A wary welcome: Coalition members invite TESCO to come to the table.

Standing in front of the future site of a Tesco market in Hollywood, members of the Alliance for Healthy and Responsible Grocery Stores lauded the British firm’s promises to uphold high standards for employment, environmental protection, and community respect—but insisted that they must be
in writing.

“While we are excited by the prospect of quality grocery stores, we are also wary of promises without firm commitments,” said Rev. Norman Johnson, pastor at First New Christian Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church and a member of a Blue Ribbon Commission that issued a report earlier this year on inequities in the city’s grocery industry.

The coalition emphasized that promises by developers, including Tesco, often don’t materialize, and that the best way for the grocery chain to win broad public support was to put its pledge to be a socially responsible business in writing.

Tesco is expanding into the United States by opening 100 “Fresh & Easy” markets in Southern California by the end of this year. Tesco promises to open stores in communities chronically ignored by major grocery chains, institute environmentally friendly business practices and create good jobs. These promises, however, have not been backed by firm commitments.

Alliance members noted that in the past, grocery chains have made promises to bring quality markets and job opportunities to underserved neighborhoods, but have failed to do so. After the civil unrest of 1992, for example, four major grocery chains pledged to build 32 new grocery stores in the most impacted areas. But ten years later, there was only one additional store in the riot-torn area. The Alliance is a citywide coalition of 25 community, environmental, faith and labor organizations devoted to ensuring that the grocery industry provides a safe environment, good jobs and more quality stores in underserved areas. LAANE is a leading member of the coalition.

Community Benefits Agreements are legally binding contracts between community organizations and developers or corporations which ensure that local residents share in the benefits of major developments. Over the past decade, these agreements have minimized opposition to large developments in Los Angeles, while guaranteeing tangible improvements for residents affected by the projects, including living wages, affordable housing, environmental safeguards and other benefits. Major developments that include such agreements are the Staples Center expansion, Hollywood and Vine, NoHo Commons and LAX modernization.

Community Benefits Agreements have also won broad support among civic and political leaders, particularly those who represent constituents whose needs have historically been neglected by developers. “I support the idea of a Community Benefits Agreement as the best way to make sure that Tesco’s promises result in real improvements for our neighborhoods," said California Assembly Majority Leader Karen Bass, whose district includes parts of South Los Angeles.

Alliance members also raised questions about Tesco’s track record, pointing to a new report from Occidental College which found that the corporation has at times come under fire for its labor and environmental practices in the United Kingdom and abroad. The report found that only about 3% of the proposed U.S. stores will be located in neighborhoods considered both poor and without existing grocery stores in a half-mile radius. The report also found that though Tesco’s U.K. employees are unionized, the retailer has refused to meet with grocery union representatives in the U.S., and plans to hire mostly part-time workers. For more information, please visit www.goodgrocerystores.org