Palin made her mark by opposing zoning -- turned Wasilla into a giant strip mall

WASILLA, Alaska - Days after Sarah Palin became Mayor John Stein's only serious challenger in 1996, the 32-year-old city councilwoman stood and cast a proud, dissenting vote against one of Stein's greatest achievements: the first zoning plan in Wasilla's history.

Over the next two months, Palin surprised and excited many in Wasilla by introducing social issues such as abortion and guns to the city's nonpartisan elections on the way to defeating the incumbent. But the centerpiece of her campaign was opposition to Stein's effort to bring zoning to the community.

Wasilla today reflects the results of her free-market approach to development. Running for a second mayoral term in 1999, Palin cited as one of her greatest successes luring a Fred Meyer mega-supermarket to Wasilla. The zoning plan, adopted over then-councilwoman Palin's opposition, proved no impediment for the store, which went up just a few feet from the banks of bucolic Lake Wasilla, with a parking lot that contains Kentucky Fried Chicken, Blockbuster Video, and Carl's Jr.

They are among the dominant landmarks in a city that councilwoman Dianne Woodruff says "looks like a big ugly strip mall from one end to the other."