Political activist Ray Richardson has started a petition drive that could bring the question of whether Wal-Mart comes to Westbrook to a vote.

Richardson, of Graham Road, registered a petition with the City Clerk’s office on Thursday seeking to place a question on the Nov. 8 ballot asking voters if they want to increase the maximum footprint of buildings in the gateway zoning district from 160,000 to 180,000 square feet.

After Wal-Mart proposed building a 203,000-square-foot store, the Planning Board approved a set of restrictions on retail projects that included a 160,000-square-foot limit. Before the City Council voted on the restrictions, Wal-Mart asked to be allowed a 180,000-square-foot store. But the council upheld the Planning Board’s recommendation in a 5-2 vote.

City Clerk Barbara Hawkes said Richardson, who is the chairman of the Republican City Committee, would need to gather 1,312 signatures by Sept. 30 to get it on the November ballot.

Eileen Shutts of Westbrook Our Home, a citizens’ group that supports the retail restrictions, said she doesn’t see the benefit of putting the question on the ballot. “Personally, I think it’s too bad in that it’s dragging it out for Saunders and for Wal-Mart,” she said.

Shutts said Wal-Mart and the new retail restrictions have been in front of the city for more than a year, and she feels the Planning Board and the City Council have come up with a set of standards that is fair to all, after plenty of debate. “It was a very long process to come up with the standards,” she said. “We feel 160,000 square feet was a very good compromise,” Shutts said. “We still feel 160,000 is very, very large.”

Richardson said he has collected about 100 signatures so far. He said he plans to circulate the petitions throughout the city. “I want to get signatures from every ward to show there’s broad support for this,” he said.

Shutts said Westbrook Our Home has learned from Stacy Mitchell, a researcher with the Institute for Local Self Reliance, that Wal-Mart has a prototype for a 160,000-square-foot store, so the company would not have to design a new store to comply with the restrictions. “It isn’t as if they would have to reinvent the wheel,” Shutts said. Shutts did not know exactly where in the country Wal-Mart had constructed a 160,000-square-foot store.

As part of his effort to get the issue on the ballot, Richardson said he plans to form a political action committee to raise money for the effort. He stressed he would not be taking any money from Wal-Mart and he will accept only individual contributions up to a $200 limit.

“I don’t want anyone to say Wal-Mart put me up to this,” Richardson said. “I’m not seeking their help. I’m doing this myself. This is about Westbrook.”

While he is passionate about property rights, Richardson was careful to say he respected the concerns of the neighbors who fought for the extra restrictions to be placed on the project. For that reason, he said he sought to overturn only the size limit.

“I know this is an emotional issue,” Richardson said. “I have great admiration for Westbrook Our Home standing up for what they think is right and out of respect for them, I only sought to amend the building size.”

If Richardson is successful in getting the issue on the November ballot, Shutts said she hopes voters will decide to keep all of the restrictions in place. “I hope that voters, regardless of whether they want to see Wal-Mart there or not, will vote for local control,” said Shutts. “It’s a bad precedent to set to allow a company coming into a city to make the rules.”

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