The Los Angeles City Council dealt a final blow Wednesday to Home Depot's high-stakes bid to secure an over-the-counter permit for a new store in Sunland-Tujunga, disregarding a lobbying blitz waged by the company over the last two weeks.
The council voted 12 to 1 to require Home Depot's project to go through a more extensive environmental review -- a move that doesn't halt the project but will require months of additional work.
The vote was a victory for Councilwoman Wendy Greuel, who said Home Depot triggered the review by performing extensive construction work inside an old Kmart building.
After the vote, Greuel said Home Depot's aggressive attempt to sway her colleagues -- a campaign that involved at least a dozen lobbyists, two of them former elected officials -- had backfired on the home improvement giant.
"Many of my colleagues said to me that they were offended by the kind of pressure and tactics that were used," said the councilwoman, whose district includes Sunland-Tujunga. "What we're saying is: We cannot be bought and sold."
The vote brought an end, at least for now, to an acrimonious land-use fight in the northeast San Fernando Valley that had touched on race, immigration and the city's business climate. For more than a year, supporters and opponents have taken to websites, talk radio and the council chamber's floor as they debated the proposed store, which would occupy a 93,000-square-foot structure on Foothill Boulevard.
The two sides worked furiously to make their case until the very end. Opponents, sensitive over accusations that their cause was anti-Latino, brought with them a religious leader involved in the sanctuary movement for illegal immigrants. Lobbyists for Home Depot went further, arguing that a vote against the hardware chain could hurt the city's effort to address global warming -- by discouraging businesses from adding fuel-efficient air conditioning systems.
Home Depot representatives said after the vote that they had not decided on their next move. But they defended their efforts at persuading council members, a campaign that involved five lobbying firms and several community organizers.
"We had a story to tell the council people, and we felt that story was important," company spokesman Damian Jones said. "We hired people that would tell that story, and there is nothing wrong, in our definition, with trying to tell that story."
