PAUL CZAPKOWICZ

Times Correspondent

CHICAGO HEIGHTS | Retail space at 14th Street and Western Avenue that has been vacant for more than 10 years is expected to be inhabited by a Food4Less grocery store late this year or early in 2010.

The City Council approved an economic incentive agreement earlier this week that paves the way for the store to take over a location that once housed a Dominick's store at 1333 Western Ave.

Mamie Yee, a real estate manager for Food4Less, told the council that in addition to an 81,000 square-foot grocery store, a gas station also will be part of the redevelopment project.

Yee said that Food4Less has about 144 stores throughout the country, including 13 presently in the Chicagoland area.

"This is a little bit of a complicated deal because we will be subleasing from Dominick's," Yee said. "They have a lease at this location through 2020." Fourth Ward Alderman Joe Faso asked Yee if Chicago Heights residents would be hired to work at the store.

Yee said that the most-qualified applicants are chosen, but that a job fair is typically held in or near the community where a new store will be two or three months prior to its opening.

The most recent job fairs drew thousands of applicants for the 100 to 130 jobs that are created by the opening of a new store, according to Yee.

Faso mentioned that a Jewel store and an Ultra Foods are near where the Food4Less would go and asked Yee if her company welcomes such competition.

"The more the merrier," Yee said. "I think it will be a stronger traffic draw for that intersection."

T.J. Somer, Chicago Heights corporation counsel, said that the store's site already is in a tax increment financing district.

"So they will receive 60 percent of the tax increment created from that TIF district through 2024," Somer said.

Somer said that at one point the city thought it was close to landing a deal to bring a Wal-Mart to the location.

"It (Food4Less) is exactly what we needed ... for that intersection," Somer said.