How Do We Save Our Small Rural Towns?

[BA Deere]

Well, maybe the small town model has run it`s course, outside of a niche destination area if they are lucky enough to have a lake or vineyard/winery/bed&breakfast deal.   Truth is, it takes less workers on farms these days and the support businesses that go with it.  You don`t need towns with a sale barn hog buying station, 2 implement dealers, blacksmith, lumberyard, 5 hardware stores...oh it would be nice and from what I remember it was great and would love to go back.  But nowadays one implement dealer every 50 miles with service trucks, hog and cattle processing plants every 150 miles, seems to suffice. 

Well that`s alot of people taken out of the equation, seems like money flows to it`s greatest efficiency...I don`t like it.  But it is what it is.

[k-289]

$$$$   FLOWS   to  it's   great - est  efficiency  or  ineffiniecy -   SO   would  the    Hearst  Castle     be most efficient  ?  ?     

[k-289]

Small  Town  meat  lockers are  efficient  or  NOT  ?    Although  I  have  yet  to  see  a  headline  of  E COLI  contamination  meat  being  recalled  from  our  local  lockers -   efficient  or  none efficient  ??  

[sw363535]

No that is not money flow...... that is money stops, pools, and stagnates... Hearst...

a few examples of the real affects of effeciency and technology.............. that are true and driving us from the past....

Health care and technology in the field of medicine.... We are close to a couple of towns of less than 3500 folks each maybe even in each county. Yet they both struggle to have modern hospital facilities and medical staff prepared for anything...

Would have made full sense 60 years ago.... not so sure these days... 

Both are taping the property taxes very hard to maintain those facilities and personel..... and yet many in those counties go the 60 to 160 miles to a regional facility bypassing the local..

I often wonder how many residents it takes to justify the facilities we desire, but it is part of the community battle for survival, to have the better health care facility in the area.... a better school, parks and rec department, rest home. 

Amazing what you can find on the County tax budget.

I used to think if Walmart, Lowes, UPS, and Kohls worked a deal, one set of stores for every 30K residents--- two convenience stores and a donut shop........ Its all over on main street (assuming 4 well placed ATM's).   That may be more business than we will have left in another 10 years, especially if 15K of those 30K are unemployed.

And don't forget there is no wisdom in money flowing when it is "other peoples money".  

WE need...... We need......  We need.....  as long as the county pays

How large is the precentage of residents that sound like this because they don't have much property to tax.  

There was a time in history that property ownership was a requirement to vote...

What a good idea..

[BA Deere]

Don`t get me wrong K-289, I don`t like "efficiency".  but let`s say an independent farrow/finish guy can have 150 sows and market 2400 hogs.  Well, that one guy could take care of 16,000 finishing hogs, that specialization has some synergies and that cuts down the need for labor...like it or not (I don`t) it`s the way of the world and is unfortunately working.

Whatever gets the cheapest food in the supermarket, so the wage slaves are able to work for less compensation is deemed most eficient.  E coli is just "collateral damages" ..just part of doing business. 

A local locker might have the cleanest best quality specialities, but it can`t compete on price with a plant that processes 10,000 hogs/day.   But that is seen as a "luxury" in this brave new world.

[sw363535]

Lets face it ...... the machine that doesn't eat, sleep, get sick, or serf the net is always going to be the most effecient and probably cheapest without health care or a pension.

But the e coli question is another matter and can be affected by many things that make the comparison impossible.  Most e coli outbreaks still rise up from poor food preparation and poor storage before serving......  So the bigger plant has the most customers and will have the most potential for blame by sheer numbers.  (And for sure the cook who didn't warm up the raw meat will blame the packing plant...)

Bigger plants have a larger number of tests run and by the numbers will have more positive tests even if the "per ton" incidents are the same the volume is there to spin the numbers...

The bigger plants have deeper pockets and larger liability insurance policies........... a principle factor in the filing of legal action

The bigger plants will generate larger reader numbers on the "scare" stories because news folks don't know how to prevent e coli. and obviously most of the public has lost that general knowledge as well..   lets face it the average TV news listener may not know the difference between e coli and ebola.

Small local meat processors aren't worth suing, or wrecking with a story = not important enough for the testing, blaming, or going after with a lawyer...

Unless usda needs a scapegoat.

Therefore data on the subject is skewed by human activity.  always ineffecient

[lsc76cat]

Another thought - the small local meat processor is serving a customer base that, on average, is more

     knowledgeable about proper handling/preparation.

The further we are from the source of our food the more danger we face.

.

[k-289]

So  a  21 year old  VFW  coming back from the Mid East  with  NO  property would  be  EXEMPT  on voting  ??

Hearst  Castle  tickets are  $25 for adults  -  $12  for  children   -   check on opening dates due to forest  fire of which tax  $$$  are being spent to protect owned  &   rented  properties ---

Occupancy  rates  for   rural  areas  are  defiantily a  headwind  -  what  a  stark  flip-flop  in  4  decades ---  

[k-289]

So   living  75  miles  from  4  MEGA  packing operations will insulate me  from  E-COLI   ?    Seems  the folks in Omaha that  get  meat from our  local lockers have yet to issue a complaint or recall  &  they are 165 miles away and 3  generations removed ---

[k-289]

Seems  the  volume  meat  business  prefers an  less  educated  customer  so  we  can  import  S A  meat  and  I  guess  the  consumer  is  to  uneducated to  read  a label  except  for  fruits  &  veggies ---