Wilderness Wal-Mart trial begins tomorrow

If enough of us boycott the company, perhaps it will finally pay attention to the wishes of the public.

General, exactly what have you done to determine “the wishes of the public?” Did it ever occur to you that public opinion in Orange County is not in your corner? A poll found strong support for the Wal-mart store. We want the jobs, the tax revenue, and yes, the low prices.

The land in question has been zoned commercial for almost four decades. Where were you when Sheetz, McDonalds, and other establishments came in, built stores, and started doing business there? Or are these entities not big and successful enough to draw your ire?

I live a few miles from the site. I would very much like to see the store built. It would be the least you could do as a historian to acknowledge the true facts here: that far more locals agree with me than with you.

As a resident of the town of Orange in Orange County, Virginia, I take issue somewhat with Jan’s assessment of the state of local public opinion in regard to the Wilderness Wal-Mart.

The poll Jan refers to was commissioned and paid for by Wal-Mart back before the special use permit was approved by the County Supervisors. Unsurprisingly, the poll results reportedly showed strong local support for the store. I say “reportedly” because I myself wasn’t polled, nor was anyone I know in Orange, and complete data from the poll, including the precise wording of the questions asked, has not to my knowledge ever been made public, so I’m somewhat skeptical about the accuracy of the poll’s conclusions. There is no doubt, however, that Wal-Mart does have its supporters here.

On the other hand, I can testify to the fact that at the two public hearings before the County Planning Commission on the question of the special use permit–both of which I attended and at both of which I took the opportunity to voice my opposition to granting the permit–supporters of the Wal-Mart were outnumbered 2-to-1 by opponents of the permit among those present who made the effort to speak. Granted, not all the speakers opposed to the Wal-Mart were Orange County residents, but neither were all the speakers who spoke in favor of granting the permit.

My impression currently, based on what I hear personally and read in the local paper, is that local opinion is relatively evenly split on the issue. Issues of battlefield preservation aside, the promises of tax revenue and jobs held up by the Wal-Mart supporters are offset for many of us by the strain the Wal-Mart will inevitably place on local infrastructure and the crippling effect it’s “low prices” will likely have on some of our few remaining local small businesses.

Moreover, for those of us in the town of Orange, in Gordonsville, and indeed anywhere in the western end of the County, there are already four–yes, four!–Wal-Marts closer to us than the Wilderness Wal-Mart would be. And for those, like Jan, who live nearer the Wilderness site, there are already several exisiting Wal-Mart stores within a 10- to 15-mile radius. Building yet another Wal-Mart store in the area will not provide Orange residents with something they don’t already have.

Finally, I’d like to put paid to the “where were the battlefield people when they built the McDonald’s and the Sheetz” comments. Local and national battlefield preservationists spoke out against both of those developments when they were proposed and built, but both developments were small enough that, unlike the Wal-Mart megastore, they did not require special use permits to proceed. As it happened, those voices in favor of preservation were loud enough that the McDonald’s changed its proposed design so as to mitigate some of the more egregious negative effects on the viewshed; Sheetz, however, did not and built the same sort of eyesore that they put up everywhere else they go.

“We want the jobs, the tax revenue, and yes, the low prices.”

If you like Walmart so much, then drive to Fredericksburg or Culpeper.
If you want those type of jobs drive to Fredericksburg or Culpeper. There are better jobs or equivalent postions in the area of Fredericksburg or farther north.
The use, abuse, noise and clutter on the roads caused by too many shipping trucks on them, will cause a reversal of what you think will be brought to the county because of “tax revenue”. Money will be put back into cleaning, upgrading and maintaining those roads.
Low prices, well again drive to Culpeper or Fredericksburg, they are not far away if you choose to live in Orange County. One note, when you do drive to those places hit a Target in place of a Walmart!
If the County thinks this Walmart will bring in revenue, I think they have drafted a poorly crafted type of dispensation plan that they are trying to hoodwink the local populace on.