Tonight at 5:30 PM the Santa Ana NICE (Neighborhood Improvement/Code Enforcement) Committee will meet again, at the Santa Ana Council Chambers, to discuss the matter about how best to regulate those wayward shopping carts. The carts are another layer of the cumulative blight that affects Santa Ana.
Store owners are expected to attend the meeting to press the Committee to lessen or remove some or all of the proposed measures to regulate cart use beyond the boundary of their stores property.
Santa Ana community leaders are asking that residents attend tonight’s meeting. They want the city to apply an ordinance to manage shopping cart use. Store owners will likely resist such controls.
Personally I think the solution would be for the city to impound any carts found in neighborhoods and sell them to recyclers. I also think that people who are found using carts outside of stores and parking lots should be cited with a fairly large ticket and their groceries should be impounded and donated to a homeless shelter. That should stop the problem.
Area grocery stores should give away bus tokens or offer shuttle services to their clients, if getting home with groceries is an issue for those who don’t drive.
Art,
I am with you up to the point of citing people and taking their food away. Keep in mind many times the reason why carts are taken from homes has to do with the fact they can not afford a vehicle or are not allowed to drive a vehicle. Taking their food away or citing them only will add to the problem, not solve it.
I like your idea regarding the tokens!!
How about taking their tokens away (and the carts too) and then giving them more food than they can carry. That will fix them!
Seriously though, 99.9% of the time, going to the supermarket is not an emergency. We all know we have to buy food on a regular basis. Therefore, there is no excuse for any of us not to be able to find a friend or family member to drive us to and from the stores when necessary.
People take the shopping carts because THEY CAN. It’s a matter of educating the public and then ENFORCING the rules.
Stores should post messages on the seats of the carts and by the entrances, stating that the carts are only to be used in the store and to the cars. To use them other wise is stealing and violators will be prosecuted.
To encourage the stores to enforce this policy, the City should charge the stores a high enough amount to keep carts out of the streets and neighborhoods, that the stores have a financial incentive to look after their own carts or take a painful loss in profits.
Sure the arguement will be made that the stores will just raise their prices, but if they do that, people will shop at other stores.
That’s the beauty of capitalism and a free-market society. Competition is good for the consumer!
This IS NOT rocket science, folks!
People aren’t taking the carts because they are bad people; up to this point nobody has made it clear that we don’t do that here.
Another solution is to do what they do where I’m from in Maryland. There, the supermarkets have barriers along the expanded sidewalks in front of the stores. People have to drive their cars to the front and load (or have them loaded for them for free by store employees) their groceries. It works great and keeps the parking lots/surrounding areas, clutter free.
That’s my two cents.
Semper Fi,
Tim Whitacre
I think Tim hit the nail on the head. People use the carts because it’s easy and no one stops them. Why wouldn’t they? Do you expect a mother of 4 kids who is working hard just to get through the day to NOT use the shopping cart to transport her food? Do you think she cares that the COMLINK board says its bad or because the Wilshire Square Neighborhood Association thinks that shopping carts and front yard fences are ugly? You are talking about families living in survival mode. Working multiple jobs and caring for in many cases, large extended families. Instead of getting mad at the users of the carts why don
Tim,
I am glad you have written the fact that those who take the carts are not bad people, and thus should not be treated as such.
Cart issues are a real problem and finding a solution may not be as easy as some would like to think.
When you live in a city where you may not have those friends or relatives around to be able to drive you, it may be a problem. I believe this happens more commonly than one would like to admit.
Putting the responsibility on the stores is certainly a better solution. However, when you look at 84K being spent on shopping carts, is that really that much? How much do we spend on the Mayor’s pet projects, or the city managers bright ideas?
The renting of the artist village, itself for $1 could have easily paid for this, but instead the city chose otherwise.
Frankly it just seems like a nit-picking idea.
Great points Luis! How about Don Cribb’s pet Art’s project at the Train Station. The “Art’s Council” has a FREE office there that could be rented out and the $$$ used for important projects like these. Now that Lisa Bist is leaving the council and Cribb is going off the Planning Comm. hopefully someone will stop these insane give aways of city resources.
