WANTED: FEWER STORES, MORE DOLLARS.

• Author: Sainato, Michael

Across the county, municipalities have imposed and enacted restrictions on dollar stores.

Wyandotte County, Kansas, which includes Kansas City, in 2016 passed an ordinance limiting the number of dollar stores in the region, with a separation requirement of 10,000 feet for any new dollar store retail locations.

In Tulsa, Oklahoma, the city council in April 2018 passed restrictions on dollar stores, requiring new ones to be at least one mile apart from existing retail locations. The changes came after a six-month moratorium on all new dollar stores passed in September 2017 Oklahoma City passed a similar moratorium in May 2019.

In August 2018, Mesquite, Texas, a Dallas suburb with around 140,000 residents, passed new regulations limiting the number of dollar stores, Officials cite the high influx of permit applications and the congestion of dollar stores in certain neighborhoods.

"They were not only going into areas where we thought they might push out competition for a grocery store that serves fresh food, but they were also concentrating themselves," says Mesquite City Manager Cliff Keheley. "We had concerns this type of concentration and the number would deter us from...