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'Stories from Porterville'
In 1991, Porterville residents welcomed a Wal-Mart distribution center into their neighborhood. It was a decision they came to regret.

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Merced residents suffer from some of the worst air quality in the country. Watch local doctors and moms tell their stories.

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The proposed distribution center site is currently home to 11,000 almond trees
Pioneer Elementary School is one of 3 schools within 1 mile of the proposed distribution center site.
Farmland in Merced County will be negatively impacted by a 230 acre industrial development and its byproducts.
Residents who live next to the Porterville Wal-Mart Distribution Center share their experiences with Merced residents.
Trash piled on the Wal-Mart property in Porterville.

 

We are the Merced Stop Wal-Mart Action Team: a broad, grassroots coalition of community groups and thousands of Merced residents opposed to the construction of the proposed Wal-Mart distribution center in Southeast Merced.

 

 

Barstow City Council gives Wal-Mart permission to pollute PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 22 July 2008 14:12

Yesterday, the Barstow City Council approved plans for a new Wal-Mart distribution center dedicated solely to food distribution.The warehouse, located approximately 45 minutes from Wal-Mart's Apple Valley distribution center, will contain over 520,000 square feet in refrigerated storage. 

 According to the project's Environmental Impact Report, diesel trucks using the warehouse will generate a shocking amount of toxic air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. 

 From the air quality chapter in the Barstow EIR:

  • In total, every year the distribution center's diesel trucks will generate over 550 tons of Nitrogen Oxide (NOx), including over 350 tons of NOx dumped into the Mojave Desert Air Basin. NOx forms ground-level ozone and fine particulate, which trigger asthma attacks and cause heart, lung and brain damage and premature death. 
  • The Barstow distribution center's diesel trucks will generate 556 tons of particulate every year, including 310 tons per year into the Mojave Desert Air Basin. The California Air Resources Board recently found that exposure to particulate (soot) causes nearly 3,000 Valley residents to die prematurely every year.
Concentrating that much pollution in the San Joaquin Valley and Southeast Merced amounts to a potential death sentence for our children and elders.

While Wal-Mart has talked about 'going green,' its global CO2 footprint increased 9% according to its 2007 'sustainability' report. As author Stacy Mitchell writes,

And all of these issues—over-sized stores, long-distance transportation—are fundamental to the company's business model. The best case scenario for Wal-Mart's sustainability initiative is to make a highly polluting operation somewhat less so.

But the best case scenario is not what Wal-Mart hopes to achieve. Like everything the company does, its eco-initiatives are designed to facilitate one overriding goal: growth. Improving its image and enlisting the support of prominent environmental groups are key to its expansion strategy. Since Wal-Mart announced its sustainability initiative two years ago, the company has built 285 new stores in the United States and almost 1,000 new stores in other countries. By its own narrow measure, Wal-Mart's CO2 emissions have gone up 9 percent.

  •  Diesel truck trips generated by the Barstow distribution center will dump 97,214 tons of the greenhouse gas CO2 into our atmosphere, according to the EIR.
Take a look at this map of the Barstow distribution center. A 205-lot housing development is directly adjacent to the south and east of the DC. The Barstow site is actually 100 acres smaller than the proposed Merced distribution center, and farther from our dense neighborhoods with homes and schools.

Will the Merced City Council give Wal-Mart permission to pollute our community and threaten our health and quality of life?

 

 
SWAT at the County Fair! PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 15 July 2008 13:11

All week long, the Stop Wal-Mart Action Team had a table at the Merced County Fair.

Check out our new t-shirts

 

 audrey and michael

Read more...
 
Council members visit Apple Valley PDF Print E-mail
Sunday, 22 June 2008 12:18

Last Thursday, June 19, three Merced City Council members (Gabriault-Acosta, Lor and Spriggs) and Assistant City Manager Bill Cahill flew from Sacramento to Los Angeles to visit with Apple Valley Wal-Mart and Chamber of Commerce officials and tour the Wal-Mart distribution center there. 

The trip, which cost $1,400 in scarce taxpayer dollars (according to the City), was unannounced to the public.

To learn more about how our elected officials represent us, SWAT submitted a Public Records Act request on Friday, June 20, to view all documents related to the trip, including agendas, notes and related financial costs. When we get a response from the City, we'll scan the documents and post them here on our web site. 

Read more for coverage by the Merced Sun-Star

 

Read more...
 
Thinking about working for Wal-Mart? Make sure you know your rights! PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 01 July 2008 15:07
According to a decision by a Minnesota judge released Monday, June 30, Wal-Mart "violated state laws on rest breaks and other wage matters more than 2 million times and as a result could face more than $2 billion in fines" (New York Times).
 
SWAT supports SB 1507 PDF Print E-mail
Wednesday, 11 June 2008 12:15

SWAT officially supports SB 1507 (Oropeza) which prohibits highway expansion or construction within 1/4 of a mile from a school.

Read more for the letter of support we sent to Sen. Oropeza's office today.

Update: The Assembly Transportation Committee will hear SB 1507 on Monday, June 23 at 1:30. If you live in Merced, please call Assemblywoman Cathleen Galgiani's office at 916-319-2017 and tell her to vote for healthy kids and good land use planning in her district and the entire state.

Update 2: Due in part to opposition from the Merced County Association of Governments and Assemblywoman Galgiani, SB 1507 failed in Committee on Monday. Merced taxpayers pay over $35,000 every year to fund a 'One Voice' lobbyist who helped defeat this bill.

 

Read more...
 
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The Merced Stop Wal-Mart Action Team | 1735 Canal St. Suite 13 Merced, CA 95340 | 209.723.9458 | swat@mercedstopwalmart.org
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