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PRESS CLIPPINGS
Getting God on side
Guelph multi-faith group takes Wal-Mart to court over plan to build store
next to religious retreat
Chuck Howitt, The Record
GUELPH (May 29, 2006)
Tucked behind a retreat centre in the north end of Guelph, overlooking an
idyllic garden and pond, a statue of St. Ignatius Loyola leans into the
wind, his cape billowing behind.
Tilting into the wind is what a determined band of citizens has been doing
for the past 11 years in their battle to block Wal-Mart from setting up shop
on a controversial site in the city's north end.
It has been a long and bitter fight that has polarized the community,
elected and defeated city councillors and filled countless columns in local
newspapers. Songs have been composed, poems penned, petitions signed and
even a book written since the giant U.S. retailer announced plans in 1995 to
build a store on vacant land at the corner of Woodlawn Road and Woolwich
Street in the city's north end.
"We've been through pretty much everything," says a weary Ian Smith,
president of the Guelph Chamber of Commerce.
He rhymes off the milestones, including four different council votes on the
project—two opposed and two in favour—plus all kinds of Ontario
Municipal Board hearings and court challenges. It's enough to drive a city
hall bureaucrat batty.
At Wal-Mart, they don't publish statistics on who has fought the corporate
giant the longest. Suffice to say Guelph has put up one of the stiffest
fights, says Kevin Groh, spokesperson for Wal-Mart Canada.
The latest, and likely the last, challenge comes from a diverse group of
religious leaders and followers who use the Ignatius Jesuit Centre, a
240-hectare nature sanctuary and worship centre located a short distance
from the Wal-Mart site.
The group's 29 members come from a variety of faiths and churches—Catholic, Baptist, United, native, Buddhist, Yogic and even Daoism.
The leader of the opponent's group, Bill Hulet, is a Daoist and former Green
Party candidate. Asked how many Daoists there are in Guelph, Hulet says he's
aware of only one—himself. But lest you think the opponents are a motley
mix of religious extremists, consider that four of them are ministers of
mainstream churches, and one, James Profit, is director of the Ignatius
Jesuit Centre.
Using the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the multi-faith
collective alleges that the Wal-Mart development infringes on the group's
right to freedom of religion because it's too close to the retreat centre
and two nearby cemeteries.
This latest challenge, filed in Ontario's Superior Court of Justice, is tied
up in the kind of protracted legal wrangling that has characterized the long
dispute. The Charter argument was launched against the city alone for
approving the Wal-Mart store, but Wal-Mart wants in on the court debate so
it can argue the merits of its preferred location itself.
Meanwhile, heavy equipment vehicles are grading the site in anticipation
that the Wal-Mart store will proceed.
Ben Bennett was inspired to write a book about his experiences leading a
residents' group against the Wal-Mart store and another big-box cluster on
Stone Road. Called Guelph Against Goliath, the book tells the story of a
determined group of residents fighting a changing cast of store lawyers,
city council foes and municipal board officials.
Bennett says he's happy to turn over the reins of his battered bandwagon to
the multi-faith group. Their actions demonstrate how broad-based the
opposition is, he says.
"From a planning point of view, it just doesn't make any sense to put (the
store) up there," he says, referring to the site at the city's north end.
Apart from the proximity to the Ignatius Centre, critics argue that the
Wal-Mart store should be located in the south end or west side of the city
where most of Guelph's residential growth is taking place.
While citizen opposition has certainly slowed the project, Wal-Mart might
simply look in the mirror to see who else is to blame. The company could
have built its store 10 years ago on an appropriately zoned site in the
city's west end. But it insisted on the north-end property.
Later, during Ontario Municipal Board hearings into its proposal and another
commercial project on Stone Road, Wal-Mart resisted orders to release its
sales figures, further tying up the issue in legal wrangling and delays.
"It seems like Wal-Mart's modus operandi is to make councils change their
minds," says city councillor Maggie Laidlaw. "They (Wal-Mart) don't change
their minds. It's like the tail wagging the dog.
Known by some critics as Sprawl-Mart, the retail giant has probably drawn
more criticism than it deserves because it is the grand-daddy of big-box
chains.
Since emerging from Arkansas in the early 1960s, the company has grown into
the world's largest retailer with more than 6,000 stores in 11 countries. It
had sales of $312 billion US in its last fiscal year and employs a workforce
of 1.7 million.
It entered Canada in one big swoop in the early 1990s by acquiring the
Woolco chain. It is now the country's largest retailer with more than 235
stores coast to coast and 60,000 employees.
While the company may be used to getting its way, it has also created a new
generation of activists eager to do battle with the discount powerhouse.
A website called Sprawl-busters.com lists more than 270 communities across
the U.S. and Canada that have fought Wal-mart and other big-box stores in
some way or another. That Guelph is included in the list is the source of
pride for some and embarrassment for others.
