Ontario, CA. Residents Appeal Supercenter Decision
Appeal filed to stop Wal-Mart [San Bernadino County Sun]
There was little shock Friday afternoon when city officials learned the Planning Commission’s Aug. 30 decision to allow a Wal-Mart Supercenter in the city had been appealed.
“I heard it was delivered,” Mayor Paul Leon said of the appeal. “And the Mountain Village Association is within their rights.”
After about six hours of public comments - and years of vocal opposition by segments of the community - the commission approved a Supercenter at Fifth Street and Mountain Avenue.
The appeal was filed by San Diego-based Briggs Law Corporation, which is led by attorney Cory Briggs.
Briggs - whose aunt and uncle Kathy and Richard Briggs of Ontario launched www.stopwalmartontario.com - is no rookie at going head to head with the corporate giant.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Monday, September 10 | 0 comments | Permalink
Oregon State Land Use Board Sends Case Back to Medford
State sends Wal-Mart case back to Medford [Mail Tribune (Ore.)]
A state land use appeals decision issued Friday is a big win for a group opposing a new Wal-Mart Supercenter in south Medford.
Medford’s City Council will hear debate over a Wal-Mart Supercenter traffic study at least once more before a final decision on whether the massive store can be built.
The Oregon Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) ruled Friday that the city was incorrect in denying a local citizens group the right to participate in proceedings about the store in November 2005. The city attorney denied the group the right to speak during one of the hearings, saying it had lost standing when it failed to file a brief in a 2004 LUBA appeal.
But the board ruled Friday the city must conduct additional proceedings to let the petitioner talk.
A citizens group called Medford Citizens for Responsible Development, led by Talent City Councilwoman Wendy Siporen, has argued the developers of the 207,000-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter project should have been required to conduct a comprehensive traffic study for the site, which would have made the giant retailer responsible for building any street improvements made necessary by traffic the store would produce. The project is proposed for the former Miles Field site.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Monday, September 10 | 0 comments | Permalink
California Site Fight: Wake Up, Ceres!
We can do better than Wal-Mart [The Modesto (Calif.) Bee]
Wake up, Ceres politicians and citizens! Wal-Mart likes developing in small towns because it gets what it wants without much opposition.
The promises to keep the existing store, the creation of jobs and the proposed tax revenue do not provide the rosy benefits they appear to.
Forget what you think you know about Wal-Mart and consider the less-publicized facts surrounding the chain. There are many allegations against Wal-Mart.
Here are a few:
* Willfully violating the federal Robinson-Patman Act, which enables Wal-Mart to sell at lower prices than the actual cost of the goods at the expense of its local competitors.
* Reducing land values and increasing welfare costs.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Thursday, September 06 | 0 comments | Permalink
New Report Calls Wal-Mart Environmental Initiatives “Smoke and Mirrors”
A new report jointing published by 23 organizations across the country calls on Wal-Mart to reframe its sustainability efforts so that workers, the environment and communities are all respected. The report examines several specific areas where Wal-Mart falls short of its claim of environmental-friendliness. Areas of focus include Wal-Mart’s organics, seafood, wood sourcing, product packaging, dangerous toys, contributions to global warming, energy use, and waste quantities. The report goes on to incorporate workers’ rights and community impact analyses, retaining a wholistic view of Wal-Mart’s business model overall. From the introduction:
Nearly two years ago, Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott announced a bold initiative to turn the world’s largest company green. A long-anticipated fi rst progress report on these sustainability goals is expected to be released soon. In advance of the company’s report, 23 environmental, farm, labor, and other civil society groups have offered their own critiques of Wal-Mart’s approach to
sustainability.Some of these critiques focus on specific Wal-Mart commitments and offer recommendations for change. Others argue that even if Wal-Mart achieved all of its stated goals, the company’s
business model makes it inherently unsustainable. All of them remind us of what’s at stake by demonstrating Wal-Mart’s huge and often devastating impacts on real people and places in the
United States and around the world.
Click here to download the full report from the Big Box Collaborative.
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Thursday, September 06 | 2 comments | Permalink
Wailuku, HI. Law to Limit Superstores in Paradise Under Review
There’s trouble in paradise for the likes of Wal-Mart and Target. For most Americans, Hawaii conjures up beautiful beaches and far-away paradise. But the paradise in Hawaii now comes with Home Depots and Wal-Marts.
