Wal-Marts down temporarily


The Groton Planning Commission voted 4 to 1 to reject Wal-Mart's "Supercenter", so at least for the moment Groton is spared an environmental, esthetic, and economic disaster. No doubt we have not heard the last of them.

A Wal-Mart spokesman said:

“I'm very, very disappointed,” she said, to have town staff believe the application “merited approval, and have the commission not pay attention to that.”

I doubt very much that the Commission did not pay attention to the town staff; it merely disagreed with them. If the function of the Planning Commission is to rubber stamp the staff's conclusions, then there seems little point in having a Commission at all.

This brings us to a question about the proper relationship between town staff and potential developers. A smart developer will contact the town staff early in the project and get their input long prior to seeking any formal approvals. There are certainly advantages for both sides in that sort of approach. However, there are risks for the town that don't apply to the developer. There's the risk that staff, having spent so much time working with a developer, and on his or her plans, will become emotionally invested in the success of the project. (I AM NOT suggesting any kind of corruption here, just human nature at work). There's another unfortunate fact of life lurking in the background as well. Due to our dysfunctional system of taxation, the towns will tend to embrace big box development, which yields large amounts of tax dollars with little short term fiscal downside for the town. It all comes back to the ridiculously large role the property tax plays in Connecticut. Get rid of that, and we would see far more resistance to projects like Wal-Mart's.
Posted: Saturday - February 17, 2007 at 04:21 PM          

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