saul-sena’s embarrassing threat
City Councilwoman Linda Saul-Sena is threatening to “embarrass” Ikea if the furniture store doesn’t come up with a better, more environmentally friendly design for its proposed Tampa location.TBO.com put her entire letter to the president of Ikea on their website:
Dear Ms. Lopez:
IKEA sells great products and I am a loyal customer. I have shopped at your New Haven store, ordered from your Atlanta store and visited the new Orlando store. Your brand represents quality design and a commitment to sustainability.
Your eagerly awaited new store in Tampa has a flawed site plan and structure, which do not properly reflect IKEA’s values. The site plan is a cookie-cutter template which hearkens to the 1970’s with its 15 acre sea of asphalt and rectangular drainage retention area stuck in the back corner. The structure is a big box, period. No green roof, no shade, no LEEDS certification.
If you were Walmart, which does not aspire beyond mediocrity, then I would not be expecting a decent design. But you have a painful disconnect between your stated mission and your built presence in Tampa. The tone of this letter reflects my frustration at IKEA’s unwillingness to make changes. I began this conversation when your representatives came before City Council for your rezoning in the spring of 2007 and IKEA has, thus far, made no improvements.
I will take this case to the public via You Tube videos of your site and embarrass you if you are unwilling to come up with a better plan. Please save yourself and the City of Tampa the shame of mediocrity and redesign your Tampa store to be sustainable.
Most sincerely,
Linda Saul-Sena
This is a joke, right?
A City Official is threatening a corporation because they don’t meet HER personal standards?
The building plans obviously meet the criteria applied by the city. As a City Official, Linda Saul-Sena has the power to suggest changing the criteria. Instead, she compares them to Wal-Mart. If you remember, Wal-Mart was rumored to want that same site. Since Linda wouldn’t expect as much from them, I suppose they would not have received such lame threats from the City of Tampa.
And her ultimatum is to embarrass them with a video on YouTube? Whaa? More kidding, right? There is already an IKEA Sucks video on YouTube. Hey Linda, why not a blog? Oh, IKEA Suckz is already taken, as is IKEA Blows. IKEA seems to be doing just fine in spite of 181,000 google results for ikea sucks, so I’m not sure your whole “embarrass them with a video” thing will work as you intended.
And really, isn’t it a bit ridiculous to think that any YouTube video or some wacky internet blogger tucked away in some corner of the vast open spaces of the world wide web will compel anyone to act in a manner in which they are unaccustomed? Do you really believe that someone could get embarrassed because of something some know-nothing nobody publishes on the internet? I mean, really, no one really even pays attention to that crap.
Tags: city-council, development, ikea, linda saul-sena, tampa, ybor
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January 16th, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Yeah, she balls her tiny fist and threatens in a vaguely pathetic manner, but it is a potentially noble gesture. She ought to redirect her rage,however, to the city that allows such hideous development, especially since she might potentially have a little influence, know’m sayin’? But it all goes together in the wonderful circle of Tampa Bay life: clueless dumbasses in government and corporate exploiters taking advantage of said c.d. s, who were in turn put in office directly or otherwise by our other-than-enlightened and forward-thinking electorate. It’s a beautiful cycle to watch.
January 16th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
“no LEEDS certification”
“The building plans obviously meet the criteria applied by the city.”
Perhaps the city’s various criterion ought to include requirements for LEED certified building materials?? Or maybe go so far as to require the buildings to be LEED cert’ed themselves??
Just a thought…and her heart is certainly in the right place.
January 16th, 2008 at 8:17 pm
Watching local government in action is always good for a laugh. Saul-Sena needs to realize that this is Tampa, not L.A., New York or even Atlanta. I understand that local government officials would like to see Tampa strive to be considered with the likes of greater cities, but sometimes they do more harm than good for the community.
January 16th, 2008 at 8:39 pm
LOL - you all are so quick to criticize the BOCC’s clownish behavior, but is this little tantrum any less embarrassing? Enough hysteria woman - get a a grip!
January 17th, 2008 at 8:17 am
Hey Geoff,
IT’S TAMPA CITY COUNCIL
January 17th, 2008 at 8:35 am
I think that was his point.
I like the letter. Who cares why she sent it or who she is? If Ikea changes the design to make it more eco friendly and the taxpayers don’t have to chip in then that is great. Yes the letter is a little high school with threats of embarrassing the company, but how many elected officials do you ever here talking about corporate hypocracy? In the end she wants a nicer building that uses fewer resources and impacts the area less and wants the company to pay for it. How can that be bad?
January 17th, 2008 at 9:37 am
Oh, yeah, and BTW, if you want to see what power the odd Youtube video has, take a look at the tent-slashin’-in-st-pete videos from last year, and then go to St Petersburg City Hall to view Bumstock on the front steps. Those slasher vids and the threat of further bad publicity have our visionary and courageous heroes in St Pete’s exec branch crapping themselves in fear of further exposure.
January 17th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
From TBO:
“We is Tampa”
It is SO unusual to see the Tampa Tribune supporting the lackluster local land development industry. I mean that’s rare, right….?
Like I said before and based on the previous comments in other articles on this issue–”Tampa is a beggar and will take whatever development scrap gets thrown their way.”
Saul-Sena is doing what very, very few in Tampa have ever done, that is, simply DEMAND that Tampa gets a corporation’s VERY BEST store model.
The Tribune should be supporting her efforts, not chiding her in an effort to preserve the status quo where they are a supposed “top dog”.
IKEA has a better prototype than what we’re getting.
Bravo!
January 18th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Hey Mark - dumbass
Hey Jason - thank you, though we may disagree