Stacy Mitchell is a senior researcher with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, where she directs initiatives on independent business and community banking. She is the author of Big-Box Swindle and also produces a popular monthly newsletter, the Hometown Advantage Bulletin. Connect with her on twitter and catch her recent TEDx Talk: Why We Can’t Shop Our Way to a Better Economy. More
In July, the town of Homer, Louisiana, will become the latest in a string of small Southern communities where Wal-Mart has taken over the local economy only to skip town years later, leaving a withered tax base and no place to buy many staple goods. Continue reading
This report opens with an overview of research on the impacts of large chain stores and the benefits of locally owned businesses. It then outlines dozens of concrete strategies to rebuild the homegrown economy. Although this report was written for Maine, the strategies are applicable in other states. Continue reading
Next month voters in Humboldt County, California, will consider a ballot measure to ban election contributions by out-of-town corporations. Continue reading
Among Jane Jacobs’ many accomplishments, she mobilized her neighbors and led several successful grassroots fights in the 1960s that saved Greenwich Village, Soho, Little Italy, and the Lower East Side from being leveled for glass towers and an eight-lane highway. Continue reading
A public hearing on a county ordinance to limit stores to 60,000 square feet got a late start because it had to be moved first to the middle school auditorium and then to the gymnasium to accommodate the throng of nearly 1,400 people who turned out. Continue reading
A California appeals court upheld an ordinance enacted by the city of Turlock that prohibits the construction of supercenters. Wal-Mart had challenged the ordinance on the grounds that it illegally restricted competition. The court ruled that the ordinance was a valid use of local authority. Continue reading
On Tuesday, voters in the small town of Damariscotta, Maine, overwhelmingly approved a local law barring stores over 35,000 square feet (about the size of a medium grocery store). The vote puts an end to Wal-Mart’s plans to build a 187,000-square-foot supercenter in this village of just 2,000 people. Continue reading
By a wide margin, the Vermont Senate endorsed a bill that would require any proposed big-box store in the state to undergo an economic and community impact analysis. Continue reading
Voters in Frisco, Colorado, resoundingly defeated a plan to develop a Home Depot superstore. Continue reading
Global retail corporations are aiming to use international trade agreements to challenge local land use and zoning regulations, according to an alarming new report from Public Citizen. Continue reading
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