Lexington gets stores; what about Newport?

In the Cincinnati area, greed too often rules the roost, and our downtowns die.

But in nearby Lexington, Kentucky, when a downtown store closes, it often gets replaced.

Last year, a Rite Aid drugstore in downtown Lexington closed. To fill the void, a locally owned drugstore has already opened nearby, and a CVS pharmacy with an expanded grocery section is also in the works. I don't know what stood on the sites of these new stores before, but at least now there's a store to serve the public.

Other cities can learn from this. In most American regions (Cincinnati included), it seems like the only new stores being built are big box retailers in the exurbs - where folks in poor urban neighborhoods can't reach them. Ironically, new businesses built in city areas now often cater to upscale suburbanites.

Take Newport, Kentucky, for instance. This city across from Cincinnati has been blighted for some 5 years by the closure of the Thriftway supermarket downtown. The city has let the building sit empty since the early 2000s. I saw it just recently, and it was still vacant.

But the city wanted more retail space. So it abused eminent domain to gut a working-class neighborhood on Grand Avenue and turn the property over to a development firm. The developer had promised not to build a Wal-Mart, but then tried going back on this pledge. Luckily, a public outcry killed the Wal-Mart plan. But the retail complex is going through. Last I heard, it would contain a super-sized Kroger and possibly a gargantuan Lowe's home improvement store.

If the city needed a Kroger so badly, why not use the old Thriftway site? If nobody wants to build a grocery there, why not an electronics store? Every time I want to buy electronic goods, I have to order them off the Internet, because the closest stores that have them are usually 15 miles out of town.

Greed drove the decision to wreck southeastern Newport instead of adding a store on the old downtown Thriftway site.

Just to be clear: it's illegal to use eminent domain to take private residences and turn them over to developers. There had been court rulings in Kentucky that say this much. If Newport wanted more space to bring in stores, it should have condemned and purchased the Thriftway site, kept ownership of it instead of reselling it, and leased it to a retailer - under conditions that uphold the spirit of public use.

I don't know what's going to become of that old Thriftway. I thought someone told me the county now wants it for courthouse parking, but I must have been half-asleep when I heard this, because I can't find anything about it.

(Source: http://www.kentucky.com/179/story/740505.html)