Politics from the Palouse to Puget Sound

Wednesday, April 23, 2008

From the "Better Late Than Never" Department

At last night's Pullman City Council meeting, the council adopted its 2008 goals.

One goal in particular caught my eye.
Encourage growth, promote a welcoming business atmosphere, and consider passing a City Council resolution in support of the proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter in Pullman
Those are all worthy goals. But a resolution supporting Wal-Mart? That would have been a heck of a lot more timely and appropriate back in Fall 2004, not Spring 2008. The District III Appellate Court decision is due any day now and I'm sure ground will be broken shortly thereafter. By the time the council gets around to "considering" a resolution, it might all be over.

It should be pointed out that Mayor Glenn Johnson and City Supervisor John Sherman have been outspoken supporters of a Wal-Mart Supercenter, and councilmembers Ann Heath, Bill Paul, and Nathan Weller all ran contested campaigns in which they publicly expressed support for the retail project in Pullman.

In related news, the Hayden Wal-Mart Supercenter project is moving ahead, with construction set to get underway this summer. That's good news for two reasons:

1. The same developer, CLC Associates from Spokane, is doing the Hayden development and the Pullman development.
2. The Hayden Supercenter has been in the works since 2002. It has faced many hurdles, much worse than the project here in Pullman, including city council rejection of a rezone request and efforts by a group similar to PARD. Wal-Mart actually withdrew from Hayden for some two years. But they retooled their plans, came back, and now it is about to happen. Like I've said before, when Wal-Mart sees a market it wants to get into, it is very patient. Pullman-Moscow is such a market.

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3 comments:

Gregg said...

Can anyone explain to me why is takes the court to make a decision after the hearing back in December? I mean, what could be so difficult that would drive this to a six month decision timeframe?! Is there some huge document that is being written by the court? Just trying to understand why this painfully slow process. Thanks.

Unknown said...

Gregg, the remanded Hearing Examiner's decision that came out of Judge Frazier's courtroom is some 40 pages. Then each side filed briefs with the appellate court. That's a lot of paperwork for the court to review.

PARD has deliberately raised as many issues as possible to slow this process down. But hopefully it will all be over soon.

April E. Coggins said...

Washington state law allows for one open hearing (three days of open mike night for PARD, one closed hearing (Superior Court, who extended the hearing by six months).

That was intended to be the extent of the "rights" of SEPA appeals. That was supposed to be the end of it, as the law is written. But then there is the further appeal, which accuses the prior process of malfeasance.

We are witnessing a grind out of the legal system. It's disgusting that the Washington state taxpayer is spending money and time to defend against such a trivial group.

I hope everyone notices that the leftists can't win in the court of public opinion. They can only hope to stall and frustrate what is supposed to be an open minded system. If the leftists ever get control, there will be no open free system. They will shut it all down to promote their better ideal.