On a 9-8 vote, vows to find an alternative for the former Hi-Lo site that won't turn Hyde Square into a gentrified pocket of rich white people, which it says Whole Foods would do, Jamaica Plain Patch reports.
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Comments
Racism
By anon5
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 6:15pm
You can't be racist against a white person. Racism is about power and as a whole white people continue to hold all of the institutional power (Wall St., Congress, media outlets, etc.). Discrimination is a entirely different thing.
Racism.
By Jonathan Bowen
Thu, 03/10/2011 - 12:48pm
You can't be racist against a white person? Possibly the most ignorant statement I have ever read.
Trololo
By willisan
Thu, 03/10/2011 - 2:45pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwGFalTRHDA
JPNC just got everyones attention
By JP-Stonybrook
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 11:46am
Not in a good way. As a homeowner in JP, I haven't paid any attention to these goofballs in the 7 years we've been here. Now they have my attention and I will make a point to oppose them at every opportunity in the future. I plan to find out who voted against Whole Foods and make sure everyone knows about it. If this vocal minority of nitwits manages to scuttle this (which I highly doubt), they are going to be pariahs to every JP resident that isn't brain dead or a professional victim.
I believe Whole Foods is the
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 11:47am
I believe Whole Foods is the only supermarket so far to sign on to work with this fair food campaign, which Trader Joe's and Stop and Shop, among others, have refused to do.
http://www.ciw-online.org/101.html#cff
http://www.ciw-online.org/index.html
Gotta love the rush of right
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 11:52am
Gotta love the rush of right wing free trade capitalists this subject brings out. Enough with this community activism crap - money is power!
Free Jamaica Plain from left wing kooks - what's good for Whole Foods is good for America!
The problem with this community activism
By roadman
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:20pm
is that the JPNC has no real and tangible facts to base their opposition to Whole Foods on.
Clearly, the burden of proof here should be on the JPNC to defend their claims beyond a reasonable doubt, and not on Whole Foods to be responsible to refute the JPNC's unsubstantiated claims.
Who are you calling right wing?
By JP-Stonybrook
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:36pm
Not me. But, I am a capitalist. Here's a tip smelly hippie (since we're stereotyping and all): Money IS power. The power to buy things. If you don't have the power (money) to buy the property that Hi-Lo occupied, then you can forget about telling the owner what to do with it as long as it conforms to local laws. So, you can cry about it all you want, but there is nothing more you can do about it. That's the way the world works brah. You can deal with it or move to a commune. Don't like Whole Foods, don't shop there.
I just think
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:47pm
That the old Hi-Lo location would be put to better use as a community farm. Why pay for food at all when we can grow it?
It would be too small to
By HenryAlan
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:06pm
It would be too small to serve the local population. If you want to support local agriculture, the best approach is a grocery store that intentionally looks for locally sourced produce. I wonder, is there such a store, one that might be willing to open at this very location?
Brilliant plan!
By Anon²
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:19pm
Seeing how a modern supermarket probably ships in more produce a week, than the property's size would be able to produce in a year, I don't think that's such a hot idea.
Points for thinking outside the box, but infeasible
I think the old anon homestead would
By JP-Stonybrook
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:34pm
be put to better use as a compost dump. Does that work for you? You seem to think you should have a say in what other people can do with their property.
And let's add to this the power of the market
By HenryAlan
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:55pm
The reason Whole Foods wants to set up shop, is because there are already people in JP who want to spend money there. It's not just the power that Whole Foods has by virtue of the corporate balance sheet. It's the power of a neighborhood that has enough money and desire to spend it on Whole Foods' offerings.
So when the dirty hippies come out of the wood work to call us conservatives, they really just illustrate that they fail to get the way our economy works, and they fail to get that it is their very neighbors who are making JP attractive to Whole Foods. That said, there is a valid argument to be made regarding gentrification crowding out working class residents. Whole Foods is a symptom, though, not the cause. As somebody else has suggested, it would be far better to place effort on other economic justice (trying for some hippy street cred.) issues like housing and transportation.
