is scheduled to vote on the issue Tuesday.

Many employees said they have families to support and may have to move if Nordstrom shuts down. Nordstrom has consistently said it will leave Salt Lake City when its Crossroads lease expires in August 2005 if it is not allowed to move to Gateway.

Nordstrom employees argued that their store is about more than clothes. Store employees organize blood drives, holiday food drives, give some $200,000 to the United Way annually, help out with the Boys and Girls Club and give to Brigham Young University Cancer Awareness and the Utah AIDS Foundation, they said.

"We do more than just sell clothes," Kirk Spence said. "We are part of this community."

Others wondered what the big deal was. The Gateway is just three blocks away, and with light rail and the public-transit free-fare zone, The Gateway and the Main Street malls are connected.

Representatives from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and consultants hired by the church said their plans to redevelop Crossroads and ZCMI Center will be greatly hindered if department stores like Nordstrom are allowed at Gateway. In fact, Bruce Heckman of the church's retail developer, the Taubman Co., said his firm would probably lose interest in the redevelopment project if department stores are allowed at Gateway.

The church's argument is that if Nordstrom is at Gateway, anchor retailers may not want to come to the Main Street malls.

Church consultants and members of the May Co., which owns Meier & Frank at ZCMI Center, argued that Nordstrom could still stay at the redesigned Crossroads Plaza and ZCMI Center.