Newest Wal-Mart Superstore overcame bogus opposition to become a reality
| Thursday, Nov 05 2009 08:18 PM
Last Updated Thursday, Nov 05 2009 08:18 PM
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It took nearly six years, but Bakersfield finally has its first Walmart Supercenter. A far-out lawsuit and stealth campaign by a bogus citizens group could not stop this environmentally friendly, one-stop department and grocery store for low-price hunting residents of our community.
For nearly 20 years as a Bakersfield city councilman, I represented all the neighborhoods surrounding the Panama Lane location of this new Supercenter. Over those years, the residents in this area of the city made it clear they did not want another mobile home park near the freeway; rather, they desired a shopping center. I met with several developers in an attempt to turn this urban eyesore into a first-rate commercial center.
Along came Lee Jamieson, who had already developed the Northwest Promenade. Jamieson agreed to some unusual development agreement conditions. He was amenable to constructing an 8-foot (instead of standard 6-foot) surrounding masonry wall to help buffer the neighborhoods to the north and east of the proposed shopping center. Second, and a first for Bakersfield, he and Walmart accepted a condition which required the existing Walmart store on White Lane to either be leased or sold within five years after the opening of the new Supercenter, or the old store would be demolished in order to address any concerns over urban decay.
I led the Bakersfield city council in following the city's Planning Department and Planning Commission recommendation to approve changing the zoning of this property from mobile home to commercial. There was virtually no neighborhood opposition to this project.
But soon, a small group calling itself the Bakersfield Citizens for Local Control (BCLC) sprouted, led by a spokeswoman from Ridgecrest, who almost immediately disappeared. Glossy anti-Walmart propaganda pieces printed in Camarillo, the headquarters of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 1036, were mailed into some Bakersfield neighborhoods. A telephone number appeared on one of these giant postcards belonging to a public relations guy from Simi Valley who had the UFCW as one of his clients; he also vanished.
I remember opening up city hall on Christmas Eve to meet with the UFCW's local business agent to discuss his opposition to a Walmart Supercenter in Bakersfield. His concerns centered on Walmart being non-union. I tried to point out this was a planning decision, not a union issue. City council members aren't elected to make zoning decisions based on whether a potential project tenant is union or non-union. It did not matter to him that another potential shopping center tenant, Lowes, was also non-union. It was all about Walmart.
I also recall receiving a telephone call from a man representing the UFCW expressing opposition to a Walmart Supercenter who was somehow confident I was too. In the midst of this, I returned home from breakfast with a friend one day on a Saturday morning when a small group of picketers jumped out of their cars and picketed my house.
I laughed and talked to some of these folks. One young man admitted his was a member of the grocery store chain union. A blond lady who came yelled at me: "How much money have you taken from Walmart?" I replied, "Zero, but I have received campaign contributions over the years from the UFCW."
Another group picketed Councilman Harold Hanson's home the same day but I do not think he was home. The so-called citizens group also tried to recall Hanson and I but got nowhere. The bitter and ill-fated Southern California supermarket strike soon followed.
Lawyers from Fresno and Stockton with ties to the Save Mart grocery chain in Stockton eventually filed suit on behalf of BCLC against the City, Jamieson, and Castle & Cooke (a second Supercenter was being proposed for southwest Bakersfield). Both Supercenter projects were halted on so-called California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) grounds. A new environmental impact report was written and the rest is history.
Some of the greatest blight offenders are the large grocery store chains themselves. Our community has witnessed countless grocery store closings that left behind empty buildings with occasional deed restrictions eliminating any new grocery stores from going in. People should have the right to shop where they want, whether it is the unionized grocery store chains or non-union stores in Bakersfield like Costco, Winco Foods, or Walmart Supercenters.
Mark C. Salvaggio, a Bakersfield city councilman from 1985 to 2004, is now a constituent service specialist for Kern County Supervisor Michael J. Rubio.
