I live in Olympia, Washington state, and have been researching Westfield for the past five months. Westfield owns the Capital Mall here and when the local city council passed a moratorium on big box stores limiting their size to less than 125,000 square feet, Westfield requested an exemption.

I became curious about just who Westfield was because I felt its representative made a veiled threat in response to one council member’s question when the Westfield rep said: “that would be getting into restraint of trade issues.”

My research has depended quite heavily on information gathered at your website and from articles you have written, and now I am committed to finding as much information as I can, since our council caved into Westfield and gave them an exemption to the moratorium in a five to one vote.

If you could help me with understanding some of the issues around Frank Lowy and Westfield in Australia and New Zealand I would greatly appreciate it. I was a bit confused with regards to the issue surrounding the Orange Grove Road site and the old Arnott’s factory site, at one point confusing them as one and the same. I have information on the Orange Grove Road issue, but haven’t been successful in finding more about the Arnott’s issue or the Mercury site in New Zealand.

I am also having difficulty getting much biographical information on Frank Lowy, his wife Shirley (would love to know her maiden name) or David Lowy. Stephen and Peter Lowy are active in the US so I have had a bit better luck with them.

I am active in the community as an organiser and am currently consulting with the local chapter of Reclaim Democracy. If you need any information about me, I will be happy to oblige. I would also like to share any information on Lowy/Westfield that I have or that you might be interested in.

CRIKEY: Westfield somehow manages to persuade a council to support its expansion plans. Now there’s a surprise. You don’t become the world’s biggest shopping centre company without a very high success rate when dealing with councils around the world. Good luck Trudy, you’ll need it.