Walgreens in Poland seeking to extend hours for 3 nights

By Denise Dick

POLAND — Walgreens wants to extend its hours three days before Christmas, but it’s up to the village to determine if that’s allowed.

Joe Mazur, council president, said the manager of the store on McKinley Way contacted him, requesting to remain open until midnight Dec. 22 through 24. Regular store hours are 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. seven days per week.

“We have Anthony D’Apolito — he’s our solicitor — researching to see if we’re allowed to do that,” Mazur said.

When the store first opened in the village in 2004, there was an agreement between it and the village that the store close by 10 p.m., said Mayor Tim Sicafuse.

Mazur said he conducted a straw poll of council members about the issue, and no one was opposed to extending the hours for the days leading up to Christmas.

It’s a legal matter, however.

D’Apolito said he’s found a provision in the village code that restricts hours of professional services in an office district. That section, however, doesn’t address commercial- district businesses, he said.

“The council predates me, and they remember an agreement with Walgreens,” the solicitor said.

He’s researching to determine whether the remembered restriction was part of an ordinance or just an agreement.

If it’s an agreement, council can change it by vote. If it’s an ordinance, that means granting the store’s request would require a change in the village’s laws, D’Apolito said.

“That would take a little more effort and a little more intricacy,” he said.

Walgreens officials couldn’t be reached.

When the chain drugstore, based in Deerfield, Ill., initially proposed building a store in the village, not everyone was pleased.

In 2003, residents signed petitions to get an initiative to repeal a decision allowing the 14,560-square-foot building on the general-election ballot. A judge ultimately determined that it wasn’t an issue for referendum.

The size of the store also had been a cause of controversy.

In May 2003, the village’s zoning- appeals board granted a variance permitting the store to be built at just over 14,000 square feet. The area along U.S. Route 224 was zoned village center commercial with a 4,000-square-foot maximum for retail businesses.

denise_dick@vindy.com