”We often take over vacant space in neighborhoods and areas that are already challenged, keeping centers and other adjacent businesses open and serving communities, especially those that are underserved,” Dollar Tree said in a statement.When Lorraine Cochran-Johnson was first running for a seat as a county commissioner in DeKalb County, Ga., in 2018, dollar stores were not something she paid attention to. But after a woman at a campaign event warned her about the stores’ impact on Black neighborhoods, she began to do some research online and by simply looking around her district, just east of Atlanta.The stores were mostly in predominantly Black neighborhood …