"I find it (Guelph) has a real social conscience. I like to think we're
different from other towns. We're not a Cambridge or a K-W," says Laidlaw.
Smith, of the Chamber of Commerce, doesn't share that view.
"We seem to have a lot of people around here who want Guelph to be what it
was 20 years ago. Everything we do around here seems to be a struggle," he
says.
Smith worries that the religious group's challenge could set a dangerous
precedent. If the appeal is successful, "what the heck would that do to
businesses in any community?"
Besides, he notes, the area around the Wal-Mart site already includes plenty
of commercial development. Woodlawn Road heading west is one long alley of
factories, stores, doughnut shops and strip plazas, while Woolwich Street
leading south into the downtown has its own share of dense retail.
But Hulet bristles at such arguments. He likens the commercial growth around
the Ignatius Centre to a person standing in waste-deep water that keeps
rising. At some point, the person is going to drown, says Hulet.
Meanwhile, the director of the Ignatius Centre rejects arguments that the
religious challenge will set a precedent. James Profit says regular urban
churches conduct their services indoors, largely shielded from the noise
outside, whereas the Ignatius Centre is like one large outdoor chapel, where
users roam the fields and trails in quiet meditation.
One of the centre's main attractions is its silent retreats. This is no
minute of silence to remember the fallen. It's major league-stuff with
participants vowing not to speak for up to 40 days.
But if a 110,000-square-foot store can be made unobtrusive, Wal-Mart is
going to try. The company plans to install a berm and sound barriers,
lighting that minimizes glow, and shielded loading docks, says Groh. He also
pledges an ongoing dialogue with the Ignatius Centre "to ensure we're
neighbourly."
If the Wal-Mart store finally gets the green light, it will bring total
commercial space in the area to 450,000 square feet. That's a lot, but it's
actually less than half the total in downtown Guelph, and far less than the
1.2 to 1.4 million square feet of commercial space on Stone Road.
Guelph's aim is to spread commercial development among four major outlying
"nodes" and the downtown to avoid situations like Cambridge, where
retail-commercial is concentrated in one strip along Hespeler Road, says
Craig Manley, Guelph's manager of policy planning.
In the U.S., where thinking has been more "outside the big box," several
communities in Maine have approved size caps of 35,000 square feet, and the
island of Nantucket in Massachusetts has banned national chain stores
altogether.
Manley does not recall size caps coming up in the Guelph debate. "You can
establish a cap, but who's to say what the right number is?" he says.
John Allan, chair of Guelph's Downtown Board of Management, isn't worried
about the impact of Wal-Mart on the core. He believes the downtown's mix of
specialty stores, shops and boutiques can weather the big-box trend, which
may outlive its popularity by the next generation.
"Downtown will always be the heart of the city," he says.
Many in Guelph speculate that Wal-Mart wants to attract shoppers from towns
to the north, such as Elora and Fergus. A store in the south end, they say,
would be too close to its Cambridge store.
Groh won't comment on Wal-Mart's reasons for seeking the site near the
Ignatius Centre, except to say, "It was determined long ago that this was
the single zoned site in Guelph that would accommodate our proposal."
He argues that the store will keep residents from leaving the Guelph area to
shop, add variety to the retail mix and lower the cost of living for
shoppers. And he points to a study by researchers at Ryerson University to
suggest that a Wal-Mart store will actually boost traffic for other
businesses in the area. The store would also employ about 200 people and
keep 200 trade and construction workers busy during the building, he says.
David Birtwistle, a Guelph councillor, feels the Wal-Mart store will give
the city a much better northern gateway. As well, the city badly needs more
commercial tax revenue to offset its heavy reliance on residential
assessment, he says.
But a Wal-Mart store is unlikely to fill the city coffers. The Wal-Mart in
Cambridge paid $525,191 in taxes last year, 1.2 per cent of the city's total
commercial taxes and 0.33 per cent of all taxes.
Any issue as contentious as this is bound to produce petitions.
In this case there are two: 9,000 signatures in favour of Wal-Mart, and
12,000 opposed. Opponents say the pro-Wal-Mart petition didn't specify where
the store would go, whereas their petition opposed a Wal-Mart at the
Woolwich-Woodlawn site. As well, the latter petition is available at the
public library for inspection, whereas the Wal-Mart petition has not been
made public, according to Sam Turton, a Zen teacher and one of the religious
challengers.
He says supporters of the Wal-Mart site have tried to dismiss opponents as a
small bunch of radicals. But Hulet recalls going to a public meeting at the
Italian Canadian Club a few years ago where there was "an ocean of people
opposing this thing."
"That's the way it's always been from day one," insists Turton.
Meanwhile, the statue of Ignatius Loyola still stands over the retreat
property. Perhaps if Wal-Mart had considered the determined nature of the
soldier-turned-saint, and the iron will he infused in his followers, the
retailer might have considered another location.
www.rexmagazine.ca/rexmagazine/issue_may2006/issue_may2006_1296321.html
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