http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/16/us-usa-ports-west-asia-idUSKBN0LK0A420150216
Posted on 04/17/2015 7:42:14 AM PDT by FR_addict
BRANDON, Fla. - Walmart stores across the country suddenly closed Monday, supposedly as a result of plumbing problems.
Now a Hillsborough County commissioner who has worked closely with the company for years says he has plenty of questions.
In Midland, Texas, which, until Monday, was home to one of the 10 busiest Walmart stores in the country, City Building Official Steve Thorpe told the I-Team his plumbing inspector was sent away when he visited the closed store and offered to help secure permits.
While the company claimed to have an average of 100 to 150 plumbing issues a year in recent years, a longtime employee of a tax service located in the store told the I-Team she never saw a plumber or an "out of order" restroom in the three years she worked inside the store.
...At the Brandon Walmart Monday night, a five-hour, unadvertised going-out-of-business sale was held after employees were informed the store would be closed for at least six months for plumbing and other renovations.
The store pays more than $243,000 a year in Hillsborough County ad valorem taxes and collects many times that amount in sales tax revenues.
The store appeared to have been fully stocked with perishables when the sudden closure was announced. ... The I-Team has learned no plumbing permits have been pulled in any of the five cities where the stores were suddenly closed for at least six months.
Permits in Midland show 70 plumbing fixtures were just replaced in an eight-week period three years ago.
That store never closed during that renovation.
Hillsborough County Commissioner Victor Crist says Walmart officials didn't even mention plumbing issues when they reached out to him, informing him of the closure which affected more than 400 workers. ...
(Excerpt) Read more at abcactionnews.com ...
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/16/us-usa-ports-west-asia-idUSKBN0LK0A420150216
If you see something, say something campaign.
I loved when that happened. Racially sensitive Target was forced to decide between cold hard cash or serving the affluent neighborhoods in the north side.
By blaming it on something else, the company could dampen employee and union enthusiasm for higher wages without ruining employee relations and possibly even opening themselves up to lawsuits.
This is a real head-scratcher. If it is just the plumbing, why all the secrecy? And if it's something more, any cover-up is bound to fail. There are too many people involved (managers, etc.).
http://247wallst.com/retail/2015/04/12/walton-family-does-not-want-to-own-wal-mart/
Last Friday the Walton family, heirs of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (NYSE: WMT) founder Sam Walton, announced that the family business, Walton Enterprises LLC, would would distribute about 6% of its holdings to a newly created Walton Family Holdings Trust. The Walton family’s stake in Wal-Mart has risen to about 50% as a result of share buyback programs, and the family is satisfied to control the company’s biggest stake without actually owning enough stock to give them actual control.
In the press statement Walton Enterprises said:
Given the prospect that Walmart may continue to buy back shares, the Walton family has informed Walmart that it currently expects to sell Walmart shares from time to time in order to help offset possible further increases in its ownership percentage and to help fund charitable contributions. The family believes that this is consistent with an appropriate balance of family and non-family ownership that supports the goals of all Walmart shareholders and long term business success.
There are Walmarts in worse parts of the area than the one they closed, FWIW.
I heard a story out of DFW that the Walmart there was experiencing a LOT of employee theft.
One woman in customer service was ripping them off of 8K per day in fraudulent returns.
Who paid you to say that? Was it some UN agency? Was it the Bilderberg Group? Or perhaps you're a member of the Illuminati.
(Just kidding, of course.)
Interesting.
Up here in the midwest they just moved all the meat processing off site and only sell packaged in the store.
When a friend of mine opened a martial arts studio, he was required to add a wheelchair ramp out front and convert the bathroom to handicap friendly, for, you know, all those wheelchair-bound martial artists.
The problem is that such a system-wide measure has attracted undue attention.
One or two plus a couple of decoy stores in a region would work over time, but this might not.
Cloosing stores simultaneously, no warning to employees, shutdown at each store timed exactly the same———yup, nothing fishy about this at all.
What, are they trying to hide an anthrax attack or some other weird occurance?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.