Community protests Kroger closing

Kroger's decision to close its Roselawn store could hurt residents' health over the long haul, some community activists argue.

Those activists, including the Center for Closing the Health Gap and the Southern Christian Leadership Council Fred Shuttlesworth Chapter, are organizing an April 29 community meeting about the store closing and the issue of "food deserts" in Cincinnati. The meeting will start at 6 p.m. with a tentative location of Woodward High Career Technical High School, 7005 Reading Road, Roselawn.

Kroger announced on Friday that the Hillcrest Shopping Center store will close on Sunday, leaving Roselawn without a supermarket. Company officials blamed a loss of more than $1 million last year at that store, and an eroding customer base.

But Dwight Tillery, CEO of the Center for Closing the Health Gap in Avondale, said profit shouldn't be the only issue when basic services are at stake.

"What we're looking at here is a pattern of major grocers are abandoning the inner city neighborhoods which happen to be primarily minority people and poor people and elderly people," Tillery said. "This has to be more than, 'We're not meeting our bottom line,' because food, like water, is essential to the health and wellbeing of our residents. You're losing something that is very critical to people's survival."

Obesity and related health problems are higher in neighborhoods where people don't have access to fresh fruits and vegetables, Tillery said.

Read more: http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100419/NEWS01/4200358/1055/NEWS/Community+protests+Kroger+closing

perhaps it can be subsidized somehow?

By whom?

however, i highly doubt anyone would subsidize a grocery store

The GOVT already subsidizes grocery stores.

When I worked at Wal-Mart, I was astounded by how many people shop with food stamps and how much Wal-Mart made off of people who use food stamps.

Wal-Mart just rakes it up.
They pay their people sh*t, they normally get tax breaks from the city/county/state, LOTS of their customers are on food stamps, and they fund a lot of our politicians which keep their taxes low, keep their workers ununionized.

Walmart sells food cheap enough they don't make much money on it.

Walmarts entire profits are something like a third of what is spent on federal food assistance.

Also they do not just support stores which would otherwise close

but also disagree.A lot of inner city Mom and Pop stores survive due to WIC,
food stamps,etc. If some of these also close,then where do people go for food? McD,Wendys???

That is an interesting precipice that brings to question, once again, how long we will sing the praises of capitalism and raise its mutant flag above all else.

If the health and sustenance of people don't matter and removing their access to food is not considered essential, then, by capitulating to the profit motive, we are basically supporting profit as transcendent in value to human beings. Since human beings and their existence are supposed to be the purpose of that which profits are taken from, it is highly illogical unless you resort to the resulting class distinction that then reveals that only some people don't matter at all because they are not profitable. Only some people will be privileged to participate in, and benefit from, the corporate agenda.

If that conclusion is clear and true, then the problem and potential solutions might be more obvious.

"Obesity and related health problems are higher in neighborhoods where people don't have access to fresh fruits and vegetables, Tillery said."

Cause, or effect?

Is the lack of sources for fresh fruits and vegetables a cause of obesity?

Or is there a lack of sources for fresh fruits and vegetables because obese people don't buy them?

I think it's more about POOR neighborhoods having more obesity because they can't AFFORD fruits and vegetables.

Which is going to fill you up more, a $1.00 worth of vegetables and/or fruit OR a something off the $1.00 menu at McDonald's?

And it can't be used at McDonald's. It should not be possible that someone is so poor they can't actually afford to eat right. Rather, it seems a question of priorities. Someone who is poor may simply not prioritize eating right. That's a pretty difficult problem to solve, though. Are we willing to force poor people to prioritize healthy eating over, say, food that is quicker to prepare?

Personally, I think the biggest problem by far - that nobody seems to appreciate - is one of education. But NOT education about "good food" and "bad food." Everyone knows that already. Rather, education about *how to prepare good food.* My own experience is anecdotal, but I strongly believe that the biggest reason people continue to buy unhealthy processed and fast food is because they simply don't know how to make healthy food taste good. Sure, there are recipes that anyone can get, but unless someone like a parent or a spouse took the time to teach you the basics of techniques of cooking and seasoning, that's useless! It's like trying to learn how to golf by reading a golf magazine.

It's no secret that there has been a tremendous breakdown of families in our poorest areas, and I think one result is that children from broken families often haven't got any ability whatsoever to prepare simple meals for themselves from basic ingredients, because nobody ever took the time to teach them. And now that they are adults, what are you going to do? Enroll in a community college course you can't afford and don't have time for?

the breakdown of Food Stamp benefits?

Yahoo! recently had an article where three chefs had to prepare meals on a food stamp budget.

My mom spends around $100 a week for groceries. I spend around $40 for food a week. On food stamps, it normally breaks down to $68 a week for a family. I couldn't see my family being able to make it on $68 a week without some hunger pangs cropping up.

I think knowing how to prepare foods is well, good, and necessary but the issue is being able to AFFORD those meals.

There are some people on food stamps who can afford to eat healthy but they choose not to and then you have those who want to eat healthy but they're trying to juggle, "Hmm...which provides me the most calories for my buck? Ramen noodles or an apple?"

They are supposed to provide assistance, to supplement some other source of income or social benefit program. At some point we have to decide what the problem is. After all, if the person choosing Ramen noodles is obese, then the *actual* problem is them simply buying whatever has the most calories, isn't it? On the other hand, if the problem is them not affording enough calories, how is it that they are obese?

