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November 27, 2013
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Jumbo Yams
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Local Greens
photo by D onovan M. S mith /T he P ortland O bserver
Eli Shannon stacks fresh fruit at the Alberta Co-op on Northeast 15th Avenue and Alberta Street.
Employees at the community grocer are gearing up for competition from Trader Joe's, a national
grocery chain that has been picked to become an anchor tenant o f a major development a few
blocks away at Alberta and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
Free Land Deal
c o n t i n u e d f r o m fro n t
is expected to sign a letter of intent
at the end of December solidifying
a transaction with PDC that will give
them a $2.4 million break on the cost
of the property with Trader Joe’s as
the anchor tenant and space for 4 to
10 other businesses and 100 surface
parking spaces.
When the proposed transaction
was made public, opposition came
quickly in the form of an organized
protest at the site drawing a few
dozen citizens led by Steven Gilliam,
a local African American resident
and community activist.
In a letter sent to the King Neigh
borhood Association, Gilliam ridi
culed the labeling of neighborhood
as a food desert saying the decision
to sell a prime piece of real estate at
an 80 percent discount was based
on a false promise and fulfills a fic
tional need that primarily benefits
the 1 percent of wealthy Americans.
“The rich will continue to get
richer, the desired population will
continue move in to northeast Port
land, and black residents will con
tinue to be forced out.” Gilliam wrote.
“ W h ile the m ech an ism s o f
gentrification are complicated the
basic idea is not. Wealthy and po
litically powerful interests want in
ner-city land because it makes them
money. In our recent history poor
black residents have been located
on some o f this land. Interests have
used their power and influence over
our government to take the land that
poor black people once held for
their personal profit.”
In an interview with The Portland
Observer, PDC Director of Business
and Social Equity John Jackley ac
knowledges that PDC-sponsored
developments have been followed
by gentrification in north and north
east Portland, but stands firm that
the Trader Joe’s development will
not be responsible for further dis
placement.
Jackley said the latest proposed
$8 million retail development is not
one of those instances. In fact, he
declares that it will assist in keeping
more traditional King residents in
the neighborhood.
“I think Steve Gilliam is exactly
right in describing gentrification and
displacement as the primary issue in
north and northeast Portland. I don’t
agree with his assessment on the
project,” Jackley said.
He said no single family homes
on the proposed site’s Garfield Street
border were displaced by Vanport
Square and no-one will be displaced
by the current development.
“When we look at the particu
lars of Trader Joe’s, at the demo
graphics of the community, at how
much lower prices they are than
Whole Foods and New Seasons I
think it continues to the community
prospering in place,” he said.
According to PD C’s assessment,
the construction of the Trader Joe’s
will also inject $1.9 million of annual
payroll dollars into the community.
When asked why there was not
something of this or a similar magni
tude being considered past 82nd
Avenue in east Portland where
many former north and northeast
residents have been pushed to, and
where recent numbers show the
h ig h est co n ce n tra tio n o f food
deserts exist, Jackley said there are
such efforts and points to the
agency’s Neighborhood Prosper
ity Districts.
He said PDC has tried for a num-
ber of years and will continue to
work to locate a grocery in the Lents
and Parkrose neighborhoods of
outer northeast and southeast Port
land, including an anchor grocer
like Trader Joe’s.
“If people are forced out or move
out of their homes it won’t be be
cause there was an affordable grocer
in the neighborhood,” Jackley said.
The marketing director at locally
owned and operated Alberta Co-Op
says the PDC’s justification for the
project feels disingenuous with
newer grocery markets appearing in
and within the vicinity of the neigh
borhood since they set up their own
grocery on Northeast 15th Avenue
and Alberta 12 years ago.
“At that time it was a very differ
ent type of place than it is now,
there’s been a lot of movement to
wards building these types of infra
structures and businesses moving
in ,” said the c o -o p ’s T h eresa
Calabrese.
PDC said it was keeping the com
munity involved throughout the
process that led to Trader Joe’s, but
that didn’t satisfy the co-op, which
received no word on such a deal
until it was finalized and came be
fore the King Neighborhood Asso
ciation.
“It’s disappointing, because we
and other organizations have been
doing a lot of great work on the food
justice level for a very long time,”
Calabrese said.
“It was just kind of a secretive
deal that happened. W e’ve worked
with PDC in the past, they gave us
some loans when we first opened
and we paid back the loans on-time,
plus the interest. We were never
consulted, and nobody approached
us about this opportunity. I mean
the land was sold for $500,000 which
is something that’s within reach for
a lot of people in this community,”
she said.