"Stop Dollar General," said residents on the corner of Apollo Beach Blvd.
For hours Friday, people who call Apollo Beach home shouted with fury.
Their message clearly written on flyers and signs urging the County to stop Dollar General from building a store smack dab in the middle of their neighborhood.
"If your going to put something out of character here, you call a meeting with the residents, which they felt they didn't need to do," said Kendell Perez.
This waterfront property was zoned for commercial use in 1979 and sat vacant ever since. But last November, Hillsborough County has given the green light to build a Dollar General store at Fairway and Apollo beach Blvd.
"I bought my house here in 1988 because it was a beautiful community," said Jill Scott.
Scott speaks for many who chose the waterfront community as home when she says enough is enough.
"Putting a Dollar General in that spot is wasting beautiful waterfront property, it's disgraceful," said Scott.
The plot of land is surrounded by residential homes on a corner where traffic whizzes by constantly.
"When we put a retail store up here its just gonna increase the traffic flow," said Bob Moore.
Already, about half mile away, sits this Dollar General off US 41, and just two miles down from there another.
Some suggested a park, boat ramp, or small restaurant..a more fitting addition to the community.
"We just learned about this and it's upsetting that it hasn't been brought to our attention, it's been snuck in," said Alyce McCathran.
But Hillsborough County development services says because the land is commercially zoned, there is no requirement for public impute prior to approval. Leaving residents only one option, to convince Dollar General to compromise.
"It's just not fair," said Scott.
Dollar General provided us with this statement:
Dollar General currently serves Hillsborough County communities by providing its customers with everyday value and convenience through 36 stores in the area. At this time, Dollar General is in a due diligence phase for a new store on Apollo Beach Boulevard. This means we’re interested in potentially relocating our current store #8976 at 6422 U.S. Highway 41 North, but have not committed to doing so yet. Based on our current timeline, a final decision for this project is expected by early spring 2017.
When choosing store locations, meeting customers’ needs is Dollar General’s top priority. The company looks for places where we can offer customers an easy and convenient shopping choice. We know convenience is a major factor in our customers' shopping decisions as we generally serve customers within a three to five mile radius, or 10 minute drive. We also take demographic trends, competitive factors, traffic patterns and community concerns into consideration.
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