Published in the Foothills Sun-Gazette March 6, 2013
"Activists seek to save 'historic' Lindsay building" ran Lew Griswold's headline in Sunday's Fresno Bee. He's referring to me and my attorney friend Richard Harriman, who's become very good at taking Valley cities to court for poor planning.
The 'historic' building is the classic Central California Citrus Exchange building on the corner of Hermosa and Mirage. At last Tuesday's city council meeting, the city planner asked the council to approve the demolition of that building and the construction of a Dollar General store on that corner, along with an extra parking lot on Elmwood to accommodate the store's delivery trucks. A public hearing was held on that proposal as well as the construction of a Family Dollar store on Hwy 65 just south of the curve, and various citizens questioned the wisdom of both proposals. But wisdom isn't behind either project. Poor planning is.
I hadn't been an activist on this issue when I got up that morning. I was focused on restructuring the railroad committee on council procedures that the city manager had wangled at the special meeting in January. Beyond establishing rules for citizen participation in council meetings that actually value citizen input, creating a planning commission is another way to do that. Lindsay is the only city in the area without one, and many of the mistakes this staff has made redesigning our town can be blamed on that. But the city staff didn't want public participation, and still doesn't, and that's why there's no planning commission.
Another good reason for having a planning commission is that it gives people, including the newspapers, a chance to find out what's in the works before it goes to the Council for approval. Until I looked at the council agenda that morning, I had no clue they wanted to bring in two dollar stores, and that fact alone lit my jets. But what made me take to the streets was the realization that it was suddenly the one and only chance to just say "no" to this crazy proposal.
I was aware that Pam Kimball had spearheaded a search for an alternative buyer for the building back in the fall, and I tried to help in that effort. I don't want to see that building go down: it represents what was good about Lindsay and could be again if we woke up to the importance of our agricultural base. It still serves beautifully as a landmark entrance to the downtown area despite the city's efforts to redefine us.
So that afternoon I went to many of the small business owners who would be impacted by the competition, and asked what they thought. No one wanted it, but when I described where it would be located, they said "There? Not there!" Many intelligently asked "Why not out at the old Lindsay Foods site?" Good question.
In the document the council was supposed to approve last Tuesday night, there is no analysis of the traffic impacts, much less the economic impacts on the downtown businesses, most of which are just getting re-established after the kibosh the downtown renovation put on their incomes. Dollar General has delivery trucks with 53' trailers that the plan proposes will come from and leave to the south on Elmwood Avenue, right through the heart of the business district which the city planner has tried to make so "pedestrian friendly." If the new business succeeds, it will drive out many of those small businesses downtown, making more empty buildings along the glamorized sidewalks (not to mention ruining livelihoods.) If it fails, it will be an empty 9,100 sq.ft. box store with a Spanish facade. It's a lose-lose proposition.
But the City will get a new parking lot out of the deal. Twenty-three spaces, to be exact, just one block away from the oversized McDermont Field House where they didn't plan for traffic or parking, or question whose quality of life they would destroy by going into the sports arena/event facility business there. Where they eliminated street parking and created a traffic bottleneck with the Roundabout, which has impacted the businesses at all four corners. I watched a lost semi go through the Roundabout two weeks ago, climbing curbs on both sides. Then it pulled a U-turn and went back through, repeating the maneuver. It managed to make it through without causing an accident, but it's really good there were no pedestrians that day.
Fortunately, Mr. Harriman was able to explain what the city planner's document lacked in language that the city attorney, if not the council, understood. She recommended the council close the public hearing but not vote until she could make sure that all the i's were dotted and the t's crossed. But it's a bigger deal than that. It's about good planning that serves the community, not poor planning that deranges the community in the service of a good-looking resume.
We all know what poor planning is: it's what happens when you don't take enough things into consideration and, as a result, what you hoped would happen goes south. That's what we've got here with the Dollar General proposal, and it's time we stand up and tell them we'll have no more of this, thank you very much.
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Trudy Wischemann is a writer with graduate education in environmental planning from UC Berkeley, where Lindsay's city planner could have learned a thing or two. You can send her your thoughts on poor planning % P.O. Box 1374, Lindsay, CA 93247
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