Whittier neighborhood contemplates future after news of Smithfield move

It didn’t take long after the announcement that Smithfield Foods would vacate its century-old downtown site for the industry’s most modern pork plant in northwest Sioux Falls for phones to start ringing in the Whittier Neighborhood.

Some of the calls were neighbors wondering what this would mean for the area they call home.

But some calls were from strangers with a question: Do you want to sell your house?

The announcement and the phone calls have led to what Whittier Neighborhood president Lim Bun has described as “nervous excitement,” with people wondering what the future will hold when the area’s largest employer moves away.

Bun, who grew up in the neighborhood and chose to return, said the Smithfield announcement should be viewed not as a danger-filled crisis but as an opportunity. People unfamiliar with the Whittier area might begin to view it as the family neighborhood it always has been, he said.

The association board is looking forward to working with the City Council, particularly Miranda Bayse, who represents the Northeast District, and Rich Merkouris, an at-large councilor. Board members want the development process to be educational, communicative and transparent, Bun said.

He understands the attachment many Whittier residents feel toward their neighborhood and the employer that, for many residents who live elsewhere in Sioux Falls, defines it. “My own family has their own ties to the factory,” Bun said. He grew up only a few blocks from where he now lives. When his family came to Sioux Falls as refugees, his parents, aunts and uncles all worked at Smithfield as transition employment.

The announcement impacts thousands of people. If you lifted the Whittier Neighborhood up and plopped it in a vacant part of South Dakota, its population would place it as the state’s 20th largest community, Bun said.

Over the decades since its founding, the tight-knit neighborhood has always been self-sufficient. It has schools, housing, grocery stores and businesses, many of which supply the area’s largest employer, Smithfield Foods, formerly John Morrell & Co.

The century-old plant will move from a 120-acre site to 200 acres of undeveloped land that is zoned for heavy industrial use. Plans for the vacated property are being developed now, but uncertainty about the impact on a neighborhood that has been closely tied to the packing plant, for better or worse, exists.

A Whittier Neighborhood resident fascinated by data has done some figuring, Bun said, and he estimates that 30 percent of the houses and apartments there are owned or rented by Smithfield workers.

“They’re either employed or connected to Smithfield” through a spouse or family member who works there, Bun said. “We’re a blue-collar, working-class neighborhood,” he said. In addition to the employment connections to Smithfield, “everyone here is like a teacher, nurse, office worker.”

And currently they’re “just going about their day to day,” he said, although determined to keep current as plans for the someday-to-be-vacated property progress.

Discussions have begun on the Whittier Neighborhood Facebook page. “I hope that everything works out for the families,” said a resident who grew up on Franklin Avenue at a time when it “seemed like every other parent worked for Morrell’s. … I would assume the city bus system will make a new route to get workers to the new location.”

Noted a 23-year resident, there “will be a lot of changes in the next five to 10 years.”

Whittier Neighborhood homeowners are already receiving unsolicited offers to buy their residences, Bun said. He knew no one who had taken immediate action.

To help educate property owners, the regular March neighborhood meeting at Daylily Coffee featured Beth Meyer of Hegg Realtors.

“Homeownership is one of the greatest blessings, and it is a huge empowerment to own a home,” Meyer said. “If there is change coming and you’re nervous about anything, we want you to be educated and know that you hold a lot of the decision-making and that you hold an advocate in your corner that can help you do that process of deciding what’s best for you as you see your neighborhood grow and change.”

Deciding whether to stay or move will be, as always, an individual decision. Someone who has lived in the Whittier Neighborhood may see this as the time to move to a different living situation. Someone who has just put down roots may want to stay and be part of the change.

Meyer has not seen any materials distributed or heard the phone calls Whittier residents have received. Often, early contacts come from investors who might look for a deal that they can use for rental property now or resell later for a profit, Meyer said.

Anyone who wants to sell should remember they are in control, the Realtor said.

“They are in control,” Meyer said. “Don’t be pressured into that phone call that offers you what you think is a really great price. Reach out for second opinions before you make a decision on the biggest investment you have.”

Another challenge facing the neighborhood is the number of families that will be impacted who do not speak English as their first language.

“Look how many translators they had to bring in when they had an ammonia leak,” Bun said. “Until the building is going to move, I imagine a good chunk of the workforce might not be aware of anything coming up.”

The Whittier Neighborhood gets its name from Whittier Middle School, which serves 700 students who speak one or more of 40 languages. Only a few of the school’s 60 teachers live in the Whittier Neighborhood, said Erika Paladino-Hazlett. She is finishing her seventh year as the school’s principal.

Whittier Middle School is distinct because it’s the “melting pot of Sioux Falls,” she said. Its age also sets it apart.

“We have 200 kids that don’t speak English as a first language and from different cultures,” Paladino-Hazlett said. “All we have in common is that we’re all on the Whittier team. … There’s a lot of pride in the building and what it stands for and who is in it. But we also know giving our kids opportunities is really important, like an auditorium to fit the orchestra and a gym that can hold more than one practice. We love this building, but we also know we need to provide opportunities.”

The Sioux Falls School District will use the months before Smithfield moves to determine how to serve students and parents, wherever the middle school is located. The current building has 44 levels, and a task force will look at replacing the 105-year-old building along with other capital outlays in the future.

More than 100 people applied to serve on a task force that will look at those projects with the school being a big part of the discussion, the principal said. Task force members should be announced in the next month.

Probably the least affected by the excitement surrounding the Smithfield announcement are the sixth, seventh and eighth graders who fill the middle school halls. By the time Smithfield moves and a new school possibly constructed, those students will have moved on to high school and the schooling and careers that await them.

“We’re working with an age group of kids that like, they’re very in the moment,” Paladino-Hazlett said. “If something is happening right now, that will be their main concern and our main concern. I’m not sure if they recognize the importance of this change. But if we build a new building somewhere, they will be excited about that.”

Adults, however, are feeling some concern for the businesses on Rice Street and Cliff Avenue, an area developed to serve Smithfield with food and fuel facilities for truckers, storage areas and cooling facilities.

“I wonder if in that shift toward Marion Road, we’re going to get shuttered because we’re not 365 days a year, 20,000 hogs a day,” Bun said. “Franklin Market — I just picked up groceries there (recently). Can they adapt if people move away?”

Bun also expects changes along Weber Avenue, which leads to Falls Park and the Smithfield plant, and the housing along Franklin Avenue.

“Everything west of Cliff Avenue is going to get developed,” he said. “I imagine there’ll be some redevelopment into multi-level housing for more density.”