More than two years after being given a thumbs up by city officials, the Wal-Mart distribution center remains in limbo.
The impasse was highlighted this week with word that Amazon, the Internet retailer, is expected to announce soon that it will build a 1,500-employee distribution center off Interstate 5 in Patterson, west of Modesto. The facility would be the first of several Amazon sites in California.
Meanwhile, similar job prospects for Merced from Wal-Mart are mired in a 2½-year legal battle.
After the City Council approved the project in 2009, a case was brought against the city by the Merced Alliance for Responsible Growth, asking to prohibit the city from moving forward with the project. The group, led by community volunteers who are also longtime residents, said it had concerns about how the center would affect air quality, its proximity to homes and schools, and the quality and pay range of the jobs offered.
In March of last year, Judge William Burby ruled in favor of the city of Merced, saying the city hadn't violated the California Environmental Quality Act in its paperwork for the proposed distribution center.
The judge also ruled that the city wasn't required to recirculate the draft environmental impact report among the public.
The Environmental Quality Act requires state and local agencies to identify the significant environmental impacts of their actions and to avoid or mitigate those impacts, if feasible.
In May 2011, the alliance appealed to the 5th District Court of Appeals in Fresno.
The city and Wal-Mart attorneys will submit their own brief to the court next month, said Jeanne Schechter, chief deputy city attorney.
The alliance will have 30 days to file a reply, Schechter said. The court will review everything and decide whether there will be a hearing or may rule based on the briefs. She said a ruling may come in May or later.
Kyle Stockard, a member of the alliance, said, "We didn't think they had seriously looked at all of our arguments and we didn't think they had tried to apply all those things we suggested."
Former Mayor Bill Spriggs said it's always been a small group of people opposed to a Wal-Mart facility. "If this was an Amazon distribution center, it would probably go (as) quickly as Patterson," Spriggs said.
Merced City Councilman Tony Dossetti said he campaigned for office saying the city needed jobs.
"Wal-Mart distribution center is jobs, so we need to get it here as soon as we can," he said. "That's all we can say about it until the courts make their decision."
Merced City Councilman Mike Murphy, who also campaigned on a pro-business platform, couldn't be reached for comment Wednesday.
Wal-Mart proposes to build a 1.1-million-square-foot center on a 230-acre site at the northwest corner of Gerard Avenue and Tower Road.
The center would employ about 1,200 people and operate 24 hours a day.
It would include a 17,000-square-foot truck maintenance building with two underground oil storage tanks and a fueling station with two 20,000-gallon diesel fuel storage tanks.
Reporter Ameera Butt can be reached at (209) 385-2477 or abutt@mercedsunstar.com.
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