Also, did you know that when any new project gets approved, Don Cribb and his planning commission insists that developers commission
Carts can be electronically prevented from going outside the store parking lot boundries. A number of stores around the country do this including California. Problem solved. For those stores that don’t want to invest in that technology, use some of the suggestions noted above. Again, its the people who take the carts home and then just leave them out by the curb or building that ruin this for the rest who take it back.
Bladerunner,
You are absolutely correct. Wal Mart on Harbor and McFadden has that in place. When a cart reaches a specific line, the wheels cease to roll.
This would definately solve the problem.
“Personally I think the solution would be for the city to impound any carts found in neighborhoods and sell them to recyclers”
Come on Art, that is what caused the current mess.
The Stores: It is time for the stores to hire the “Box Boy(Girl)” to secure their carts. Even to push the cart a few blocks away for delivery and back too.
Teenagers with jobs to not have the time to “tagged” stuff, they are too busy spending their money and working.
The City: The 72 hour hold on picking up carts pertains to scraping them. If the city doesn’t plan on scraping the carts – there is no 72 hour waiting period.
Why is the city contributing to the problem.
The Landlords: The big apt. & Condo. places should have a place for cart storage. (heck why don’t they supply their own carts for their tenants?)
The Custormers: It has become ordinary & custemary to use cart to take home purchases. There is NO crime here.
People are told to leave the carts out in the open for pick-up.
“Carts can be electronically prevented from going outside the store parking lot boundries”
The city does this now for new stores…it’s the existing stores that are a problem. They city has not ever tried to make the existing stores comply. I’m not sure if the can legally.
Cook,
That is the best idea I have heard yet:
1) Hire High School students to assist in walking customers home and bringing the carts back. If they have tons of customers it may be a pretty large cost, bit it certainly is worth a try.
2) Have Apartment Landlords, provide carts by which the consumers can push to the market and back.
3)Have apartment complexes have a storage facility for carts so that a truck can come by and pick them up.
This is exactly the type of progressive thinking we need from our leadership on the city council, not ways to punish. Cook thank you soo much for that type of thinking!!
http://www.PaulLucas2006.com
Why don
Cook and Luis:
With all due respect to both of you, why should an entire city incur more costs and force more costs on others, for the personal convenience of very few?
I firmly believe government should not do for the people what they can (and should) do for themselves.
Getting groceries home from the store is not a governmental function. Individuals sincerely needing help with this should seek assistance in this order:
1. Family
2. Friends & Neighbors
3. Churches (not the fried chicken)
4. Non-Profit Organizations
If a store wants to voluntarily help, that’s great. In fact, some store will actually deliver groceries after you buy them online.
This whole thing is simply a matter of educating a certain segment of our population. Any enforcement actions necessary should not be with a ton of bricks, when a slap on the wrist is sufficient to change behavior.
Maybe you guys could organize some of those teenagers you’re talking about hiring, to perform some required community service hours assisting others with their groceries. It could be a great program and another option for our youth to help others.
Semper Fi,
Tim
Tim,
I am not sure where I said the government should pay for, or the cities citizens should bear the costs.
The markets need to pay for the problem they are partly/mostly responsible for. (I know it is passed thu, so is everything)
I have not seen a reduction in the price of food, after the elimenation of the box-boy jobs. So are we still paying for that service and not recieving it?
The city should have required a cart storage sites at the large complexs to make up for the shortage of parking places allowed by waivers of the “code”.
This is not a food transportation problem, but a cart storage problem.
Rob
Tim,
If it is of a few why then are we making this such a big deal? So much so that neighbors are posting on SA citz to make sure to be at a meeting here and there in order to fight this?
I am in agreement with you, if its not such a big problem because only a few cause it, do we really need to give it this much attention?
food for thought.
Luis:
A “few” in a city of 300K plus, is a couple of thousand folks.
Even if these folks used the same cart to and from their homes, that’s still a lot of blight.
But the fact of the matter is, the carts are usually used for one-way trips – from the stores to the neighborhoods.
