SOUNDING OFF: Larger retailers are needed downtown

As a retailer of 25 years on Forest Avenue I’ve had my finger on the pulse of the downtown business community for a long time. Our current Planning Commission style of micro-management has, in large measure, led to vacancies and less than desirable tenants in key locations.

Several years ago, a fine women’s clothing and accessories store, located in Pasadena, applied for a conditional use permit for the then-vacant Banana Republic location. I attended that meeting along with owners of boutiques throughout town who spoke against allowing this use due to overlap of product and fear that such a store would put them out of business. The Planning Commission caved to that pressure and the site remained vacant for a long time. Thus, a viable business with potential to add vitality to that part of Forest Avenue with appeal to residents and tourists was denied.

More recently, Jack’s Sportswear “” a company that publicly pledged $1 million to improve the facade of the building on Ocean Avenue and an enormously successful business that would have generated huge sales tax revenues for the city “” was turned away.

Once again, most surf shop owners, spearheaded by Hobie, were vocal about their displeasure of having them [Jack’s] in town and, again, the city succumbed.

Why not let the free market determine whether we have too many surf shops and allow the public to benefit from competition?

I fully appreciate the extent to which small, one-of-a-kind stores (of which I am one) contribute to the unique shopping experience of downtown Laguna.

In order to achieve Planning Commission’s much desired diversity and revitalization of downtown we need to embrace both large and small independent stores and yes, , the much-maligned chains.

ROSALIE GELSTON owns Thee Foxes Trot shop in Laguna Beach.