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Smiley's Back
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Keep Our
City Superstore Free
Vallejoans for Responsible Growth is a grass
root citizens’ group that seeks to keep our fair city
“superstore”-free.
What do we have against Wal-Mart and its
“superstores?” Oh, you know, all the usual reasons – low wages,
insufficient health benefits, export of American jobs,
discrimination against women, exploitation of immigrant labor,
union-busting, cheap foreign goods, deceptive “come on”
advertising, saturation marketing, etc., etc., etc.
But there are local, Vallejo-specific reasons
for our opposition. Let’s begin with saturation marketing. The
“superstore” Wal-Mart wants to put in Vallejo is just one of
several it plans to cluster in close proximity to each other in
Solano, Contra Costa, and Napa counties. Indeed, as I wrote here
last year, if it gets its way, we might as well change the name
of Solano County to “Wal-Mart County.” The “superstore” it
intends for the old K-Mart site at Redwood Street and Sonoma
Boulevard would be 3.5 miles from the one it’s building in
American Canyon and, I hear rumored, the one to come in Benicia;
about seven miles from one it plans for Suisun City; nine from
another in Fairfield; ten from the one Hercules is fending off;
maybe a dozen from another in Richmond’s Hilltop Mall; and only
slightly further down the road from other stores in Antioch,
Concord, Dixon, and West Sacramento. Get the picture?
It is a business plan Wal-Mart has put into
action around the country…with disastrous effects for local
communities. With an area now saturated with cheap goods and
predatory-priced produce, competing stores and markets that
offer employees decent wages and benefits move away, leaving the
field to Wal-Mart which then proceeds to close several of the
newly-opened “superstores.” The communities are then saddled
with derelict blighted properties, low-paying jobs, long
commutes to shop, reduced choice, and higher prices than
originally promised.
Think of the businesses and jobs that would be
threatened by a Wal-Mart “superstore” at Redwood and Sonoma –
Mervyn’s, Raley’s, Albertson’s, the Seafood City we welcomed
with justified fanfare just a few years ago. Concerning Seafood
City, just across the street from the proposed Wal-Mart store,
good friends have said to me “Don’t worry, Wal-Mart wouldn’t
sell fish or Filipino specialties.” But that’s precisely what
they would sell…and at predatory prices designed to undercut
Seafood City.
And, then, there’s the nature of the site
itself – an environmentally sensitive property on the shores of
the White Slough we are attempting to rehabilitate. It is a site
that is protected in the White Slough Specific Plan which
restricts development to residential/small scale commercial
mixed use – the sort of development that, in business terms,
also jibes with the city’s plans for the commercial renaissance
of Sonoma Boulevard. We support efforts of the Vallejo Planning
Commission to strengthen the Specific Plan, in particular
removal of references to widening Sonoma Boulevard to eight
lanes. And we support a moratorium on building on this site
until such changes are in place.
But VFRG is opposed to a Wal-Mart “superstore”
anywhere in Vallejo. Why? Because Vallejo is a city that is on
the cusp of commercial developments that portend a marked
upswing in the economic well-being and quality of life for all
its citizens. I have in mind the development of our downtown,
our waterfront, and Mare Island. Indeed, Triad’s plans for
downtown and Lennar’s plans for housing, tourism, and light
industry on Mare Island have drawn front-page attention in
recent editions of the San Francisco Chronicle’s real estate
section. These are developments which will, at last, make
Vallejo a quality place to live and tourist destination worthy
of its people and location. Accepting a Wal-Mart “superstore” in
our midst, however, would earn us the sobriquet “Cheap Town” and
set us back a decade or more. Can you imagine Trader Joe’s,
Whole Foods, Nugget, or Barnes and Noble wanting to invest in a
downtown only a mile or so from a “superstore?” Accepting a
“superstore” would be the kiss of death for our downtown
development. Were we to do so, we would kill that Golden Goose
or at least the golden egg we’re incubating.
Hopefully, however, our City Council will have
at least the same vision and gumption shown by those in Hercules
and Turlock. As in Hercules and Turlock, Wal-Mart’s blue-suited
bullies have barged into town and arrogantly claimed that they
know better than we do what’s good for our city. Will we plan
our city or will they? Will our City Council members stand up as
their colleagues did in those other towns? They will if you get
involved and tell them what you want. The message? “We live
here. We know what’s best for Vallejo and what we want and don’t
want. And we don’t want Wal-Mart!”
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