[ From: "Anti-Wal-Mart groups vow continued scrutiny of retailer's Ventura plans," TradingMarkets.com, November 05, 2009, quoting from the Ventura County Star, November 4. ]


Supporters of a failed ballot measure created to keep Wal-Mart out of Ventura vowed today to continue scrutinizing the retailer's plans to take over the closed Kmart store on Victoria Avenue.

About 55 percent of voters rejected Measure C in Tuesday's election, while 45 percent supported it. The measure would have barred any new store citywide larger than 90,000 square feet that uses more than 3 percent of its sales floor area to sell groceries.

Although the measure did not mention Wal-Mart by name, proponents were among those who spearheaded the Stop Wal-Mart Ventura Coalition after the retail giant proposed replacing the closed Kmart with a 150,000-square-foot store. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has submitted revised plans calling for a 98,000-square-foot store, with a new entrance and facade, a garden center and realigned parking. The stores complies with city rules that restrict stores along the busy Victoria corridor to no more than 100,000 square feet, according to city planners.

"We will continue to work to make sure Wal-Mart has to adhere to the city's codes," said Das Williams, a spokesman for Livable Ventura, a citizens group that is part of the Stop Wal-Mart Ventura Coalition. A store boycott also has been discussed, he said.

Wal-Mart's plans also show an additional loading dock would be constructed behind an adjacent, vacant commercial building. The building, which Wal-Mart controls, likely would be leased out, according to a company spokesman.

The plans still need approval from the city's Design Review Committee. City planners have recommended Wal-Mart and the committee meet again in an informal public hearing to iron out details -- an invitation Wal-Mart is still considering, officials said.

The store would be Wal-Mart's third in Ventura County, joining ones in Simi Valley and Oxnard. Wal-Mart also has a Sam's Club in Oxnard.

Labels: Ventura, Wal-Mart, Walmart

[ From "Lompoc Citizens Against Walmart Expansion moving forward," by Robert Cuthbert, Central Coast Democrat Examiner, October 29, 2009 ]


The Lompoc group fighting a Walmart expansion is building its campaign. Thursday night the group held a meeting with two guest speakers. If Walmart was hoping this group was going away anytime soon. They’re wrong.

Elliott Petty, well known community activist, lead a successful campaign in Inglewood, California, stopping Los Angeles’ first Supercenter. In 2004 the community of Inglewood rejected a measure for a Walmart Supercenter the size of “seventeen football fields.”

According to Petty Walmart spent “over a million dollars in a public relations campaign” across the city, using “typical rhetoric that Walmart creates jobs and increases land value” in a community. The Coalition for a Better Inglewood launched a grassroots campaign that “united community activists” opposing the retailer’s ballot measure.

Petty spoke about Walmart’s Inglewood ballot measure, “With land already bought, a shopping center was proposed that included a Supercenter.” “At the beginning, the Inglewood community was two to one in favor of it. By the time we were finished the final votes were two to one against,” reported Petty.

The second speaker Santa Barbara City Councilmember Das Williams said, “Getting the Walmart expansion defeated in Lompoc is all about keeping the town's self respect.” Both speakers encouraged local activists, and citizens, that success was more than possible in Lompoc. Also, both felt the likely scenario would be, given current trends, that a ballot measure defining “big box” development for the City is likley.

Das Williams, who also works as a legislative analyst, is a member of Livable Ventura that in turn is affiliated with Ventura’s Stop Walmart Coalition. Williams explained at length aspects of developing a ballot measure to “put restrictions on Walmart's size.” Williams said he is committed and will continue to help. He suggested, “We need to tell the City Council if they aren't willing to restrict by the ballot process, there will be future City Council members willing to do so.”

In a typical ploy, Walmart seems to be stalling on forwarding information for the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) in the hope opposition will dissipate. The required information was expected by mid-October, failing that, city officials expect the next step in the EIR process will take place in January 2010. Then the public will have a second comment period on the “Draft Walmart EIR.”

With this latest morale booster the Lompoc group is showing no sign of letting up. They have over 2000 signatures, have collected donations, and continue to develop nonpartisan contacts in the broader community.

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See also: Lompoc Walmart Expansion Opposed, September 16, 2009

Labels: Lompoc, Wal-Mart, Walmart