Immediately Summerlake home owners started communicating the news with each other via social networking and old fashioned word of mouth. The residents were very unhappy to find out that a store with the reputation of being messy both on the inside and out was planning on opening at the entrance to their subdivision.
The same night as the article was published a long and detailed email was sent to all members of the Alexandria city council, the planning and zoning administrator, and the Mayor. On the morning of August 6th I met with the Mayor, police chief, and city council members face to face at the monthly "Coffee with the Mayor" at the Alexandria city building. At that time they were unaware of the article, or what Dollar General was proposing.
On the evening of Monday August 9th I decided to take a drive to nearby Dollar General stores in Northern Kentucky. What I saw absolutely scared me to death!
Warning, the following pictures may make you sick to your stomach.... Reminder, all photos were taken on one night without any staging or set ups at all. These photos have not be edited or enhanced in any way. The trash and clutter that you will see at these stores is REAL.
For more information on helping stand up and be heard opposing this store please contact Andy Schabell at volffas@gmail.com
I first visited the Dollar General in Silver Grove, KY. This store is very new and overall pretty clean. However as soon as I pulled into the entrance I noticed a cart used for keeping cardboard tipped over and laying in mud with cardboard scattered on the ground. Upon closer inspection it was easy to see that the cart had been laying on it's side for several days without anyone bothering to pickup it up. I had a premonition that if this store was less than a month old and already had garbage scattered around it, the other stores were really going to be bad. I would find out soon enough how right I was.
Here is the Silver Grove, KY store from the front, if you look to the right of the store and towards the back you can see the rack tipped over.
Here are some close pictures of the rack tipped over. Also notice the garbage bag outside the delivery door. There is no dumpster corral on site, and no dumpster on site, even though the store is operating daily.
Pictures from Dollar General store, Falmouth, KY.
Grass not cut, sign has all kinds of straps and zip ties from previous ads.
Rusty racks with old cardboard in them, broken carts on side of building near the front of the store.
Old damage to side of building left unfixed.
Potholes all over in parking lot.
Next stop Crittenden, KY Dollar General.
As soon as you pull in the parking lot you can see that there are no gates on front of the dumpster corral, and there is trash everywhere inside of the corral.
Grass not cut, parking lot not maintained.
More racks with soggy cardboard and two bags of trash next to the racks.
Next up Dollar General Store Burlington, KY. The first thing you see when you pull in is the Dollar General sign with weeds growing out of control around it.
This store also had the worst corral of all of them. Trash everywhere. Wood corral that has long ago stopped functioning. The wood is falling apart, the hinges are bent. No attempt at all made to put trash into dumpster.
More racks... AND they didn't even bother to make sure the soggy cardboard was in the racks.
Next was the newer Dollar General on Dixie Highway in Florence. This is obviously a newer store, and was the best overall condition of all of the stores that I visited. It was starting to rain and almost 8pm on a Monday night, but the store was still crowded. The corral had cinder block sides and wood gates. However, they still have the racks with soggy cardboard sitting outside of the corral. They did make an effort to hide the heating and air conditioning units on the side with evergreens, but there were not enough evergreens, and they were not tall enough.
Next stop, Dollar General, Cave Run Road, Erlanger, KY.
Notice they don't even have a corral. There was trash laying next to the dumpster, skids along the side of the building, and old damage to the building that has not been fixed. As I was leaving a car pulled up to the dumpster and unloaded their personal garbage into the dumpster. I realize this is not Dollar General's fault, but having open dumpsters in parking lots does help facilitate these kind of actions.
Having seen enough, I called it a night. Hopefully these pictures will help spread the word on how terrible Dollar General could be as a neighbor. In our current economy, I strongly encourage growth and development, but we cannot go backwards in the name of progress. The city of Alexandria, and the fine people of Summerlake Subdivision have spent years making our city and our subdivision one of the best places to live. We cannot have our image ruined by a company that makes the bottom dollar the top priority and does not appear to worry about maintaining a good image for the community they operate in.
For more information on helping stand up and be heard opposing this store please contact Andy Schabell at volffas@gmail.com
Thank you.
I never realized how truly ugly these buildings are. This is going to be an eyesore if built at the entrance of Summerlake.
ReplyDelete