September 30, 2005

To the Editors:

The Wal-Mart controversy has created cleavages in the student community as well as in town. Some argue that Wal-Mart is a logical proposition with the attached benefits that it will provide jobs for the jobless and cheap goods for Oberlin residents who suffer from the “artificial” overpricing of town stores that we as students create. The position of Oberlin Citizens For Responsible Development, though perhaps more theoretical, is every bit as concerned for the material well-being of Oberlin residents as our opponents. Wal-Mart exemplifies an economic model that we totally reject. Its employees in America make seven dollars an hour without benefits and the vast majority of them are on welfare even with employment. Likewise in Honduras, employees make 42 cents per hour and work 14 hours a day and women under 17. WM uses a pre-1930s model of radically squeezing employees and breaking unions, it is changing the dynamic of labor and management and playing on the circumstantial weakness of labor unions in our current time. For Oberlin, it will confer initial economic benefit while putting a ceiling on further development. Incoming traffic means nothing. People shop at Wal-Mart, eats at the lunch counter and leave. Seven-dollar-an-hour salaries won’t put any new stores in business and their employees will only be able to afford Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart products en mass function as a Geffiin good monopolizing the low end of the market. Wal-Mart may offer some benefits, but it is a devil’s bargain for working class Oberlin. Or so we believe.

The position of Oberlin Citizens for Responsible Development is not “all too simple” as the Review claims. Every disinterested individual who read the article (whom I’ve talk to) admitted they were swayed by coverage either to support Wal-Mart, tacitly, or to abstain from opinion. The column and article work together to paint the issue as human interest of bourgeoisie liberal elites versus small town populists. The editorial claims that students oppose the construction agreement for “largely political reasons.” To the extent that Oberlin is a polity, the Wal-Mart is political and political reasons are admissible. The editorial remarks lead students to believe that conflict is a matter of identity, that they will be identified with the elite if they oppose Wal-Mart. It does not offer logical argument so much as a manipulation.

City Council President Dan Gardener’s letter to the Review which appeared Sept. 23 in which he generously confers upon them “kudos” for “thoughtful and nuanced treatment of the Wal-Mart issue in Oberlin.” No one with vested interests, (i.e. Dan Gardener’s pro-Wal-Mart position) ever gets that excited by truly “nuanced” journalism.

[Edited for length]

–Edward Livingston
College sophomore

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October 7, 2005

To the Editors:

I am pleased to see that Oberlin students have begun to get involved in the local debate about the imminent construction of a Wal-Mart in town. I have been a vocal opponent of Wal-Mart locally for about a year and a half now, and I hope that students will participate in legal, responsible opposition to that development. But the most recent Review shows an alarming lack of command of the facts.

First and foremost, there never has been “a decision to bring Wal-Mart to Oberlin” by any members of city council, a fact that seems to have eluded the Review editorial board even in this week’s “clarification” of last week’s editorial. Wal-Mart decided to come to Oberlin all by itself. Cities do not have the right to pick and choose who can develop within their confines. We can enact zoning restrictions and enforce them rigorously, but we cannot deny Wal-Mart a permit simply because we don’t like them, any more than we would want cities to have the right to deny permits to, say, African-American owned businesses.

There has been absolutely nothing secretive in the city’s dealings with Wal-Mart. The Wal-Mart application for site plan approval was vigorously debated last year in open meetings of the city council, City Planning Commission and Design Review Subcommittee. Some members of city council employees of the City Planning Office did meet with Wal-Mart privately. This is a normal process in the development of any site plan proposal. City representatives used those meetings to force Wal-Mart to make concessions that they initially did not want to make. Any results of those meetings, moreover, were fully and openly discussed at numerous crowded public meetings.

Next, I must point out that Edward Livingston’s characterization of city council Chairperson Dan Gardner as “pro-Wal-Mart” has no basis in fact. At the very moment that Wal-Mart filed their initial site plan, Mr. Gardner was pushing the city council to adopt stricter zoning regulations for the property in question. Had those zoning restrictions passed, they would have at least discouraged, and perhaps prevented, Wal-Mart; among them was a limit of 100,000 square feet for any retail space. (The store that Wal-Mart plans to build is approximately 155,000 square feet). Even after Wal-Mart filed their initial application, Mr. Gardner led the charge to approve the new restrictions, in the hope that they could be applied retroactively to Wal-Mart. Alas, he was a minority vote on the Council that night. (For those who are interested in such matters, Councilperson Sandberg was absent due to a religious observance; Councilperson Peterson was also absent.) Mr. Livingston’s characterization of Mr. Gardner demonstrates a thorough ignorance of the events of last year’s council meetings.

Students should also know that Wal-Mart threatened both the city council and the City Planning Commission with legal action if those bodies did not give in and approve Wal-Mart’s initial plans. To their credit, our city officials stood their ground and insisted that Wal-Mart meet Oberlin’s zoning requirements to the letter. In fact, Wal-Mart has granted the city concessions that go beyond our zoning requirements and that we could not legally insist on. These concessions were won by a process of hard negotiation in the face of threats from Wal-Mart’s legal bullies.

