A degenerative bone disease and other ailments are robbing her of vitality. At 58, Fosburg says she also is coping with asthma and MRSA, an antibiotic-resistant infection that can be fatal.

Unable to work, Fosburg shares an upstairs apartment with her daughter and two granddaughters just off Fourth Plain Boulevard east of Interstate 5, one of city’s most downtrodden sections.

Several times a week, she puts her 21-month-old granddaughter, Trinity, in a stroller and begins a 20-minute walk a half-mile west to the Fred Meyer at Fourth Plain and Grand boulevards.

The city has identified the Fourth Plain corridor as needing help, but it will take a body blow instead next month when Fred Meyer shuts down and opens a new store in Grand Central, a spiffier shopping center closer to wealthier customers.

The pending closure is a case study in unintended consequences and a reminder of how one incremental decision can damage a broader city goal.

The area’s largest all-purpose retailer wouldn’t be moving to Grand Central if it weren’t for a huge assist by the city council. In May 2005, a divided council voted 4-3 to rezone 13 acres of industrial land, where Jantzen manufactured swimsuits for 50 years, to accommodate retail development.

Fosburg, who said her back problems make it impossible to hoist her granddaughter, a stroller and bags of groceries onto a C-Tran bus, isn’t sure what she will do when the Fourth Plain store retailer closes April 15.

“To find that Fred Meyer is closing in our area is a complete and totally devastating feeling to me,” she said.

Fred Meyer’s departure will leave a hole in an area already suffering from crime and poverty rates higher than citywide averages. Fosburg’s apartment is across Fourth Plain from Evergreen Park, which police identified last year as a hotbed of gang activity.

“Folks are poor here,” she said. “I have never lived in this kind of neighborhood before.”

Mayor Royce Pollard, who voted for the Jantzen rezoning in 2005, acknowledged that “every action has a reaction.” But he said Vancouver remains committed to reinvigorating the Fourth Plain corridor.

“We don’t want to leave any area of the city behind,” he said. “That area of the city is begging for help. But we can’t do it by ourselves.”

The closure of Fred Meyer has been scheduled for 20 months, since developer Killian Pacific announced the retailer would anchor Grand

Central, at the south end of Grand Boulevard slightly more than a mile away from the Fourth Plain site.

What’s new is word that Fred Meyer will prohibit any purchaser of the Fourth Plain site from operating a grocery store or pharmacy. Not only is the retailer leaving, but it’s preventing someone from filling the void.

Eric Holmes, Vancouver’s economic development director, said a noncompete clause doesn’t mean the building will become a vacant shell.

“If you look at the full spectrum of uses that could go on the property, from A to Z, and because of a private transaction, L and M are removed, you still have other uses that could go on there,” Holmes said.

“It doesn’t mean we are unable to achieve a mixture of uses that bring vibrancy.”

Too small for Fred Meyer

Fred Meyer spokesman Melinda Merrill said the existing Fourth Plain site isn’t big enough to accommodate a full-sized store.

“I guess you could say we were looking prior to the rezone because the Fourth Plain store, the old store, was not performing,” she said. “It was eventually going to have to close regardless of whether we had a place to go.”

Merrill characterized the noncompete clause as “part of the business.”

“We place our stores according to what else is around there,” she said. “We have to make sure we can still do a good, solid business.”

Fred Meyer has considerable history in the Fourth Plain store, which opened in 1968. Michael Ellis, Fred Meyer president, and Lynn Gust, its senior vice president of store operations, both got their starts working at the central Vancouver store, Merrill said.

“We serve our customers a specific way and with a specific offering at our stores,” she said. “And we just couldn’t do that any longer at the Fourth Plain site.”

A C-Tran line (Route 3) runs from the old store to the new site at Grand and Columbia House boulevards, Merrill said.

“If they could get to Fourth Plain, it’s only slightly longer to get to Grand Central,” she said.

Lost optimism

Meanwhile, the shelves at the Fourth Plain Fred Meyer are becoming increasingly bare as the retailer liquidates its stock in preparation for the closing.

Fosburg said she has worked for U.S. Bancorp and Southwest Washington Medical Center. She previously operated the Garden View Adult

Family Home in the neighborhood, but the state put the group home’s license on hold in 2002.

Fosburg said she spent a couple of years and $20,000 successfully fighting that state decision, but she also had to cope with her husband’s death and her own medical problems.

“I am suddenly put in a position I never had been before,” she said.

“Poverty-stricken.”

Fosburg said she was optimistic when she first heard of the city’s plans to reinvigorate the Fourth Plain corridor. With Fred Meyer closing, her optimism has turned to despair.

“These promises to economically develop and improve our area are a farce,” she said. “The city is turning their backs on us, absolutely.”

Jeffrey Mize covers Vancouver city government. Reach him at 360-735-4542 or jeff.mize@columbian.com.