Dimona mayor Gabi Lalouche reversed his position in the past year regarding a second mall in the town, stated Hillel Karadi today in his objection to Peretz Bonei Hanegev’s proposal to build a mall on the old Dimona Textile factory. The Local Planning and Building Committee will discuss the objections to the mall this week.
Karadi submitted two letters to support his claim. In the first letter dated February 18, 2002, Lalouche wrote to Noga Real Estate, which was planning to build a mall in Dimona, stating, “The municipality believes that there is no justification for opening a second mall in the town, and will therefore not approve more land to build a mall for commercial purposes in the next eight years.”
Lalouche’s second letter, dated February 17, 2003, to Noga Real Estate’s attorney, stated, “The Dimona municipality hereby declares that it will not promise not support a similar project. To the contrary, the municipality will do whatever it can to promote similar projects.” By this time, Noga Real Estate was in financial trouble.
Karadi bought Noga Real Estate’s project by tender for $2.5 million, and plans to invest an additional $10 million to build an 11,900-sq.m. mall. Most of the space has already been leased in conditional contracts. Karadi said the construction of a second mall in Dimona would cause him severe economic harm, especially considering the industry’s present condition. He said he had agreed to buy the project only after Lalouche had promised him that no new mall would be built in Dimona over the next eight years.
Karadi also cited High Court of Justice ruling 71/246 that states, “The administrative authority may not, without reasonable cause, deviate from the stipulated principles for its actions, and must show equal treatment.”
Karadi added that the Peretz Bonei Hanegev’s application for extraordinary use, i.e. rezoning the industrial plot for commercial use, was illegal, since the plot has an additional owner who was not a party to the application. He said the application did not include appendices addressing the proposed project’s environmental impact, and contained various administrative errors.
Published by Globes [online] - www.globes.co.il - on July 6, 2003