Was the Dominick's purchase a trap for village taxpayers ?

The village is moving full steam ahead with its $6.5 million purchase of the Dominick's at Glenview and Waukegan Roads. The lessee for the property is Dominick's owner Safeway Corporation. Here is where the village might have boxed themselves in. Safeway has a net/net lease that runs until 2012. If they wanted to they could sublet the property to someone else during that time. Glenview does not want this since they have their own  view as to how that property should be developed. Here's the catch - Safeway has the right (with 180 days notice) to cancel the lease in each of the remaining years of the lease. The cost for canceling the lease in 2008 is $ 280,000 which is about what Safeway would spend in 2008 for the lease rent of $ 156,000 plus property taxes - to all taxing bodies - of about $ 115,795.76 plus insurance. 

The question is how much of a "premium" will Glenview pay to get Safeway to terminate the lease. Given this option why would Safeway continue to pay these expenses on vacant store for the balance of the lease unless they see another option. 

All of this could have been easily avoided if Glenview had made it a condition of the purchase that the sellers deal with Safeway. Glenview will tell you the sellers would not entertain this notion (which is exactly what you would say if you were them) - if that was the case then Glenview should have walked away. Now we are in the position of being a strategic (vs. economic) owner of a property that Safeway knows we really want to develop. What do you think Safeway is going to do ? Let's hope for the best.