Please also be aware that Avon resident and lawyer Jerry Phillips is not the arbiter of truth on these issues. Mr. Phillips has, regrettably, been hired by a group of well-meaning citizens (Oberlin Citizens for Responsible Development). In that capacity he has engaged in a series of lawsuits against the city. I will not comment on the merit of these suits beyond pointing out that the first was summarily dismissed (currently under appeal), the second, denied by the Ohio Supreme Court. I dissociated myself from OCRD when they chose to hire Mr. Phillips, because I came to the conclusion that I could not trust him or work with him. I urge Oberlin students and residents to look at his record carefully before joining in his tactics.

Last: Wal-Mart is a despicable company. Their business practices are appalling, their record of labor violations is incredible (over 60 violations filed with the National Labor Review Board) and their record of hiring and promotion has shown clear, systemic racism and sexism. They are currently the defendant in the largest sex-discrimination class action suit in American history. Their effect on small towns and rural counties has been well-documented: study after study shows that after Wal-Mart moves in, towns lose local businesses, average wages go down and poverty increases. For all these reasons and more I hope that Oberlin residents and Oberlin College students will join together to oppose Wal-Mart. But please, do so in full knowledge of the facts and don’t rely on a hired gun like Mr. Phillips to give you your information. City council meetings are open to the public.

I am afraid that the Wal-Mart development will go forward. If it does, I believe that the best thing we as citizens of Oberlin can do is to boycott the store and help educate the community about Wal-Mart’s failings. It is also crucial that we continue to support locally-owned businesses. I hope Oberlin students and the OCRD will join me, and other concerned citizens like me, in this endeavor.

–Kirk Ormand
Associate Professor of Classics

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October 14, 2005

To the Editors:

I’m writing in response to your recent coverage of Wal-Mart’s plans to build a store in Oberlin. I want to set the record straight about our work with the Planning Commission, Design Review Committee and Oberlin City Council.

Wal-Mart has worked extensively with the city of Oberlin to develop this site for more than a year. Opponents have suggested we are not working within the democratic process. Like a lot of their arguments, this is simply false.

A recent letter to the editor also suggested that Wal-Mart had somehow obtained approval by threatening lawsuits. Given the facts of the situation in Oberlin, this allegation is beyond outrageous. In fact, just the opposite is true — our project has been delayed by frivolous actions and threats of lawsuits by the opposition who have tied up the process and wasted taxpayers’ money on legal fees battling with their reprehensible tactics.

The letter writer may be confusing Wal-Mart’s actions with those of a group calling itself Oberlin Citizens for Responsible Development. This group hired an attorney who did not participate in most of the public hearings, then began filing frivolous actions to try to overturn the city’s decisions. Fortunately, the court agreed and dismissed the lawsuit. This is the same attorney, by the way, who challenged two members of council, resulting in one’s resignation and the other’s absence from the ballot. And the letter writer calls Wal-Mart a bully!

The city’s approval process has never been a secret, as some have claimed. Wal-Mart submitted a preliminary site plan to the Planning Commission in February 2004. We participated in several public hearings, and even held a special open forum with residents to discuss the site plan. We made numerous changes to our original proposal to incorporate residents’ suggestions and many of the city’s new design guidelines — something we were not obligated to do, as our plans were submitted well before these guidelines were adopted. Wal-Mart went so far as to take out full-page ads in the local newspaper encouraging members of the community to participate in the public hearings. We did this because we wanted an open dialogue with Oberlin residents.

I also would like to refute several of the statements in the article about a proposed living wage ordinance. As one of the world’s most visible companies, Wal-Mart expects attention and criticism. When the criticism is warranted, we use it was a tool to improve the way we operate. But, when special interest groups and critics spread misinformation about Wal-Mart, the public deserves to hear the truth.

The truth is Wal-Mart provides value for customers, opportunities for our workforce, economic support for communities and a helping hand for charities across America.

Wal-Mart provides good jobs with excellent advancement opportunities to our more than 1.2 million U.S. associates. We bring good jobs to people who need them — jobs with competitive wages, benefits and career opportunities. It is not uncommon to have thousands of people standing in line to apply for a job when we open a new facility. This tells us that they want our jobs and that we fulfill a need — whether that be a career opportunity, a move up on the economic ladder or whatever.

Today, the majority of Wal-Mart’s hourly store associates in the United States work full-time, unlike many other retailers who employ part-time workers. A typical new Wal-Mart Supercenter — like the one to be built in Oberlin — will create about 350 jobs paying a competitive wage. In Ohio, the average wage for regular full-time hourly associates is $9.46 per hour, almost twice the federal minimum wage. Your story claims this rate is $2.60 lower than the national retail average, which is not true. According to the National Retail Federation, the national average is $9.77 — and that includes parts of the country where the cost of living is significantly higher than it is in Northeast Ohio.

There are many other inaccuracies in your story. I’d like to address two of the more serious charges — about health care benefits and discrimination.

Wal-Mart provides affordable health care insurance. And we offer something that many other plans do not — unlimited coverage of expenses after one year on the plan. Wal-Mart provides health care insurance to more than 948,000 Americans, including 568,000 associates.

