Sebastopol council considers ban on chain stores

Sebastopol city officials appear close to finalizing a new ordinance designed to prevent cookie-cutter retail and business establishments from taking root in their town, a place with a distinctive personality they’re trying to maintain.

Part of a yearlong effort that reflects, in part, widespread bitterness over the intransigence of drugstore giant CVS, whose plans for a downtown store resulted in a long-running legal battle finally being settled last year, the new ordinance has been in development over the past several months by the city Planning Commission, with council input.

It’s slated to go back before the council Tuesday night.

But so far, there’s been little engagement on the part of local residents, who, one critic argues, could find their access to low-cost goods limited if a sweeping version of the new rule is applied.

Bay Area attorneys John McNellis and Michael Powers, owners of the Redwood Marketplace shopping center on Gravenstein Highway, say the “formula” for most large national chains is discount pricing.

Applying a new rule throughout the city - rather than just downtown, where, McNellis said, “it can do some good” - might eventually force lower-income consumers to go elsewhere to shop, they said.

Given the lack of participation so far by voters, McNellis also wondered what was driving the effort beyond the fact that “it’s a fashionable movement across the country.”

There has, so far, been no outward demand for new restrictions from the public, he asserted.

But Councilman Robert Jacob said the council for many years has discussed limiting formula businesses, a practice that gained popularity with the advent of “big-box stores” that can outprice small businesses through high-volume sales.

Under then-mayor Michael Kyes, who died last year, the council in 2013 unanimously approved an interim moratorium on formula businesses that has since expired.

Jacobs said he wants to protect locally owned businesses that give back to their communities through support and sponsorship of city programs from being driven out of business. He said corporate retailers take money out of the community and deliver profits to Wall Street.

“For me, personally, I’m concerned about economy strippers and those businesses that close our local, small independent businesses,” he said.

A draft ordinance scheduled for a public hearing Tuesday night would restrict development of new formula restaurants, service or retail outlets throughout the city, defined as those with standardized features that make them “substantially identical to twenty-five or more other businesses in the United States.”

The interim moratorium and an earlier draft of the ordinance defined formula businesses as those having 10 or more similar establishments. Planning Director Kenyon Webster said it was loosened to accommodate regional retailers like Mary’s Pizza, which has 20 locations, and Sole Desire shoes, which has more than a dozen but was permitted in downtown Sebastopol under the interim measure because the stores are distinct in design.

“Standardized features” would include things like signage, decor, uniforms, color schemes, menus and trademarks, as well as a “standardized array” of services or in-store merchandise, at least 50 percent of which are from a single distributor with uniform markings, the ordinance states.

The ordinance would prohibit new formula restaurants in the city’s “downtown core,” a carefully defined area that includes the city center, the Barlow marketplace and events center, and several retail centers near downtown. It extends from Morris Street and the city limits on the east to Pitt Avenue and High street on the west.

The proposal would give the city additional discretion by requiring use permits for formula businesses in the downtown area that are not otherwise prohibited, and for such businesses outside the downtown larger than 5,000 square feet.

Offices, banks, gas stations, hotels and motels would be exempt from the ordinance.

There also would be exemptions for projects under ?5,000 square feet located outside the downtown business core; projects already approved or ?developed; renovations of existing businesses, including expansion by as much as 15 percent ?or 1,500 square feet; and construction required to comply with fire, safety or disability access codes.

The challenge, said Jacob, is to devise rules that keep out chain restaurants, drugstores and other establishments that might jeopardize the downtown’s unique culture and put existing, locally owned businesses at risk - without thwarting economic growth.

He said the council has to determine, “what is the sweet spot for our community? What are the details of the ordinance that will most preserve our downtown core in a way that doesn’t stifle business?”

Tuesday’s council meeting starts at 6 p.m. at the Sebastopol Youth Annex, 425 Morris St.

You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.