Two entrepreneurs, Anthony Tolliver and Ralph Duda, want the city of Springfield to rezone five properties at the corner of Sunshine and National from single-family residences to general retail.
The land is located northwest of Mercy hospital. Two other corners of that intersection have been redeveloped in recent years. One corner is now a retail strip, another is a CoxHealth facility under construction.
Tolliver and Duda want to use their 1.8-acre site for professional or medical offices, a restaurant, or something similar. Duda said the retail buildings could also include upstairs apartments.
But residents in University Heights aren’t happy about the idea. As word about the neighborhood meeting spread among residents, they started reaching out to the developers — in advance — to share their opposition.
"If you want to put businesses in, do it someplace else," said Cindy McCarty Sherman. "Don’t go into the historic district and tear the houses down. It’s just — deplorable. I can’t imagine — he obviously doesn’t care about historic homes.”
McCarty Sherman says she lives down the road from the proposed retail.
'Stealth attack'?
A few days later, roughly 80 residents turned out for the Thursday-night developer meeting. They shared even more pointed criticism. Nearby resident Don Dunbar, who’s a retired military veteran, called the developers’ plans a “stealth attack.”
Dunbar added, "That’s what my term for it would be, from a military perspective, to have gone this far and acquired the properties without talking to us about this significant change to our neighborhood.”
Later, the meeting got heated. A woman advocating for the neighborhood used an offensive term to refer to the wife of a developer. After that, the meeting ended a half-hour early.
The morning after the meeting, University Heights Neighborhood Association president Jan Peterson issued a written public apology.
Peterson declined to be interviewed by KSMU, but her statement said in part that “last night’s incivility was absolutely unacceptable.”
As the meeting wrapped up, Duda told KSMU that he and Tolliver will continue pursuing their plans.
"University Heights neighbors are very passionate about their neighborhood," Duda said. "They’re concerned. They’re concerned about traffic flow, they’re concerned about noise, they’re concerned about maintaining the character of their neighborhood. And we are definitely hearing and listening to that. We do not want to come in and do something that’s going to upset them.”
Duda said Springfield’s Planning & Zoning Commission could begin considering the rezoning proposal in early September.