Most people are working more than one job and simply don't have time to watch the stove, even if they wanted to. I wonder if there's been any research that giving people a crock pot would help?

I certainly am grateful to my family for teaching me how to cook. It's saved my bacon more than once. Literally. :D

Giving people a crock pot will not help unless they *already* know how to use it and what to put in it.

Frankly, I think the only way to fix this going forward is to make at least a semester of cooking a required high school class.

I took a semester of cooking and sewing in the 8th Grade, IIRC. It's either 7th or 8th grade.

But They've cut out all that because it isn't one of the 3 Rs.

My family taught me to cook, but in Home Ec you could at least get family with a stove and what to do with it.

I shop at several middle class and upper class grocery stores. Well off people have piles of processed food in their carts too. My husband and I currently live on unemployment check. I get very little at regular grocery stores besides flour and other basic cooking from scratch ingredients, toilet paper and other non food essentials. I buy my meat, which we eat maybe twice a week at whichever grocery store has the best sale. I buy all my fruits and veggies at a large stand I am fortunate enough to have within a short driving distance. All food is expensive and even though I cook all my meals from scratch we run short of food.

I see no difference in the food choice of the haves and have nots. Most americans buy processed packaged "food". Although I do see more have nots at the veggie stand because of much better prices.

Poor food choices run right up the economic ladder.

As far the lack of inner city grocery stores, that has been a huge problem for years and getting worse. If private business wants to control access to food for profit then yes, force them to operate in poor areas.

farmers markets?

Urban gardening seems to be the wave of the future.

I don't know what the answer is to get more fresh produce to people.

We have one in my city and a new grocery store that serves a lot of local + organic foods recently open.

My only concern is that the people in the neighborhood who could REALLY benefit from the store (poor African-Americans) won't be able to afford the food. Sure the store takes EBT cards and SNAP benefits but eh....
When I went in there, the soy milk (which normally costs $3.00 at Kroger and $2.00 something at Wal-Mart) was $5.00.:rant:

I understand they need to make a profit but...wow.

Buying good quality food is seen as yuppie behaviour and therefore comes with a premium pricetag still.

If you've got one, buying at the farmers market can be really good on the pocket book for veggies and fruits. OTOH, buying things like meats or cheeses or other produced goods at the farmers market can be expensive.

Unhealthy food is just subsidized more.

In any case, I've looked at the fruits and veggies at the farmer's market and it's more expensive than Wal-Mart and Kroger.
However, since I like to support local farmers, I try to buy locally grown foods.

When it comes to meat, I try to buy organic meat when I can afford it. I've tried organic milk and I just can't get down with it. I just try to buy the kind without the R-whatever growth hormone added to it.

Locally grown foods are grown on a smaller scale, so the farmers have to charge more money per "item" just to survive. The larger the farm, the lower the overhead costs per "item" are, and the cheaper it can be sold.

"the larger the farm,the lower the overhead" came from. They need more equipment,labor,land,etc.Their profit margin is probably lower.

Let's say I have a tractor, and that tractor has a monthly payment of $500 a month. If I make 500 "units" a month using that tractor, I need to add at least a dollar to the price of each item to cover the cost of my tractor. If I make 5000 "units", I only need to add 10 cents to the cost of each item.

It's a fairly simplistic example, but you get the point. Farms, and especially family farms, tend to have a lot of fixed costs that don't vary much based on volume. It's true that there are variable costs that do fluctuate with size, but those tend to scale no matter the volume of the product, and aren't really all that relevant to the discussion.

Megafarms sell food cheaper because their per-item fixed costs are a fraction of that borne by small family farmers. Food from small family farms is more expensive because of this. The solution? Bigger organic and family farms, or better resource sharing and tax breaks to reduce the fixed cost overhead borne by smaller family farmers.

It's basic ag economics.

Why not do both. Walmart is actually doing some pretty laudable work in this area. See, e.g., http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/03/the-great-grocery-smackdown/7904/.

"I'm all for self-empowerment. There are other options. Maybe we can open our own grocery store."

Large grocery stores are expensive to run because they tend to carry a huge variety of items that take up shelf space and spoil. Smaller, independent groceries can be a lot more efficient, because they can adjust their stock to the demands of the particular neighborhood and only carry the foods that people want.

I was in another store years ago that I thought was brilliantly run. When a big grocer shut down, a couple of partners leased the space and carved it up into several smaller stores. You walked into the front doors of the store, and were greeted by wide walkways lined with other small stores. Each of these was a family owned small business in its own right. Some sold ethnic foods. They convinced a local meat market to open a satellite store in one of the booths. They visited the local farmers market and talked a few of them into combining to open a vegetable shop. It was pretty cool.

Sadly, that particular store failed when the partners running it started bickering over some unrelated investments. I'd love to see someone try to recreate that concept elsewhere.

It would be nice if the city there gave start up funds or they could apply for funds somehow.
Cities like to give big tax breaks when big companies come into town but they don't like to support small businesses.

I know Michelle Obama talked up more community grocery stores in her fight against childhood obesity.

Instead of large "grocery stores", you have a collection of small booths selling everything you need. Need fish? Go to the fish vendor. Need vegetables? Got three booths selling those. Toothpaste? There will be someone selling dry goods somewhere.

They just took the concept, moved it into a modern building, and added communal shopping carts.