Los Angeles City Council looking for ways to block Wal-Mart from opening superstores:
The Los Angeles City Council today approved, in concept, a law that will make it harder for Wal-Mart to erect Superstores in the city by requiring them to show whether surrounding communities will be harmed by the addition of the mammoth stores.Under the ordinance, which faces another vote Wednesday, retailers larger than 100,000 square feet that devote more than 10% of their sales floor to food and other non-taxable items will have to pay for an economic analysis to forecast whether a proposed development will eliminate jobs, depress wages or harm neighborhood businesses.
This law would basically block any new stores since Wal-Mart isn't going to cave into unions. I couldn't find the exact language of the "concept" on the website(they didn't pass an actual ordinance yet), but it would be a fair guess that this is a fairly open question as to whether a superstore actually harms a community.
Posted by Bob on August, 10 2004 at 10:50 PM
