It’s an old story, and it generally follows the same set of events: Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, pursues a piece of real estate that catches its interest. Opponents of the retail giant gather their forces, develop an organized campaign and attempt to stop the development of a new store in its tracks.

Sometimes Wal-Mart loses. Many times it doesn’t. But there is always another piece of land on which to build another store.

In Cordova, that oft-repeated turn of events is roughly at the midway point. Several nonprofit and community activist groups have banded together under one name and for the purpose of presenting a united front in fighting a planned 151,908-square-foot Wal-Mart Supercenter coming to Cordova.

Taking a stand
The new group calls itself Citizens for Sustainable Growth and is comprised of groups including the Grays Creek Association, Cordova Leadership Council and Parents and Friends of Macon Hall Elementary School. At the moment, the approval process for the sleek new Wal-Mart store, which will carry the retail chain’s new logo, is in a state of suspended animation.

And the new grassroots activist group is using that to its advantage.

The new group is hosting a meeting today at the Fisherville Community Center at 6 p.m. to strategize and fine-tune its game plan for volunteers who want to pitch in. A petition drive also is under way, an effort that includes both an Internet-based petition and a petition of the pen and paper variety.

A Wal-Mart spokesman did not return several calls this week to discuss plans for the new store, which the city-county Land Use Control Board approved by a vote of 8-1 last month. That vote overturned a recommended rejection by the city-county Office of Planning and Development of the big box retailer’s vision for the Cordova store, which is slated to be built at the northwest corner of Houston Levee and Macon roads.

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