Wal-Mart does not tolerate discrimination of any kind. While it’s true that we have been named in lawsuits, Wal-Mart disputes the allegations. Wal-Mart is a great place for women to work, and isolated complaints that arise from our 3,600 U.S. stores do not change this fact. There are hundreds of thousands of women who have wonderful stories to tell about what our company has meant to them.

Wal-Mart is a good neighbor through economic support and charitable giving. A Wal-Mart facility provides hundreds of jobs and supports communities financially through sales tax revenue, property taxes and community giving. We look forward to serving our many loyal customers in Oberlin.

–Philip Serghini
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.

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November 4, 2005

To the Editors:

I am writing in response to the letter from Wal-Mart representative Philip Serghini.

Before any Oberlin student hangs their head in shame and regrets saying anything mean about Wal-Mart, I feel compelled to analyze Mr. Serghini’s argument. Serghini states that “Wal-Mart provides good jobs...Wal-Mart provides affordable health care [sic] insurance...Wal-Mart does not tolerate discrimination of any kind.” If these statements are true, one is lead to believe that Wal-Mart is an ethical company and every person should strive to shop at, and work for, Wal-Mart.

Let us look at the first argument that “Wal-Mart provides good jobs.” If Mr. Serghini considers it to be a good job to work in a sweatshop that Wal-Mart purchases its products from, I encourage Mr. Serghini to take this form of employment. The reason that Wal-Mart is able to provide many of its products at extremely low prices is because they are made with cheap materials, with cheap labor, in terrible working conditions. This sweatshop job is one of the many secondary jobs that Wal-Mart provides to citizens around the globe. Looking at the actual jobs that Wal-Mart provides its employees, I would again offer Mr. Serghini to take any of the actual store-keeping jobs of his choosing. Perhaps Mr. Serghini would enjoy the feeling of security Wal-Mart provides its employees when it locks them in their own stores to prevent them from stealing any products. Perhaps Mr. Serghini would enjoy working as a janitor at one of the janitorial firms that Wal-Mart contracts with that have been found guilty of many labor violations. All of these are indeed jobs that Wal-Mart provides, but I will leave it to others to determine whether they are in fact good.

In a closer examination of Mr. Serghini’s second argument that “Wal-Mart provides affordable health care [sic] insurance,” I would again offer Mr. Serghini the option of taking the health care plan his employer provides its storekeepers. According to the Oct. 17, 2005 edition of The New York Times, the states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland are in the midst of litigation efforts that are trying to force Wal-Mart to provide insurance to its workers. According to the Times, “9000 Wal-Mart workers needed public insurance in Wisconsin, and that more than 10,000 children of the store’s workers in Georgia were treated at taxpayer expense.” If I owned a business, I for one would certainly be concerned for my employees, my employees’ children and the health care they received; can Wal-Mart really say the same?

Furthermore, if Wal-Mart truly “doesn’t tolerate discrimination of any kind,” it makes one wonder why according to the July 14, 2005 New York Times, two truckers sued Wal-Mart for hiring bias. It also makes one wonder why Wal-Mart agreed to pay $11 million to the federal government when they admitted they used illegal immigrants to clean their stores. It further makes one wonder why the largest class action lawsuit in American history was filed against Wal-Mart by women employees who claim they have been sexually discriminated by the company. While these may be some of the “isolated incidents” that Mr. Serghini admits to in his letter, they are only a few of the 19 articles that popped up on the New York Times archive that detail discrimination lawsuits against Wal-Mart.

–Benjamin Klebanoff
College first-year

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October 14, 2005

To the Editors:

I face a predicament in the upcoming election. As a member of a union (OCOPE), I find the hiring practices of Wal-Mart abominable, but as a 20+ year resident of the city of Oberlin, I find the activities of the Oberlin Citizens for Responsible Development almost equally despicable.

Wal-Mart is coming to Rte. 58, a parcel of land that has already been zoned commercial. How can Oberlin legally prevent it from coming? Even if Oberlin could prevent Wal-Mart from building there, what good would it do the city? Wal-Mart already has a store less than ten miles away and is planning to build two more within a similar distance. The only thing Oberlin will do by preventing the store from building on Rte. 58 is to keep much needed tax money out of the city.

The concept of a living wage, though admirable, is delusional. And in this case, it is directed especially at Wal-Mart, even though OCRD may deny it. Does anyone really think that Wal-Mart will not hire a high school or college student to avoid the higher wages it would have to pay someone with a family? How would this improve the unemployment rate in the city? The Wal-Mart debate presents a class issue in American society. The intellectual elite oppose it for philosophical reasons, but the lower classes embrace Wal-Mart for practical reasons: they maybe can get a job there that they may not be able to find anywhere else, and they can afford the merchandise. The only way a living wage is going to be workable is if it is applied universally as a minimum wage.

It would be good for The Oberlin Review at some point before the election to present the other side of the issue. College students’ votes are a valuable part of the civic process in Oberlin, but if students are not well informed of all sides of the issues, their votes are not helping the city.

–Ellen F. Broadwell
Library Technician