Oakley, CA. Study Shows Wal-Mart Would Hurt Local Business
Study says Wal-Mart would hurt Oakley retailers [Contra Costa (Calif.) Times]
Several supermarkets and a major retail store could close in the area if Wal-Mart is allowed to open an Oakley Supercenter.
Wal-Mart is proposing a 24-hour discount Supercenter with up to 230,000 square feet, including groceries, general merchandise and a seasonal garden center.If approved by the Oakley City Council, the new Wal-Mart would be an anchor tenant in the future River Oaks Crossing shopping center on the north side of Main Street.
An impact study released this week, though, indicates that Oakley’s CentroMart and Raley’s grocery stores might close due to Wal-Mart’s presence. Oakley only has three grocery stores at this time, but Safeway is supposed to open a store at Laurel Road and O’Hara Avenue.
“The impact on communities from large retailers such as Wal-Mart has clearly been established across the country,” said Lucky Communications Director Alicia Rockwell. “It isn’t going to be any surprise that they will probably put some stores out of business.”
The former Albertsons and now Lucky store in Oakley is less likely to face closure than Raley’s or CentroMart, according to the studies. As its neighbor in the Oakley Town Center, Rite-Aid is predicted to survive as well.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Monday, September 17 | 0 comments | Permalink
Albany, OR. Developer Eyes Wal-Mart
Developer: Wal-Mart is just one possibility [Albany Democrat Herald]
Wal-Mart is a possibility as the anchor tenant in a proposed Albany shopping center, but so are other retailers, according to a spokesman for the developer.
Flavio Volpe made that comment today. He speaks for SmartCentres, the Canadian company planning to develop a 25-acre shipping center site at the southwest corner of Santiam Highway and Goldfish Farm Road.
A preliminary site plan shows the center with one 190,000-square-foot anchor store and four smaller ones, according to the city planners who met with the applicants last Wednesday.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Friday, September 14 | 0 comments | Permalink
Labor Relations Problems in Nevada
What’s disgusting? Union busting. What’s outrageous? Poverty wages.
Wal-Mart breaks the law, gets punished, wins anyway [Las Vegas Sun]
Here is how Wal-Mart, at a cost of a couple of thousand dollars, illegally beat back an attempt to unionize its stores in Nevada:
Seven years ago, as Wal-Mart corporate executives proclaimed Nevada ground zero in an attempt to battle unionizing the giant retailer, three workers at Wal-Mart stores in Southern Nevada took the first steps toward organizing. Avis Hammond, Norine Sorensen and Diana Griego talked to fellow employees about the union and passed out fliers in front of stores, activities clearly allowed under federal labor laws.
Management stepped in. The three employees were told to stop. They were questioned, threatened and insulted, according to later findings by the government. Wal-Mart stripped one worker of his union fliers and denied another a promotion.
The union seeking to represent workers asked for help from the National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency charged with enforcing labor law. The workers wanted Wal-Mart to act within the law so they could continue to try to organize.
That was in 2000.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Friday, September 14 | 52 comments | Permalink
Concord, CA. Developer Self-Destructs Wal-Mart Project--For Now
On April 24, 2007, Sprawl-Busters reported that a Wal-Mart supercenter project in Concord, California, called the Jones Ranch Project, was floundering. Concord is 29 miles east of San Francisco, has roughly 130,000 residents. It’s the largest city in Contra Costa County. The City Council in March argued that the Environmental Impact Report did not address transportation and circulation, parking, public safety, solid waste generation, storm water and urban decay. The Mayor of Concord, Mark Peterson, voted for Wal-Mart, but he was outnumbered by 3 councilors against the plan. The city’s planning staff prepared a resolution with findings of fact to support a rejection of the EIR, recommending the Council vote formally to deny the project. Nearly five months of controversy later, the developer has fallen on his own sword. That makes three projects that Wal-Mart has bungled in Contra Costa County: Antioch, Hercules, and now Concord. The developer, Winton Jones Development, submitted the 28-acre Jones Ranch shopping center on Arnold Industrial Way, which included a Wal-Mart and a Lowe’s. Jones promised that the project would create 650 new jobs---a gross figure, not a net figure. Two days ago, Jones sent a letter to City Hall which read, “Winton Jones Development Co. respectfully withdraws its application without prejudice.”
