Beaverton Oregon,
Tuesday, May 17, 7pm.
Wal Mart plans to build a new supercenter in the Portland Suburb or Cedar Mill. Residents have risen up and formed a group known as Save Cedar Mill. They are not against capitalism or against Wal Mart the company (although those feelings are felt by many members) they simply do not want Wal Mart in their community because of the impact it will have on traffic, safety, and community.
Tonight at 7pm about 300 people gathered in the gym of Cedar Park Middle School to attend a rally put on by Save Cedar Mill. Save Cedar Mill is the group that has formed in just 90 days to a size of about 1000 people. It was a well organized and well set up rally complete with door greeters (that was me!), interesting speakers, and a large turnout. It was a kind of pep-rally to keep people motivated and interested in the cause. The other purposes of the rally were to inform people on how to argue their points (the idea is to focus on things like traffic and how it will effect the community, not on bad business practices or anything personal), to get people involved by signing and distributing petitions, and to sell materials such as lawn signs and t-shirts. The purpose of generating revenue is to hire our own traffic analysts and to pay for our legal fees in the fight against Wal Mart.
For those who know the area, the Wal Mart would be built on the corner of Barnes Rd and Cedar Hills Blvd. Wal Mart has not submitted its plans yet but when they do we will be ready to oppose them on every front we can.
The corprate media was present, as always, and so was Kboo. KATU (Part of the news, Some of the time) was there for a while, and the slightly better Channel 8 was there as well. An off duty channel 8 reporter who lives in the area was also there checking things out for her own personal reasons, and it was nice to see that not all reporters are evil.
On a more somber note, there was a man there causing trouble, he came in and was loud and annoying to people working at the front desk. He looked agitated and like he wanted trouble. He asked to speak privatley to one of the organizers and complained about how people wouldn't answer his questions and told him to listen to the speaker (as there was a speech going on at the time). I felt so inclined to keep an eye on this discussion because he looked rather on the edge
Overall, it was an excellent rally. People are very into their cause and were reassured and well informed afterwards. Materials were distributed, donations given and community built. It was an awesome sight to see so many so called "regular people" out in force. After seeing mostly young people at protests it was refreshing to see so many people get out and act on something they felt passionate about.
Go to the website and sign up, sign a petition and lend a hand. We need all the help we can to defeat this threat to our community.
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Seems to me "bad business practices" would be one of the paramount reasons to
reject a business in MY community. A low priority in BEAVERton, evidently.