Multiply that by two or three trips a week and it becomes very easy to see what is the problem.
Cook:
I mis-understood your comments. I apologize.
Semper Fi,
Tim
One of the problems urban areas have is lack of supermarkets where fresh food items are plentiful and prices are reasonable. Some inner cities contain only liquor stores and gas station minimarts.
Grocery stores operate on notoriously thin margins — much thinner than any other kind of retailer. If a city makes laws that increase a grocer’s cost of doing business, it may drive grocers out of the area and leave only the liquor stores and minimarts.
Tim,
Suppose you are correct, and 10% of all the residents in Santa Ana visited their local grocery stores and came back with a shopping cart back 2-3 per week, as you stated.
That would about to 30 carts per person, and 60-180 carts per week. In turn this would be 3120-9360 carts per year. The city then pays anywhere between $2.24-$.74 per cart. Does this seem something worth complaining about? More importantly, spending tons of meeting describing why we are paying “soo much” for this service. I think there is bigger fish to fry than this, would you not agree?
It is petty things like this, that get many of us residents at odds with each other when it comes to selecting the right candidate and have us all be behind them.
Is there any wonder why Pulido and Co. is successful every election?
Luis:
Are you aware that “…3120-9360 carts per year” figure you came up with would be PER PERSON?
I disagree that the shopping cart issue is a petty one – it is blight that affects quality of life and neighborhood values. I say this professionally as a real estate consultant.
I will however, agree that the LACK OF LEADERSHIP on this issue by the Mayor and Council has caused un-necessary snarling and gnashing of teeth between various individuals on both sides of the issue.
That’s why I’ve tried to bring the debate back around to a very simple core issue of education and proper enforcement.
Again, the people taking the carts aren’t bad people. Most don’t know they shouldn’t take the carts out of the parking lots.
One month of a localized media campaign addressing the issue, with the help of all of the Spanish newspapers; combined with issuing warning citations to every individual seen with a cart; combined with posting notices at the entrances of the stores and on the seats of the carts, will greatly reduce the problem.
After the month long “warning period”, tickets should be issued with an initial $150 dollar fine. The 2nd infraction should double the fine and the person should receive six hours of community service removing carts from neighborhoods.
After the word gets around that a few folks have received fines and community service, shopping cart infractions will virtually cease to exist.
This is very similar to the method I used in the early 90’s to get rid of graffiti in the city. It worked until I got burned out and moved on. Then enforcement went down, fines were waived or suspended and it stopped costing the very small percentage of families who were responsible for the vandalism damages they or their children causing to the entire city.
Without an incentive to obey the law – respect public/private property – look after your own children, graffiti is back – with a vengeance!!!
Our City Leaders don
Tim,
I am aware that it would be person, and for that reason, the mere fact we are only paying 84K to have these carts picked up is a drop in the bucket. I think we should allow the carts to be recycled like are soda pop cans and you will see tons of people impounding this carts themselves and removing them from our neighborhoods. When was the last time you saw a can of soda pop laying on the street.
This brings revenue to the city and to those who are willing to make the effort to recycle them.
Luis:
That’s an interesting concept…
If it was implemented, how would we explain the loss of all metal shopping carts throughout the city in one night?
This debate is very civilized, and very politically correct. The problem is that taking shopping carts is theft, and it signifies a greater underlying problem: the people who do this have no respocet for others belongings, and have no respect for their own neighborhoods, or the fact that people have to pay for the carts to be brought back to the stores so they can be stolen again. You do not see these people taking the carts home and then returning the carts to the store. Enough excuses. People who do not have cars have managed to get their groceries home without stealing shopping carts and littering neighborhoods with them. In any other state, or in Mexico, these people would be prosecuted for theft.
The city incurs costs, as well as the stores. In both cases, the costs are borne by the honest.
Now, one day I was late for work and I ran across the street three seconds after the orange hand went up. No one felt sorry for me–I paid a $100 ticket! I learned my lesson.
So the solution here is to ticket each person pushing a stolen cart. The perp then has the choice of paying the ticket or purchasing a hand cart (or picking one up from luis or other charity that wants to sponsor this) and getting the ticket signed off by the PD. The guilty then pay, and those who choose to help the downtrodden can do that, too.