Jones is leaving the door wide open to apply again. The Jones withdrawal was a dramatic last minute bail out, because the City Council was slated to discuss the project the same evening. Instead of discussing the project, the City Council simply read the letter out loud to the crowded hearing room, and moved on to the next item on their agenda. The citizen’s group that had organized against the store, No More on 4, was prepared to fight the retailer in court. “The quality of life impacts we feel in North Concord need to be considered first, and these kinds of big-box discount stores do not have a track record of serving communities well,” said Gregg Davidson, chairman of the group, according to the Contra Costa Times. “We are pleased that the Jones Family had the courage to end this controversy by withdrawing the current Wal-Mart project from consideration.”
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Posted by Al Norman on Friday, September 14 | 0 comments | Permalink
Lihu’e, HI. Wal-Mart Calls it Quits
Wal-Mart supercenter plans stall [Kauai Garden Island News]
The Kaua‘i County Planning Commission has denied Wal-Mart’s request to expand its Lihu‘e store into Hawai‘i’s first supercenter.
Wal-Mart says its expansion will provide a wider variety of foods and goods and at lower prices than are available on Kaua‘i today.
During a meeting at the Lihu’e Civic Center Tuesday, planning commissioners agreed with the county Planning Department’s conclusion that Wal-Mart had yet to meet all the conditions to expand its store from 120,000 to at least 185,000 square feet.
Those conditions include requiring a traffic study to outline the impact of any expanded Wal-Mart store on neighborhoods in Lihu‘e.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Thursday, September 13 | 0 comments | Permalink
Concord, CA. Developer Withdraws Plans
Concord Wal-Mart plans fall through [Contra Costa Times (Calif.)]
After months of emotional debate and hand-wringing over whether the city should allow a 24-hour Wal-Mart store in North Concord, the developer has pulled the plug on the plan.
This is the retail giant’s third failure this year in Contra Costa County—Antioch rejected a Wal-Mart expansion earlier this year, and Hercules is using eminent domain to stop the store.The Winton Jones Development Co., which proposed the 28-acre Jones Ranch shopping center along Arnold Industrial Way, pulled the project by sending a letter to City Hall on Tuesday afternoon.
“Winton Jones Development Co. respectfully withdraws its application,” reads the four-line letter.
However, the company did ask that the application be withdrawn “without prejudice,” meaning the company could resubmit this or another plan in the future.
The City Council had planned to debate the merits of the shopping center, which also would have included a Lowe’s home improvement store and an In-N-Out Burger, on Tuesday night. But after reading the letter aloud to the crowded room, the council deemed the issue moot and said nothing about the project.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Thursday, September 13 | 0 comments | Permalink
Bay Area Site Fight: Developer Deems Wal-Mart Not Worth the Effort
Wal-Mart Dealt Another Blow in Expansion Plans in Bay Area [NewsBlaze (Calif.)]
Wal-Mart suffered a major setback in its Bay Area expansion plans here Tuesday night when the Winton-Jones Development Company officially withdrew its application to build a Wal-Mart big box discount store in North Concord.
Concord residents applauded the decision to end the long-running Wal-Mart controversy, signaled by a 3-2 Concord City Council vote in March to reject the project’s Environmental Impact Report for significant inadequacies in the areas of traffic, public safety, urban decay, water control, energy and parking. Certification of the vote was delayed until Tuesday for procedural reasons.
“While No More on 4 is pleased with the outcome, the fight is still ongoing. Wal-Mart can come back tomorrow and propose another ill-conceived store. I doubt it will be the last we hear of Wal-Mart trying to build a store in North Concord,” said Gregg Davidson, chairman of No More on 4, a community group opposing the Wal-Mart project.
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Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Wednesday, September 12 | 0 comments | Permalink
Suisin, CA. Residents Fight with Local Regulations
Residents Against Suisin Wal-Mart Cite Zoning Laws [KMAX-TV (West Sacramento, CA)]
Opponents of a proposed Wal-Mart superstore in Suisun City say they have the regulations necessary to keep the big box store from moving to their city.
The flight path of planes at Travis Air Force Base runs over the proposed site, making it a potentially dangerous location. They say that aircraft parts can fall off into that zone.
Current regulations allow only 300 people per acre in the area and opponents say 10,000 or more people could be in the area because of the store
Wal-Mart owns the land on highway 12 where they plan to build, but the city of Suisuin has the final say on whether or not they can build.
Posted by Alex Goldschmidt on Wednesday, September 12 | 0 comments | Permalink
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