Mayor Gary Singh — if you ask any council member or senior management staff at city hall — has played a key role in shaping a number of endeavors now moving forward in Manteca, including along the Atherton Drive corridor.

Singh makes it clear is not only a “Team Manteca” effort, but it wouldn’t have been possible without the leadership of past elected officials such as Steve DeBrum, John Harris, Willie Weatherford, Vince Hernandez, Jack Snyder, and Debby Moorhead that each spent 12 years or more moving the city forward to this point.

“What we (as a council and a city) are doing now was made possible by the ground work previous councils put in place,” Singh said Wednesday after Walmart filed a pre-application to build a 181,000-square foot store anchoring a 44-acre proposed shopping center on the northeast corner of Atherton Drive and South Main Street.

Mike Morowit, who along with Singh forms the council’s subcommittee on economic development, agreed with the mayor.

Morowit praised Singh for continually pushing developers and city staff to get the best outcomes for the Manteca community.

Singh noted the emerging Atherton Drive commercial corridor success stories including the announcement of a new Walmart Supercenter wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for a 3-2 council decision in 1989.

That decision — to reject Yellow Freight’s request to build a massive trucking freight terminal on the southeast quadrant of the Main Street and 120 Bypass interchange — almost tore the community apart.

The decision came nine years after a 1980 recall of Mayor Trena Kelley and council members Rick Wentworth and Bobby Davis did tear the community apart when the voters removed them from office in a recall election stemming from the dismal of then Police Chief Leonard Taylor.

Yellow Freight ended up locating in Tracy even after they were offered an alternative site on the northwest corner of Airport Way and Main Street.

Those opposing the council decision, slammed elected leaders for killing jobs.

Their battle cry “jobs, jobs, jobs” repeatedly surfaced in the next four council elections before fading away.

“Big trucks and shopping traffic don’t mix,” Singh said.

Neither do trucks mix well with residential neighborhoods as Snyder once pointed out.

Snyder over the years repeatedly pointed out if Yellow Freight had been allowed to locate next to the Main Street interchange it would have killed any chance of residential development in the area and there would have been no Woodward Park.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com