On the island of Maui, they want to change all that. The Maui News reported recently that the Maui County Council Planning Committee has taken an initial step on legislation that would amend the county’s zoning laws to prohibit large discount retailers. The committee recommended that a bill to prohibit superstores in Maui County should be forwarded to the three county planning commissions for review as well as to the Hana Advisory Committee, the Maui Planning Commission and the Maui County Cultural Resources Commission. Council Chairman Riki Hokama introduced the bill when he became aware that other counties in the state are working on similar legislation. The Kaua’i County Council in May, 2007 approved a law prohibiting retail or wholesale store larger than 75,000 s.f. Kaua’i is the first in the state to implement a ban on large stores. “I don’t have a problem being considered a protector, if that’s what it takes to protect local people and the economy,” Hokama explained after discussing how big-box stores such as Target and Wal-Mart try to dominate the regional trade area.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Al Norman on Thursday, September 06 | 0 comments | Permalink
Easy Steps for Overcoming Local Opposition
We couldn’t resist this sly commentary on big box development’s approach to fighting local opposition to their stores. This op-ed columnist from the LA Times makes crushing citizens’ groups sound so easy!
How to build whatever you want [Los Angeles Times]
Progress without strategy is regress. Time and again a new Wal-Mart or airport runway that would enable investors to make as much money as they want or consumers to travel twice as often from here to there is stalled by the Taliban mentalities of local resistance. Fortunately for America and its future, a formula exists whose careful application seldom fails. It deserves to be better known. Here it is.
Delay announcing your development for as long as possible. Never underestimate the element of surprise. This is not merely a matter of catching your opponents off-guard. Most people have an entrenched fatalism, as evidenced by the number of lottery tickets they buy. To give the appearance of a fait accompli is to take on the authority of fate. It was bound to happen. Whatcha gonna do?
Never lose an opportunity to outlast your opponents by outspending them. If there’s a formal approval process, do everything in your power to prolong it. Amend your proposal. Reschedule your testimony. The new paradigm of “let them eat cake” is “let them hold a bake sale”—again and again.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Wednesday, September 05 | 1 comments | Permalink
CALIFORNIA SITE FIGHT: PROPOSED WAL-MART PROVES DIVISIVE
Anxiously waiting on Wal-Mart [The (Calif.) Press-Enterprise]
The big-box retailer figures prominently in plans for generating tax revenue.
At a time when Wal-Marts are sued and criticized by residents across the country, Wildomar cityhood proponents are opening their arms wide to the Arkansas-based conglomerate.
If built, a Wildomar supercenter could bring in an estimated $500,000 a year in sales-tax revenue, money that could be needed to provide services to the proposed new city. Wildomar residents have been given approval to vote on incorporation as soon as Riverside County supervisors set an election date.
Not all residents are excited about accepting Wal-Mart. A group of neighbors doesn’t want the 240,000-square-foot facility on property along Bundy Canyon Road near Interstate 15. Incorporation critics have called the Wal-Mart a red herring that will never be built because the company may bring supercenters to other Southwest Riverside County communities. “We do not want the community referred to as ‘WaldoMart,’ “ resident Beryl Yasinosky wrote in a letter to George Spiliotis, executive director of Riverside County’s local boundary formation commission.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Tuesday, September 04 | 0 comments | Permalink
CALIFORNIA SITE FIGHT: WAL-MART WOULD HAVE NEGATIVE IMPACT
Wal-Mart Would Have Negative Impact [(Calif.) Daily Bulletin]
I am a member of Ontario Mountain Village Association. We are a group of residents who successfully worked with city staff and officials several years ago to deny a big-box store, Home Depot, from being built on Sixth Street and Mountain Avenue. This cooperative effort resulted in the approval of the Calthorpe plan, also know as the Mountain Village Specific Plan, consisting of a pedestrian-friendly development for Fifth and Mountain.
Needless to say, when we found out that the city was considering another big-box store to be built on Fifth and Mountain, we rallied together again to remind our officials of the agreed-upon plan for a neighborhood-friendly project at that location. Our membership grew, and we collected more than 2,500 signatures opposing this project.
We asked for a new environmental impact report (EIR) and after much debate the city agreed. When we received it last month we found it substantiated all of our concerns.
Read the rest of this story ...
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Monday, August 27 | 0 comments | Permalink
View Wal-Mart Watch's videos on YouTube