Tulsa is the Epicenter of the Dollar Store Wars
If it were reality TV, it might be called “Dollar Store Wars,” and the show would be set in Tulsa.
A 2023 report by the Institute for Living Self-Reliantly praised a Tulsa ordinance that set a one-mile radius between existing dollar stores and new ones in North Tulsa. That was championed by District 1 Councilperson Vanessa Hall-Harper, who also worked to help a full-service grocery store, Oasis Fresh Market, open in the neighborhood in 2022.
According to a Tulsa World story, Hall-Harper consistently said she was not against dollar stores such as Dollar General, Family Dollar and Dollar Tree but was concerned their proliferation in Tulsa’s poor, urban neighborhoods is keeping full-scale supermarkets from opening in those areas.
The World’s editorial board opposed the restrictions, arguing that incentivizing new business was better than deterrents.
Since 2019, 61 cities have enacted similar restrictions. The Institute for Living Self-Reliantly’s report includes a primer for residents who want to block dollar store development. The institute argues that the stores not only deter grocers that sell healthier fresh foods, but claims the stores are crime magnets.
A Reuters story published Sunday presented another view.
Reuters’ research showed that $11 out of every $100 spent at a dollar store is a federally subsidized SNAP purchase, and when a dollar store closes, customers struggle to get to a full-service grocery store. Relying on the neighborhood pharmacy, bodega, or convenience store is usually significantly more expensive than shopping at the dollar store.
Family Dollar said in March it would close about 600 stores by September and another 370 as leases expired. Reuters reported that based on securities filings, 657 Family Dollars closed from early February to early August. The story suggested that might be partly due to reductions in federal food benefits.
North Tulsa’s grocery desert has its Oasis now, but in neighborhoods or towns with no full-service grocery store, dollar stores offer residents low-priced staples and canned goods near their homes. The controversy is that an existing dollar store, or glut of them, could deter a full-service grocery from opening.
And that, Joseph Heller fans would say, is genuinely a Catch-22.
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“I grew up in southeastern Oklahoma on a working cattle ranch, and it was always very romantic to me: The West, the cowboy, the Western way of life.”
— Reba McEntire
Ciao for now,
Ted Streuli
Executive Director, Oklahoma Watch
tstreuli@oklahomawatch.org