Hi
By Anon²
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:16pm
You're not helping.
May I suggest the pen where we also keep the teahadists?
This has gotten ridiculous.
By Sally
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:01pm
I am so tired of people beating this dead horse. It seems to be a tiny sliver of vocal residents who are all up in arms to prevent WF from coming to Hyde Square. I certainly didn't see flyers on this meeting and frankly I'm shocked by the non-constructive, negative and narrow-minded approach taken by the opponents of the market, not to mention the assumptions made that the Latino community is a. not interested in or deserving of higher-quality food and b. Is not resilient enough to respond to this issue on their own. We've heard already that there are local businesses eager to fill the niche left by Hi Lo. We know that WF will provide over 100 jobs in the community and enjoys a reputation--unions or no--as an excellent employer. I've enjoyed the debate but no it's just pissing me off. Where were these folks when landlord greed drove Bella Luna and the Milky Way out? Please...I hate to sound like a snot, but...get a life.
Cool, I can shop at Whole Foods in Dedham!
By HenryAlan
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:07pm
And send my money out of the city. Is that what JPNC wants? Really? What happened to shop locally?
The JP "progressives" are
By ponytail
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:10pm
The JP "progressives" are showing their true colors. Prior to Whole Foods, they would preach about diversity and how great it is living in an urban environemnt and how much more enlightened they were comparted to those living in the suburbs. Now they are decrying the "ghetto" part of JP with the noisy low riders and trash and gang issues, and they only saving grace are those yuppies who have moved into such a desolate place and have made it livable. And they only thing they ask for is some truffle oil and double green smoothies.
Report: Massachusetts needs more supermarkets
By Ron Newman
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 12:18pm
Did any of the JP anti-Whole Foods activists happen to read this story on the Globe front page a few days back?
[url=http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/art... of grocers plagues Massachusetts cities[/url]
"Massachusetts ranks nearly dead last — third from the bottom nationally — in having enough supermarkets with fresh, nutritious food, according to a report to be released today by the Massachusetts Public Health Association."
The report (which you can read in full [url=http://www.mphaweb.org/documents/FoodforEveryChild...) specifically mentions Jamaica Plain as one of the neighborhoods that needs more grocery stores.
How will pushing Whole Foods out of JP contribute to solving this problem?
How about....
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:43pm
a Family Dollar? oh, that would be like saying 'you people are poor, here's some discount detergent and peanut butter'
or maybe
a Roche Brothers? oh, that would like saying 'what you want this to be the next WEST ROXBURY???'
how about
any empty storefront
there's already a Stop and Shop down the street, who the heck is going to move in there?
Family Dollar and West Roxbury
By adamg
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 2:21pm
There's one right on Centre Street. Somehow, the sun continues to rise every morning.
A plague on both your houses!
By cscott
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 1:58pm
Gimme a break, most of the people I've seen complaining about Whole Foods are the same people who swarmed into JP and started the condo boom in the first place. After the dust settles they'll drop into Whole Foods for coffee beans or whatever and all will be well. JP is not and never was a place of real racial mixing, its just as balkanized as the rest of the city. If you're against gentrification then sell your condo at a loss to a sleazy landlord and get your white, high income butt outta there. Sorry that the market research based appearance of Whole Foods once and for all shatters the myth that JP is a funky/gritty artist enclave.
Easy solution
By Lanny Budd
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 2:06pm
This location will be known as Alimentos Enteros. Problem solved.
I wish I could
By pugdaddy
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 6:03pm
I wish I could upvote this comment the most .
Hold elected officials accountable
By deselby
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 3:00pm
This vote really should have no effect, there are no zoning or major permitting issues.
It's not an issue of democracy - the zoning and permitting laws are democratically enacted by our elected officials - but an issue of whether the rule of those laws is followed. We all depend on the law and its enforcement in our daily lives. The people who own Whole Foods are entitled to the same dependence, not arbitrary blocking of business activity for social engineering and political purposes.
