Tiny California City uses Eminent Domain to say "no" to WalMart

The tiny city of Hercules (poulation 24,000) has voted to use the Eminent Domaine law to seize 17+ acres owned by Walmart to prevent the retail giant from placing a store in thier community. Historicaly "big box" retailers have used the process to force thier way in to communities, but now it seems that the hunters have become the hunted.

If this holds up it could spark a wave of this all over the US. Its interesting that the law is being used against big business this time around.

See the story here

HAHA excellent!

I always love seeing the little people sticking it to "the man" But seriously,
One of my biggest arguements that I have had about the new Eminent Domain laws is that they cater to big business at the expense of the common man.

And I really love this part


Boy they really dont like the law working against them when they spent so much time and money lining the pockets of the politricksters that made these insane laws.

Way to go Hercules, California!!

this at first seemed like a victory, but it is really just a snobby town that doesnt want to be labled poor, but rather an upscale suburban quiteville. im sure when it comes to property take-overs, walmart knows its stuff, but now they are probably questioning wether it would be profitable given the responce from the comunity.

for some reason the city of vancouver b.c has also decided to aviod walmarts big boxes. although their image is far from quite and suburban, they still prefure small buisnesses over big. mind you this was before our new conservative govrenment stepped in. i guess we will wait and see.

Major thumbs up to them. It's nice to see Eminent Domain used for its intended purpose. See, eminent domain allows the government to seize land for use that benefits the people. Unfortunately eminent domain has been used to crap on the people as far back as anyone can remember. So, if the town doesn't want a store that treats its employees like garbage and destroys all local businesses, good for them!!! Their elected government excercised eminent domain for the good of its people.

Beautiful beautiful beautiful.

Its actually mislabled as Hercules is much more blue collar than it was made out to be in the story. You want snobby in the Bay Area, come on over to Palo Alto. Also, the city of Mountain View (also in the Bay Area) where a 3br 2 ba 1300 sq. home built in 1950 will run you 900K+ did allow a Walmart so snobbery played little part in it IMHO

thanks for the follow up on this point.

btw FredT -great signature and avatar
Bob marley is one of the most prophetic people of the 21st century IMHO

doesn't that seem weird though. what sounds like a town exclusive to those that have money, builds a big box store that the residence might not shop at for trend reasons.
i dont know the area, is there a booming real estate economy?

they would not allow a big box wal-mart here in vancouver b.c that has seen similar if not higher property prices than you speak of. this town is very trendy, it is very expensive, i think that is why more people keep coming here from all over the world, and that is the way city hall likes it.

wal-marts in the areas are located in the poorer cities surrounding vancounver like New Westminister, and Surrey, which are the two poorest neighboring cities.

a new skytrain is beeing built here for the olypics coming in 2010, and instead of runnin the line right down an existing unused track, that ran through an upscale neighborhood, they are going to tie up traffic and destroy a beautifull boulevard running down a cheaper neighborhood. not because they didn't want to offend the people that had a little more money, but because that is where they would get the most fairs.

The skytrain is the same as Walmart, they will usually be put where they will get the most use.

there is no mention of the publics responce to this in the article. is city hall speaking for the residence and what is a current trend they want to see continue, or is this mearly a future projection of what things could be like. if it is the later then it is fair game, but if there is a current fashion to the city image then wallmart has no right to step in, and sweet move with the Eminent Domain claim. i have no idea what it is but it sounds like it russled some feathers.

I really think it's unfair to ignore two points that I've raised before.

Wal Mart is a company well known for mistreating their employees, and for relentlessly driving local businesses into the ground.

Would you think for a moment that this might be the reason a small town finally stood up and said "Stay Away" rather than some sort of snobbery?

Sorry, I think the snob aspect is so far off base it risks falling off completely.

While I live in New York City, I do go to upstate New York fairly frequently during the summer months and what I see upstate is a massive Wal Mart, a massive Home Depot and absolutely not one mom & pop store that used to be all over the place. They were driven into bankruptcy. As for the employees? Typically a group of people who don't get treated particularly well, don't get any insurance and with the help of god don't stay there very long.

I think it is a horrible mistake to believe people don't want WalMart because they think they're "too good" for it. Because if you really think about it, while adding convenience for shoppers it devastates other aspects of life for the community.

