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This time, they beat Wal-Mart

By DIANE STEINLE
Published June 19, 2005

The residents of the Brighton Bay neighborhood in St. Petersburg apparently weren't expecting to be the battlefield victors when they went up against a well-armed enemy, Wal-Mart.

They sat in stunned silence for several moments last week after the city's Environmental Development Commission voted down a proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter on Gandy Boulevard next door to their homes.

The residents surely knew what they were up against before the hearing began. Perhaps they read the June 4 St. Petersburg Times story in which Wal-Mart president and CEO Lee Scott said he wants to erect supercenters at an even faster rate than previously planned - 350 of them a year. Wal-Mart has said it thinks it can have supercenters as close as every 2 miles in heavily populated areas.

The residents were aware that Wal-Mart will commit millions of dollars if necessary to gain approval to build a single supercenter. The company doesn't just hire a squad of expensive experts to press its case, it also will modify its typical supercenter size and architecture to silence critics. It will promise to widen roads, give up land for parks, build nature trails and give donations to esteemed local causes. It will do almost anything to win.

The Brighton Bay residents also may have read or heard about the battle waged by Tarpon Springs folks in January to keep a Wal-Mart Supercenter off an environmentally sensitive site on the Anclote River. Those residents lost their fight when the Tarpon Springs City Commission approved the supercenter after an all-night public hearing.

So how did the St. Petersburg residents win?

By doing a lot of things right. For example, they:

Organized a formal group and started meeting regularly more than a year ago, as soon as they heard that a Wal-Mart might be in the offing.

Collected money and hired their own phalanx of experienced attorneys and engineers to match wits with Wal-Mart's experts.

Almost to a person were models of self-control and courtesy, even throughout a stressful nine-hour public hearing.

Focused with laser-like intensity on the two or three issues on which they could mount the strongest arguments against the supercenter.

Used facts rather than emotion to argue their case.

The Brighton Bay residents also had some advantages in their battle that the Tarpon Springs residents lacked.

First, their neighborhood of about 1,000 units is directly behind the proposed Wal-Mart site and Wal-Mart intended to share the neighborhood's only access to Gandy Boulevard, narrow Brighton Bay Boulevard. In the Tarpon case, no neighborhood was directly adjacent to the Wal-Mart site and there was no shared access. Most of the Tarpon opponents lived miles from the site, making it tougher for them to claim a direct negative impact.

Second, it was easy for the St. Petersburg residents to prove that little Brighton Bay Boulevard would be degraded by Wal-Mart traffic. The Tarpon Springs residents had to try to prove that U.S. 19, on which that site fronted, would be overburdened by Wal-Mart traffic.

Third, the Brighton Bay residents got a big assist from outside agencies and organizations. The state Department of Transportation refused to approve Wal-Mart's request for its own traffic light on Gandy Boulevard. Federal environmental agencies opposed the construction. The Sierra Club fought hard against the project.

Fourth, St. Petersburg officials seemed less susceptible to Wal-Mart's siren song and did not have to endure the company's threats. Tarpon Springs officials, on the other hand, were seen as eager for development that would expand the city's tax base, even on a sensitive site, and were clearly reluctant to risk a lawsuit from Wal-Mart if they turned the project down.

Also, it probably didn't hurt Brighton Bay's cause that St. Petersburg City Council member John Bryan lives in the neighborhood.

So the Tarpon Springs residents lost and the Brighton Bay residents won. However, peace is not necessarily at hand. In Tarpon Springs, the citizen group has sued the city, claiming its approval of the Wal-Mart was improper and the store should not be built. The Brighton Bay residents are still waiting to find out whether Wal-Mart will appeal its loss to the St. Petersburg City Council and force them back to fight another day.

Diane Steinle may be reached via e-mail at steinle@sptimes.com To send a letter to the editor for possible publication, go to www.sptimes.com/letters and complete the form. Or you may fax your letter to 727 445-4119 or mail it to Letters to the Editor, 710 Court St., Clearwater, FL 33756.

[Last modified June 19, 2005, 00:38:17]