The number one question in

our city is why do these massive stores want to locate

here if they are already so close by in neighboring

cities? The second question is what will these big box

stores do to the quality of life in Peachtree City?

Lastly, the third question is what does our city stand to

gain from having the big boxes (boxes - plural, because

when you get one the others will follow)?

The big box retailers

position so many stores so close together (saturation) to

discourage competition. The Peachtree City stores are not

being provided for our convenience. Rather, they are an

attempt to discourage competition in our marketplace. In

fact, their longing to eliminate all competition in our

marketplace is so vehement that they are willing to

cannibalize market share (take profits) from their own

stores close by. In many markets, the big boxes have

almost reached the status of monopoly by effectively

eradicating the competition. Citizens in Costa Mesa,

Calif., fought Wal-Mart because they already had a store

in neighboring Santa Ana only three miles away!

Your family might be like

mine. We moved to Peachtree City to escape the urban

commercial chaos of a large city. Or you might have moved

here from "Hometown USA" where you appreciated

the quality of life and you just could not settle for

anything less.

Another city that

appreciates its quality of life, Greenfield, Mass., voted

to keep Wal-Mart out because they said, "We're not

gaining a store - we're losing our community."

They enjoyed the small town qualities of Greenfield and

they knew that once you lose those qualities that

Wal-Mart could not sell them back to the residents at any

price.

Citizens of Windsor,

Calif., fought the big boxes and stated in an impact

study that "they had an overwhelming desire to

maintain and enhance the unique character and quality of

the Windsor community." To me, this sounds like the

approach that Peachtree City should be taking. I would

rather be infatuated with my quality of life than

saturated by the big boxes.

Think about the 100,000

plus shoppers that invade Fayetteville every shopping day

(that is over three times the entire population of

Peachtree City). Aesthetically speaking, does "dead

architecture" (what big boxes are called in design

circles) belong in a nationally recognized planned

community?

What is in it for us? The

big boxes advertise low prices. They also hand out very

low wages. Who will staff the big boxes? Currently, we

have industrial sites that are having an extremely

difficult time filling $10 per hour, full benefits

positions. Employees at the big boxes coming from

neighboring counties will cause yet more traffic

problems. Perhaps that might bring crime problems also.

Will the city get enough

money from the big boxes to make them worthwhile? No. In

most cases there is no gain in jobs - only job

displacement. Big boxes cause the loss of higher paying

local resident jobs, create empty retail space and a loss

of local spending power (since their employees are from

out of town and the big boxes send the profits to the

corporate headquarters and do not spend them here with

us).

Listen to what we can

reasonably expect from the big boxes ethically and

financially. "In Toledo, Ohio, Home Depot's real

estate manager presented the city in November of 1997

with a breakdown of the project's fiscal impact on the

city. `We estimate this project will pay about $248,000

per year in real property tax' said Tim Platt, Home

Depot's Midwest Real Estate Manager.

"Three days later, the

city's Commissioner of Economic Development submitted a

memo to the members of the City Council repeating the tax

revenue impact of `$238,000 to $248,000 per year on

completion.'"

However, "residents

found that the slightly larger Home Depot a few miles

away [in the same city] was only paying the city

$153,132." The residents used the existing Home

Depot "tax bill and subtracted out the property

taxes already being paid by a series of apartment

buildings that Home Depot wanted to destroy, the Westgate

Neighbors [residents] showed that the Home Depot tax bill

would net out at only $69,430, or 28 percent of what Home

Depot had estimated, and city officials had parroted.

"In their exuberance

to build, Home Depot had magnified the projected property

tax increase three-and-one-half times. The estimated

property tax change calculated by the citizens, and based

on Lucas County property tax payments, meant that Home

Depot's project would translate into a savings of 41

cents per year per voter in Toledo"

("Slam-Dunking Wal-Mart" by Al Norman, p. 76).

Do you think that 41 cents

per voter is worth deflating your quality of life?

Some cities like New Paltz,

N.Y., have discovered that once you offset the city's

expenses concerning a big box development that there can

actually be a negative fiscal impact.

Add into the equation the

absolute gridlock the increased traffic will cause us due

to a halt in federal highway funding along with the fact

that the developers do not give a damn and it all adds up

to irresponsible development. Please let me know how you

feel about this issue. Please get involved.

Sources are

"Slam-Dunking Wal-Mart" by Al Norman;

"Built from Scratch" by Bernie Marcus, Arthur

Blank and Bob Andelman; "Sam Walton, Made in

America" by Sam Walton and John Huey.

Steve Brown

Peachtree City

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