[edit on 5-28-2006 by Djarums]

Part of it you hit on the head. I am very very familiar with Vancouver and the surrounding area. My Uncles's "Winter residence" is in the hills of West Vancouver which speaks volumes towards hit relative net worth. It would make sence in a big city area like Vancouver to locate such shops to the suburbs which can and do have cheaper real estate prices.

To give you an idea the median price of a home in Santa Clara County (Which Mountain View resides) is about 760,000. Mountian View runs about 850,000 or so
Hurcules in COntra Costa Country as of January 2005 (best stats I could find had a median price of $529,000.00) Figure at best 20% above that. SO relative affluence of a community may not have anything to do with the rejection.

Also rich people by and large are thrifty people and save money where they can (The hilton sisters are an exception) so they will go where the best prices are. It also would be a case of "the rich getting richer" as the WalMart siphons off customers from other areas the taxes it generates for the city would go up as well.

Link

"It's the quality of living in Hercules that we're dealing with," said Steve Kirby, a Hercules resident since 1988. "One thing that we don't want is a regional-type business in there that brings in a lot of traffic."


sorry, i dont know how to use external quotes, but this was in the article, and i used it to base my opinion.

this sounds like a quiet town, like west vancouver Fred T?

they dont particularily like outsiders, people they dont know doing u-turns in their cul-de-sac's.

like you said FredT, the rich didn't get rich without chasing deals. the residence of Hurcules are likely going to drive to what ever town is sufuring from the traffic in the "regional-type businessa" areas to shop at a store they never aproved to be built in their own community. kinda hipocrtical, IMHO.

Hercules is a blue-collar town and is not "snobby". They don't want WalMart for the same reason that every other town that has voted no on WalMart does; they want to encourage Mom & Pop businesses and they don't like the policies of WalMart.

This happens in Cape Cod all the time. They wont allow any chain stores this side of the bridge with the exception of KMart.

Mom & Pop stores, and artists are big here and is a draw to our economy. I cant say i blame them, in a way.

I do travel to Walmart- some 25 miles away for the cheap thrills.

Emminent domain, the phrase is reminiscent of manifest destiny.

FredT, thank you for posting this item. I had caught a whiff of it in passing, but did not know the entire story.

I think it is great that people are fighting W-M. Using eminent domain, itself a huge issue in recent months, was very clever.

Go Hercules!

From the main article:



A similar development is being built here; supposedly almost 50% of the homes are already sold before ground has even been broken. And the small business element is wait-listed.

If Hercules has a Master Plan that included this type of development, I say more power to them. The "public good" element of eminent domain should embrace quality of life as well as tax revenues, imo.

WalMart can build in one of the other, more welcoming cities listed in the aticle. The shoppers from Hercules will still drive there to shop, believe me.

when i first heard about this i had hoped that it would get other towns thinking about doing the same thing.... but, no.

the way wal-mart treats its employees isn't a secret. its sad that so many people are unemployed that they are completely willing to take a wal-mart into their community

I still think eminent domain should be restricted just to a real public need, such as a school, bridge, etc. I don't support using it to usurp land neither for nor from business. Zoning laws can be used to prevent a big-box store from occupying a certain area of land anyway, can't they?

I'd love to see the world go back to Mom and Pop dimestores like it was when I was a kid growing up..........so much nicer back then. Not like today.
I'd also love to see Walmart, K-Mart, and Target topple.
I miss the shopping era of the 1960-1970's.
And malls need to go too.........they draw too many loitering troublemakers nowadays.
Over the last decade Baltimore has had a major rise in crime in malls. Shootings, murders, etc.......not just shoplifting. I don't remember this at all when I was young.
In Baltimore, you have a shopping choice....the throngs of trash that shop at huge superstores (sorry if it sounds snobby, but it's true), or young punk thugs and their homies that hang out at malls.

My Dad has a theory that if we go back to the small town stores these types won't bother if they don't have the convenience of shopping cheap/in bulk, and indoors (the malls). They'd find other places to congregate (hopefully in their own Mom & Pop shopping district), and shopping would resume to the pleasant experience it use to be during yesteryear. Ahhh, the good ol' days........

[edit on 8-1-2007 by rocknroll]