San Juan Bautista
– The City Council will consider adopting an ordinance allowing
certain formula businesses into San Juan Bautista at its meeting
tonight.
San Juan Bautista – The City Council will consider adopting an ordinance allowing certain formula businesses into San Juan Bautista at its meeting tonight.
The council passed an ordinance banning formula businesses – namely, retailers that conform to a larger chain’s appearance or business practices – in 2004. However, that ordinance was accidentally removed from the books when the city code was revised in 2006.
Now that the oversight has been discovered, the council is trying to put the ordinance back in place, but some councilmembers believed the restrictions should be loosened.
The new ordinance still forbids most formula businesses, but it creates an exception for stores that address unmet community needs. For example, San Juan Bautista doesn’t have a hardware store, and City Manager Jan McClintock has said such a store is unlikely to open if it doesn’t have the buying power of a national chain.
Many Mission City residents and business owners have said formula businesses such as Starbucks or McDonald’s would ruin the town’s quaint, historic atmosphere. But some argue that a few high-profile franchises could be a boon for San Juan Bautista’s economy.
The City Council meeting begins at 6:30pm today in the San Juan Bautista City Hall.
