No Big Boxes in Store for Ventura Group

From his music and video stores, Ventura merchant Jim Salzer looks down a busy road and bristles at what might come: Word is that Wal-Mart is eyeing a move to a shopping center half a mile from where he has done business for more than 30 years.

Although no formal plans are pending, Salzer already is worried about increased traffic, an influx of low-paying jobs and the effect the retail giant could have on independent business owners such as himself.

“To me, Wal-Mart is synonymous with lower prices and lower expectations,” said Salzer, 63. “From what I’ve seen, Wal-Mart has lowered the living standards in communities across the country and put businesses that are on the margin out of business.”

Seeking to head off a Wal-Mart expansion, Salzer has joined a coalition of business owners, religious leaders and community activists dedicated to preventing big-box retailers from setting up shop in the coastal city. Dubbed the “Stop Wal-Mart Coalition,” the group asked the Ventura City Council this week to craft a law that would require large retailers seeking to occupy existing commercial space to undergo a permitting process that would include review of the effects on traffic, housing and municipal services.

Wal-Mart officials late last year talked to city planners about the possibility of moving to a 124,000-square-foot space on Victoria Avenue, home now to a Kmart. Under city law, critics maintain the retailer could do so with little city oversight and little regard for how the move might affect the community.

The coalition’s efforts stem from a larger campaign to boost employee wages across Ventura County, with group members echoing sentiments heard nationwide that the world’s largest retailer destroys good jobs, pays poor wages and pushes into communities where it isn’t wanted.

Wal-Mart officials reject those assertions. Kevin Loscotoff, Wal-Mart’s regional manager for community affairs, confirmed Wednesday that the retailer is looking to take over the Victoria Avenue site when Kmart’s lease expires in spring 2007. He said the company is looking to establish one of its smaller discount stores, rather than a more controversial Wal-Mart Supercenter, which also sells groceries. The store would be Wal-Mart’s third in Ventura County, joining discount centers in Oxnard and Simi Valley.

Loscotoff countered claims that the company is bullying its way into communities and that it doesn’t pay well. He said the average wage for full-time Wal-Mart employees in California is $10.16 an hour and that the company offers benefits that include health coverage and profit sharing. And he said that at recent store openings in Fremont and Oakland, there were nearly 20,000 applicants for about 800 positions.

“We are responding to customer demand,” Loscotoff said on a possible move into Ventura. “The opposition we are seeing is really a vocal minority. I think that there isn’t enough credit given to the majority of residents who support customer choice and who support competition.”

The retailer may not get the warmest welcome.

When coalition members on Monday pitched their plan for a new big-box law, council members were quick to say the city’s new General Plan contains language discouraging big-box development along Victoria Avenue, one of the city’s widest and busiest corridors.

“In American society, there’s a place for nearly everything but our General Plan clearly says Victoria Avenue is not a place for big-box development,” Ventura City Manager Rick Cole said in an interview.

Cole conceded, however, that under existing ordinances, the city would have little to say if Wal-Mart simply began operating out of an existing building.

That’s what the coalition hopes to address through an ordinance requiring large retailers such as Wal-Mart to look at effects on housing, traffic and small businesses when they come to town.

As proposed, the law would pertain to businesses seeking to occupy existing commercial space of at least 75,000 square feet.

It also would establish a permitting process to ensure that large retailers coming into Ventura would be good corporate citizens and wouldn’t run smaller operations out of town.

“This is a wonderful community, still not completely eaten up by franchises and stores that look like each other,” said Nan Waltman, chairwoman of the anti-Wal-Mart coalition.

“Wal-Mart has a long history of driving out small, local competitors. We don’t want to lose our small businesses. They are the anchors of our community.”