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Target ‘Coming Soon’ sign a hoax, officials say

CONTRIBUTED PHOTO — A sign declaring that a Target store is "coming soon" at the current site of the McFarland Clinic in downtown Marshalltown is nothing more than a hoax, according to local officials.

The rumor mill was abuzz locally on Tuesday night after residents spotted a sign indicating that national retail giant Target would be “coming soon” to the downtown McFarland clinic site, which will be vacated once a new clinic is opened on East Merle Hibbs Boulevard. Alas, it was apparently nothing more than a hoax.

Both the Marshalltown Area Chamber of Commerce and UnityPoint Health — Marshalltown, which owns the McFarland site, had addressed the situation by Wednesday morning and put to bed any lingering speculation after a post showing the sign in the “Marshall County Outreach” Facebook group received over 200 comments and 60 shares.

“We can confirm that is not a future site of a Target store at this time. We are in continual contact with national retailers such as Target and others to see if our community is a good fit for their expansion plans,” the Chamber wrote in a Facebook post. “In this case, it was merely a hoax and the sign has been taken down.”

Chamber President/CEO John Hall did emphasize, however, that the organization works with corporate real estate developers and regional brokers of national chains to recruit new retail options to the community.

In its own social media post, UPH-Marshalltown said there was “no truth” to the sign but added that the property was still for sale and even half-jokingly invited Target to buy it.

Marshalltown Police Chief Mike Tupper said there will be no criminal investigation into the incident, and he was “as disappointed as everyone else” to learn it was a hoax.

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Contact Robert Maharry at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.

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