If Whole Foods pulls out because of stymieing and strong-arming from City Hall, those who organized this movement for their own electoral purposes - Sanchez and Arroyo - should be held accountable at the polls. Felix, Jr. is up for reelection city-wide this year. He won't be one of my four votes. I'd say that with Sanchez's hypocrisy in moving from Armstrong Street in Hyde Square to verry gentry Moss Hill, it's high time he had a challenger who won't shoot down 100 jobs.
It's also time that some other elected officials took a stand for 100 jobs and to remove the blight that an empty store will be. Matt O'Malley, I'm looking at you first, but also at Sonia Chang-Diaz, John Connolly, Steve Murphy and Ayanna Pressley.
Again with the politics...
By John-W
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 3:17pm
You still won't say who you're working for? This whole story is just tiresome and has been fairly well handled by comments above, and yet you're still dragging "Dirty" Sanchez and "Ain't his Papi" Arroyo into this. You either had the Spiderman villain origin story and one of those two guys beat you up and took your lunch money as a child (and you therefore spend your days seeking revenge) or you have a vested interest in getting rid of them. Whatever.
And if anyone thinks the zoning laws in this city are the result of or are implemented in the spirit of a democratic process, they really need to get treatment for encephalo-tergum syndrome. In the end if local politicians, smelly hippies, non-profiteers, community rabble-arousers, toothless townies, tea-baggin' in-breds, Fountainhead-clutchin Libertarians or freemarket orphan-organ salesmen are against Whole Foods (that's WF not HF, which I guess would be Hole Foods, which is kind of gross) it doesn't mean a thing.
If the mayor doesn't want it, they're fucked until they provide the proper campaign donations. And that's all that matters.
I'm against them and the poverty pimps
By deselby
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 4:19pm
I'm working for whoever is against Arroyo this year, and Sanchez next year.
That's because I'm against poverty pimps and those who want to suppress good commercial development with 100 jobs in order to social engineer a neighborhood for narrow racial electoral purposes, along with their allies who want to knock out the competition.
Keep up the great work--you
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 4:59pm
Keep up the great work--you have been all over this, and you've had it nailed from Day 1--
Poverty Pimps
By eiffel designs
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 5:04pm
Hah! I'm totally stealing that term.
And it is quite apropos here.
Completely not stealing it from me
By deselby
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 5:37pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_pimp
John-W is right.
By pugdaddy
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 6:06pm
John-W is right. It's true that it's all about payola to the right person. Boston is especially difficult for some businesses, the ones with money.
Market Basket?
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 3:50pm
I know the space is small, but if they'd put a Market Basket there it would be great.
I get why some of JP doesn't
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 4:57pm
I get why some of JP doesn't want Whole Foods. They should try and find space in Roslindale or Hyde Park. Say what you want (and I'm sure you will), but those two neighborhoods have a lot of great things happening. People just don't realize it.
Wait, I'm confused about the movie
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 5:00pm
So the cops knew Internal Affairs was setting them up?
I'd much rather be protesting
By eiffel designs
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 5:14pm
the new tanning salon coming in on Centre St. How exactly is that good for JP diversity?
Why don't we come together and protest shitholes that prey on the poor people and immigrants this group supposedly protects? Let's boot those check cashing places and rent-a-centers in Egleston and Jackson, not a company who is going to create good jobs with good benefits.
Why are people celebrating, for the lack of a better term, ghetto glorification? Why is it that gentrification is the dirty word here? Stopping WF ain't gonna stop gentrification. That train left the station a looong time ago. The fact is, JP needs a good grocery store. That stop and shop is an abomination, and city feed and harvest don't cut it for everyday shopping. I'm personally tired of having to drive to Dedham or West Roxbury or Dorchester to get decent produce. JP is one of the biggest neighborhoods in Boston and we don't have a good grocery store. That is what the problem is here- and the people that want to stop something from coming in that JP so desperately needs is actively hurting JP. Period.
Tanning salon?
By pugdaddy
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 6:11pm
Are you freakin' kidding me? Where? How about another nail salon, hair salon, pizza place (because 6 isn't enough), check cashing, rent a center, or whatever else crap ass thing we have. Oh, I wonder if the new psychic on Center street will add jobs or enhance the area. Useless.
