"Great going, Amy. I have sent your mail on to some others. What else can we do?"
"I was interested in reading the article you had attached, I had not seen it.
I agree with you, we need to be supportive of those that have business in Annandale, especially downtown. I think that the city council needs to be aware of how people think, but I also think they need to put pressure on those business owners downtown that continue to be poor landlords, and require all vacancies be filled. I have heard Ben Franklin is closing due to a leaking roof that the landlord refusing to fix, let alone the outrageous monthly rent. The empty space where the dollar store was, same owner could very well be the same situation. How about the business that many years ago was I think “Village Properties” (something like), for heavens sakes, you look in the window and there is still a rotary phone on the desk, has been nothing in that business for years, my kids are 19 and 17 and neither one of them remember there ever being anything in that space, that should be unacceptable. I think if we want to keep downtown thriving every owner needs to take responsibility for their property and be penalized or something to encourage them to keep main street thriving. I have heard from many people it is too bad nothing works downtown. The city council needs a program or incentives for new business owners downtown that will help them ‘Make it’, otherwise downtown it will continue to struggle.
I don’t have any ideas or possible solutions, your e-mail encouraged me to share these thoughts."
"Yikes -- I am in Tampa working this week. I will be home Saturday and then off to DC for work on Sunday! It is interesting to me that the project has moved forward without anyone's knowledge. I would understand if it was just me who didn't know because of my wicked schedule. However, it appears that many did not know! I hate it when things slide through the cracks that have such a direct impact on our community.
I believe that dialog is important and that we as a community need to express our concerns! Is it too late? We don't need Walmart type store in Annandale. Anyone driving out from the cities can stop at Target and Walmart along the way if they want to. Once they arrive in Annandale they are happy to leave the big box stores behind and enjoy the relaxed pace of shopping our little stores. I have found that Annandale is a wonderful community to start a business in and I hate to see the unique culture diluted by a big box type store.
I believe that it was Duckwalls-Alco who setup shop in Independence Kansas along with KMart in the late 90's. The downtown simply died. At one point both family owned grocery stores closed because everyone went to Duckwalls or Kmart. When Duckwalls and KMart closed their doors, there were NO grocery stores in town!!!! Folks had to drive 20 miles to the nearest grocery store. Eventually the family own grocery store returned.
The Duckwall and KMart buildings now sit empty and Walmart opened a mile away. The downtown is beginning to revitalize itself and Walmart has survived on the outskirts of town. Many Midwest cities have experienced the Duckwall promise just to see them close several years later. I encourage growth and new development but a big box store is not the ticket, especially a Duckwalls. I have a sour taste in my mouth because our 85 year old aunt had to find someone to get her groceries 20 miles away because she could not drive that far!!! It was an awful year in which a town simply did not have a grocery store!!!
I wonder if there is a study of all the Duckwall stores that have opened in small towns just to pull out when the home office determines that they are not profitable.
Just my thoughts from experience!! I wish I had more time to research this. I work tomorrow and will be in the air flying home tomorrow night.
Thanks for taking the lead in this."
" I, too, was very unhappy when I read the article in the paper. I have very strong feelings about how this will affect our community and what makes it so special. Please let me know if I can be of any assistance. I will definitely attend the meeting on Sunday.
Thank you for contacting me."
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