Though voters in a Los Angeles suburb defeated a bid by Wal-Mart
to skirt
local officials and build a "Supercenter," the battle
over expansion by Wal-Mart
and so-called big-box construction is far from finished.
The
non-union retail giant has encountered vehement opposition in
every
corner of the country--including Chicago; Atlanta; Albuquerque;
the Milwaukee
area; Medford, Ore.; and Liberty Township, Ohio--where it has
proposed such
large-scale facilities mixing grocery and department-store goods.
On
Tuesday, in a vote that was closely watched around the country
by
unions and land-use experts, residents of Inglewood, a diverse
working-class
community of 117,000 people, dealt Wal-Mart a devastating defeat,
with more than
60 percent of voters rejecting a measure to allow construction
of a Supercenter.
Wal-Mart's
proposal to construct a 155,000-square-foot store on a parking
lot
near the Great Western Forum, the former home of the Los Angeles
Lakers, drew
attention nationwide--not so much for what the retailer was doing,
but how.
Rebuffed
last year by an Inglewood City Council ordinance banning
mega-stores, Wal-Mart for the first time opted to bypass the local
government
and take the issue directly to voters via a ballot initiative.
Though
Wal-Mart lost, state lawmakers have already introduced bills aimed
at
Wal-Mart and other large retailers. One measure would prohibit
a large retailer
from bypassing local government in constructing a Supercenter
and another would
require such a company to provide health insurance for workers.
Wal-Mart
has faced opposition to proposed expansion in other parts of the
country, including the Chicago area. This week about a half-dozen
union pipe
fitters picketed outside a Wal-Mart under construction in Antioch
to protest the
use of non-union workers from Texas on the project.
The
Antioch demonstration comes asWal-Mart seeks to build its first
stores
within Chicago's city limits on the South Side and the West Side.
In
the months before the Inglewood vote, the campaign intensified
with
Wal-Mart flooding residents with more than a dozen mailings praising
the project
while Rev. Jesse Jackson and local community leaders and pastors
held rallies
denouncing it.
Supporters
of the project asserted that Wal-Mart would bring badly needed
jobs, high-quality and low-cost merchandise and further development
into the
largely depressed section of Inglewood.
$1
million effort
But
opponents portrayed the issue as David versus Goliath, with the
nation's
largest corporation spending more than $1 million--10 times more
than
opponents--in support of the measure.
"This
is a victory. We demand better and deserve better from Wal-Mart,"
Inglewood City Councilman Eloy Morales said Wednesday.
"Inglewood
is pro-business," he said. "This was about [stopping
a]
corporation from trying to supersede our planning and enforcement
rules."
Wal-Mart
officials said they were disappointed and have no plans to pursue
the superstore in Inglewood. But the company said the vote would
not affect
plans to open 40 of its hybrid Supercenter stores in California
over the next
four to six years.
Spokesman
Bob McAdam blamed outsiders, specifically Jackson, for Tuesday's
results.
Willie
Agee, an Inglewood Parks and Recreation Department commissioner
and an
initiative proponent, agreed. "Voters were misled by the
politicians and unions,
" he said.
"Inglewood
had an opportunity to grow and they killed it last night,"
Agee
said. "Without Wal-Mart, I don't see the city having the
revenue for parks,
police, fire and city workers. [The proposed site] will just continue
to be a
vacant lot."
Wal-Mart
Chief Executive Officer Lee Scott downplayed the vote in an
interview with Reuters following a Little Rock Chamber of Commerce
meeting in
Arkansas.
Pressure
on unionized stores
"It's
a single store," Scott said. "We have lost votes on
single stores
before, and I would assume in the future we will have some we
lose."
Bill
Dombrowski, president of the California Retailers Association,
said
Wal-Mart expansion plans are putting pressure on unionized grocery
chains.
Unionized
grocery workers at several chains went on strike for more than
three months to protest the supermarkets' attempt to cut pay and
benefits,
mainly in response to Wal-Mart.
California's
quirky initiative process, which has been used to pass numerous
state laws, in this case provided Wal-Mart with a chance to overturn
the
Inglewood council's actions. A rarely used provision in state
law gives
developers of certain major projects the option to seek approval
directly from
voters.
Yet
Wal-Mart's end run may have been the major factor in dooming the
project.
Rev. Altagracia Perez, pastor of Holy Faith Episcopal Church in
Inglewood, said
many people supported a Wal-Mart in the city, but were opposed
to the company's
tactics.
"What
Wal-Mart wanted to do is use democracy to violate the community's
democracy," she said. "Some people say they thought
Wal-Mart was great but felt
it was disrespecting them."
Indeed,
Perez said she would like to see the city come to terms with Wal-Mart
on some type of development in Inglewood.
Others
see hope for redevelopment of the parking lot, even without Wal-Mart.
"Developers
are extremely interested in Inglewood," Morales said. "If
that
piece of land is for sale, I feel extremely confident a number
of developers
will be interested."