At this point, with no more Veloria or June Bug, I'd welcome a Starbucks with open arms and wallet. Why? Because if two LOCAL businesses couldn't stay open in this area because of horrible landlords, maybe a business with ample backing will.
Maybe you could learn to
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 8:29pm
Maybe you could learn to spell Centre street, and then get back to us.
Pedant.
By MattyC
Thu, 03/10/2011 - 8:52am
Pedant.
Right on the main drag
By eiffel designs
Thu, 03/10/2011 - 10:50am
on the side of the street with the Galway house. I was out running an errand and saw the signs.
Wait, wait, wait, wait, WAIT A SECOND!
By Kaz
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 5:26pm
Paul Berkeley runs the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council too?? When did THAT happen!?
wuh?
By John-W
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 8:39pm
Who's Paul Berkeley, what else does he run and why should I care? (I could Google it but I'd probably just end up surfing porn.) Enlighten me on Great Kaz-nac!
Who's Berkeley?
By Kaz
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 11:47pm
He's the head of the Allston Civic Association (Allston's JPNC) that led a recent vote to something like 9-8 against Stone Hearth Pizza opening in Allston.
When did capitalism become the way the world works?
By pilgrimm
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 7:33pm
Is it wrong to question or be opposed to unregulated capitalism?
I'd love for the the pro whole food do-gooders to show some data on how a whole foods WILL NOT speed up the process of gentrification of JP. So far they've only provided personal experience. I'd argue that the burden of proof is on WF and them. Show people how WF will benefit the community. Also I believe that the high student population in the areas that Whole Foods now resides is the reason those areas have not been gentrified. I have no data, but I'm open to it, if you'd like to provide some.
BTW I enjoy shopping for meat at those WF. It's expensive, but good and I am able to afford what little I buy. I can't say for certain that all the other residents of my neighborhood or Hyde Square's can say the same. I guess the PRo WF advocates might say "let them eat beans!"
Do-gooders?
By anon
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 9:11pm
Why does being in favor of a private business entering an agreement with another private business regarding the future of a private piece of property have to be a 'do good' issue?
There are many businesses where there are special privileges granted by the government such as broadcast TV and radio, commercial fisheries, etc... where there is a legitimate active role for the government to be involved acting in a role as the representative of the 'community' as a public domain resource (frequencies, fish, etc..) is partially privatized. This situation isn't one of them, so there's no actual need for WF to kowtow to the nebulous 'community' except for the fact that people with specific axes to grind seized the opportunity.
Like every single other real business, the community at large will vote on the success of the venture with their wallets. Why didn't the community get to 'vote' on Zon's becoming a different restaurant? Why didn't the community get to 'vote' to override the Milkyway/Bella Luna rent increase and keep that business there? Why didn't the community get to 'vote' on Triple D's becoming the Alchemist, then whatever is now? Given the existence of Stop and Shop a short walk away, this isn't an issue of access to basic staples, so the only differences I see are the ethnic/political ones. Or I guess people want there to be fewer jobs in the neighborhood?
That’s exactly what I’m talking about.
By pilgrimm
Thu, 03/10/2011 - 10:17am
Pro WF do gooders who want to bring people jobs, while those in the anti-WF camp want to take away peoples jobs??? What?
Sure, it’s ethnic/political and it’s also about class issues. I don’t see why these are any less important then the others that are often looked at when there’s a new business, like noise traffic ,etc.
lots of things speed up gentrification
By deselby
Wed, 03/09/2011 - 10:48pm
low crime rates
good schools
libraries
quality housing stock
interesting architecture
parks
good and safe public transportation
variety of restaurants and bars
cultural institutions
finally, Whole Foods
So why not promote crime and degrade schools to stop gentrification?
Makes as much sense.
Why do you think there hasn't
By anon
Mon, 03/14/2011 - 10:00pm
Why do you think there hasn't been an uproar to improve JP Schools?
Because these same clowns know that if JP had good local schools, "gentrification" would speed up even more.
Progressives against progress. Fantastic.
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