Brickbat: Don't Go Yet

San Francisco Board of Supervisors member Dean Preston has proposed an ordinance that would require supermarkets to provide at least six months' notice before closing any stores. It would also require supermarket executives to meet with community members before closing a store and require them to try to find a replacement supermarket. The Board of Supervisors passed a similar law in 1984, but it was vetoed by then-Mayor Dianne Feinstein after one supermarket executive warned it would discourage new supermarkets from opening in the city. At the time, Feinstein called the ordinance "an unnecessary intrusion of governmental regulatory authority."

Comments

[Stuck in California]

Feinstein called the ordinance "an unnecessary intrusion of governmental regulatory authority."

Feinstein said that. If you're more intrusive than Dianne Feinstein, Mrs. Assault Weapons Ban, Mrs. You Have to Register to Buy Cold Medicine, you're really being a socialist dick.

[SQRLSY One]

“You didn’t build that grocery store”… So WE, Government Almighty, will tell you what to do and not to do with it!

(Meanwhile, Government Almighty can't be trusted to properly prosecute shoplifting, pooping on the curb outside of the store, vandalism, robbery, etc. ... Policies which MIGHT help the stores stay open!)

[Mark Twine]

After reading and considering the article, I came to the conclusion that it is a fine idea. I support the passage of it.

After all it will protect the poor, the homeless, and the downtrodden, at minimal expense and inconvenience to the rich capitalists who seek to extract from those disadvantaged souls money in exchange for a basic human right - free food.

I will concede it might some some stores to close prematurely to get out of town before the ordinance goes into effect, but one must be willing to break the occasional egg to get that delicious omelet. No government protection of the poor, the homeless, and the downtrodden in California is excessive "too good for them". No penalty, however ridiculous or excessive, should be overlooked to reward to those "capitalists" who were stupid enough to enter or remain in California.

Go for it, San Fran!!

[Adans smith]

So, what they're saying is, if you're thinking of closing better get out now.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

To coin a phrase, what are the "root causes" of stores wanting to leave SF?

[MatthewSlyfield]

"what are the “root causes” of stores wanting to leave SF?"
Being in SF?

[Fist of Etiquette]

San Francisco Board of Supervisors member Dean Preston has proposed an ordinance that would require supermarkets to provide at least six months' notice before closing any stores.

Or else they'll shut you down.

[Illocust]

How exactly do you force someone to stay open? Worst case you just go "We didn't shut down. We just sold our supermarket to Bob the homeless guy for a dollar. If you need lease money, new stock, salaries, taxes, or anything else related to keeping the thing operating you're going to have to take it up with him."

[mad.casual]

Also, I'm not an investigative journalist or anything, but circa 2022, 'two weeks' after 2019, a number of local hotel/motels, banquet halls, and aging gathering places suffered tragic grease fires; which was weird because they were all required to have fire suppression up to code and some of them didn't even have dedicated kitchens.

[Rossami]

re: How do you force someone to stay open?

At the extreme end, you can't. (Not without backdooring your way into indentured servitude and slavery, anyway.) But at the margins, they can:
1. make threats that push the sale value of the closed store's assets to zero. That is, force you to choose between continuing to operate the store or completely abandon the property. No selling the property to, for example, a movie theater operator even if that would be a viable use of the property.
2. make threats to attach assets you own beyond the store. In other words, not only will you lose the store but we'll take your house, your other businesses and generally force you into a total bankruptcy rather than let you stop subsidizing this one unprofitable enterprise.

It's stupid and (hopefully) illegal but if you have neither morals nor sense, it's fairly easy to do.

[MatthewSlyfield]

"That is, force you to choose between continuing to operate the store or completely abandon the property. No selling the property to, for example, a movie theater operator even if that would be a viable use of the property."
Under such conditions "completely abandon the property." is economically justifiable.
Cut your losses before they get worse.
Making economic decisions on the basis of sunk costs is always a bad idea.

[Eeyore]

In socialist countries operators who have tried to close have been taken out back and shot in the head as an example.

[Sometimes a Great Notion]

If this passes, I look forward to articles claiming SF only has a weeks supply of food left and for Berkley to call for end of the blockade!

[Minadin]

It's like they don't even know how business works. And yet are quite swift to blame 'capitalism' for all the predictable problems they are causing themselves.

[A Cynical Asshole]

I'd expect nothing less from a bunch of socialist weasels.

[Emmett Dalton]

Bingo

[Longtobefree]

But we haven't "closed".
There are/were supply chain issues (and a small amount of theft) that left the shelves empty, and so we couldn't pay the utilities or our employees.
So, just until these small issues get resolved, we are saving energy by not going the store.
Just for a while.

[Nazi-Chipping Warlock]

"Don't worry, it'll just be for two weeks."

[Mickey Rat]

Supervisor Dean Preston has revealed himself as someone too dangerously stupid to be allowed to hold any position of authority, anywhere, ever. He is a prime example of why San Francisco and California are so dysfunctional.

[Eeyore]

I thought they had already decided to have city owned bread lines?

[LIBertrans]

Before Reagan and Tricky banned acid, SF was a bustling hive of trading activity, with markets everywhere. One of my faves on Haight St was called "The Legal Front." Since then, Operation Intercept, the International Psychotropic witchhunt, the War on South America for moving their goods in as replacements, Reagan's Testing order to fire everyone in the government except Baptists, Mormons and Jehova's Witlesses, and his and Bush's Anti-Drug-Abuse law policing the entire planet plus Crashes of 1987-92 and 2008-12. Hooverville SF is Prohibition in action.

[John F. Carr]

Dianne Feinstein, 1984: This bill will pass over my dead body!
Dean Preston, 2024: OK.

[mad.casual]

+1 ......nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnNow!

[Uncle Jay]

"At the time, Feinstein called the ordinance "an unnecessary intrusion of governmental regulatory authority."

...and it still is.

[A Cynical Asshole]

When you're an even bigger socialist cunt than Dianne Feinstein:

At the time, Feinstein called the ordinance "an unnecessary intrusion of governmental regulatory authority."

[Tyval Dayall]

What is the penalty if 80 teenagers do a smash and grab, destroy the store, and the owners say "Eff it, we aren't reopening"?

[Think It Through]

Why don't they just open city grocery stores? Free to all comers?

[AT]

Then don't "close" any stores. Just stop restocking them. As profits dwindle, start laying off staff, cutting wages, and reducing hours open for business. Then start downsizing the fixtures - selling off shelves, refrigerators, display cases, registers, carts, etc. to keep the lights on. Then, run it absolutely threadbare and keep paying for the business license.

As the story goes:

"Jim, I meant to ask you, what in the hell's the matter with your train service down on the San Sebatian line? Running just one passenger train is pretty measly service, it seems to me, and what a train! You must have inherited those coaches from your great-grandfather, and he must have used them pretty hard. And where on earth did you get that wood-burning locomotive?"

Take everything of value, leave nothing worth stealing behind, and inform them that the grocery is absolutely still open for business should anyone like to do business there.