(upbeat music) Overgrown weeds, empty bottles, and discarded bags littered property around a Detroit Family Dollar.

Bridge Detroit, One Detroit's content partner, found this type of blight has impacted dollar stores across the city.

Jena Brooker has the story.

- I found more than 2,400 blight tickets in a three year period going back to 2020 just to Family Dollar and Dollar Tree, which are owned by the same company.

- One of the things that your article highlights is the fact that there was a recent settlement with the City of Detroit, tell me a little bit about that.

- Sure, so in response to all of these blight tickets that Family Dollar and Dollar Tree have accrued over the last few years, the city negotiated a settlement with them.

They accrued more than $740,000 in unpaid fines to date.

The city settled with them for 150,000, and once they pay that and a small fine for their unpaid inspection fees, they will receive a blight clearance for all of their properties in the city.

- What was the reaction from city officials with this settlement?

- So the city's law department and the building's Safety, Engineering, and Environmental Department negotiated this settlement with Dollar Tree and Family Dollar, and they said that they negotiated 150,000 because it allowed the city to get some money from the company, but not have to go through this arduous process of litigating all of these 2,400 blight violations.

- [Will] In a statement to Bridge Detroit, a Dollar Tree spokesperson said Detroit shoppers rely on their stores and it's committed to offering a clean and safe environment.

Brooker's report said Dollar Tree disputes some of the unpaid inspection fees, fines, invoices, violations, and judgments.

Dollar Tree declined to comment on the specifics of the settlement to Bridge Detroit.

Not all elected officials in the city were okay with the settlement.

One is calling for a halt on opening new dollar stores.

- Council member Angela Whitfield-Calloway has requested a temporary moratorium on building new dollar stores while City Council figures out what needs to be in place to lessen the harm that they're causing on the community.

- [Will] Whitfield-Calloway also wants to see more fresh food in these stores.

- One of the things that she's thinking about is requiring all dollar stores to dedicate 10% of their retail space to fresh produce.

And so that's something that other cities as well have done 10 to 15% of their retail space for food.

- [Will] Other cities around the country have these requirements because of what's known as the Dollar Store Effect.

- Nationally, dollar stores have been linked to increased crime, blight, and worsened food access.

So there's research that when a dollar store goes into a neighborhood, there's a decline in independently-owned grocery stores nearby.

And then there's also research that specifically low income people, which we know there are a lot of in Detroit, spend less on fresh produce when there's a dollar store nearby.

If there's one dollar store nearby, low income people will spend 14% less on fresh produce.

And if there's three dollar stores, that number goes up to 30% less.

So no one actually knows the exact number of dollar stores in Detroit, the three biggest chains, Dollar Tree, Family Dollar, and Dollar General own approximately 80.

And then there's all these other independently-owned ones.

- [Will] While dollar stores help fill gaps left by traditional grocery stores, they're not a replacement.

- They do provide access to some foods like packaged foods, canned goods.

But there is evidence that it's actually more expensive in the long run to shop at a dollar store than Walmart or Meyer.

Dollar General has approximately 20 stores in the city of Detroit.

Just four of those carry fresh produce, and Dollar Tree and Family Dollar declined to comment on how many of their stores stock fresh produce and if they're willing in the future to stock more.

- [Will] Moving forward, Brooker says there are things to watch.

- I think we need to see if the dollar stores are going to uphold the agreement that they signed with the city and take care of their blight.

I think we need to start having more conversations about how we can support more grocery stores to set up in the city.

The majority of people do find dollar stores helpful to the community.

They just wish that they stocked more fresh produce.

A question that kept coming up in reporting this is we don't have a lot of grocery stores.

There are more dollar stores in Detroit than grocery stores.

How do we get more grocery stores here?

What can the city do to support those people?