Anon.
Ok, let me understand your logic.
You feel taking a shopping cart home from a grocery store should be compared to the possibility of you being an unsafe driver, and potentially causing an accident, are equivalent?
More importantly, you feel our police, should begin to cite pedestrians with shopping carts? I prefer to have police go after the criminals, and those crimes committed down Harbor. The police can not do everything, so choose wisely.
Both are violations of the law, luis.
I am not sure it is against the law if no crime has been reported, however, just like there is a difference in murder as there with robbery, any penalty one would want to assess must match the supposed crime. Since you got a $100 ticket for running a light, the punishment if any for a shopping cart should be about 5-10 bucks, would you agree?
I did not run the light. I walked across the street at the end of the Walk sign, with lots of other people.
I am not trying to convince you–you see the world through your race-colored glasses.
I am hoping some reasonable politician will read this blog and see there are other alternatives to anarchy in our cities.
Your concern about breaking laws is appreciated. The point of this issue is that the taking of a cart can only be a crime if the owner of the cart reports it as being stolen.If some one takes your car and is stopped for whatever reason and you have not reported it stolen then no crime has been committed, except the driving infraction.Abandoning the car or cart probably is a civil offense.The grocery stores attitude seems to be that this problem is a cost of doing business.The solution and the criticisn is on the grocers.The individual might not be aware he is breaking the law, unlike the driving infraction example posted.It is unacceptable for the taxpayer to pay for the grocers cost of doing business position.Implementing no real solutions results in maintaining and promoting divisions between communities(Quality of life issues).Actions and no actions intentional or not are responsible for community divisions and can be interpreted as political strategy.
Consider these figures from this article, and explain away the apologist approach, Luis:
Wheels Of Fortune
Pushed to the Limit: Shopping cart theft is the latest cause c
anonymous 11:04 , what is your point of these articles and what do you mean-explain away the apologist approach, Luis ?
“The solution and the criticisn is on the grocers.The individual might not be aware he is breaking the law, unlike the driving infraction example posted.It is unacceptable for the taxpayer to pay for the grocers cost of doing business position”
Not defending the grocers, but they are caught between a rock and a hard place. The problem is so widespread, and so tolerated, they are left being blamed for the problem. The problem is that a lot of idiots think that taking carts home and leaving them in the street or on the sidewalks is somehow legal and acceptable.
Art, you are being an apologist for the people who are taking the carts. Period. Do you really believe that someone believes this is the way the world works? I take away the cart and – gee whiz – it must magically be taken back to the (right) store by the shopping cart fairies?
It is not a debate about whether or not it is against the law, it is. The argument proffered is “We just should not waste the resources enforcing the law. Let the city pay for it.” Garbage.
OK, so we as a community bear the cost yet again for the same group. The average person does not believe that this an acceptable practice, Art. And it is frankly inconceivable that anyone could. It is just a sign of a “what do I care – everything is free” attitude.
Luis wants to punish the stores: “impound any carts found in neighborhoods and sell them to recyclers” … “those who take the carts are not bad people, and thus should not be treated as such . . . Putting the responsibility on the stores is certainly a better solution. ” . . . “Hire High School students to assist in walking customers home and bringing the carts back. If they have tons of customers it may be a pretty large cost, bit it certainly is worth a try.” . . . “If it is of a few why then are we making this such a big deal? (HINT: Tagging is only a few peope doing it – should we ignore that too?) “It is petty things like this, that get many of us residents at odds with each other when it comes to selecting the right candidate and have us all be behind them. (This “petty thing” costs the grocery industry in California $15 million annually. TThink that may cause a few jobs to be lost (maybe union) and cause the rest of us to have to pay more in grocery costs? In addition to the tax costs i the city for the “pick-up service”?
Poor or less fortunate people for years have been able to get their groceries home without stealing carts. Why don’t you talk about the community educating the yahoos who somehow think this is acceptable behavior?
Yes, Yahoos. Stop being an apologist for them.