RANT WARNING!
Well, I had a nice well thought out entry that I was almost finished with and then my computer ate it...this pisses me just about is much as the Wal-Mart being approved to come to Cleveland. However, here is a letter to the editor sent in by Teresa Stansel of Cleveland that pretty much sums up my thoughts on the matter completely. And, unlike our elected officials she seems to have her facts straight about the other side of Wal-Mart, what's beyond simple "increased tax revenue"
To the editor:
I am completely shocked by the red carpet welcome that some of the local citizens have given to Wal-Mart by their silence and tacit consent. Some have expressed the convenience it will bring to purchase shoes and shirts, and that less effort and gas will be required to drive to other neighboring counties to acquire cheap foreign made goods. Have they forgotten their local businesses play a vital role in supporting and nurturing a community, and that Wal-Mart is typically associated with slaughtering the economic viability on main streets of rural America?
Here are a few Wal-Mart statistics. (1) Wal-Mart costs American taxpayers an estimated $1.6 billion each year in state and local subsidy programs. (2) One Wal-Mart store with 200 employees may result in an annual cost to federal taxpayers in excess of $420,750 (3) Costly premiums and strict eligibility requirements result in only two in five Wal-Mart employees being covered by the company's health care plan, compared to 66 percent nationally at large firms. (4) In Georgia, over 10,000 children of Wal-Mart employees are on state-funded healthcare. (5) In Arkansas, Wal-Mart's home state, nearly 4,000 employees receive public assistance, and the taxpayers bear over $39 million in medicaid costs. (6) Wal-Mart generates large numbers of police calls-far more than local businesses do. While someone caught shoplifting a $3 item from a local store might simply be told by the owner never to come back, that same $3 shoplifting incident at Wal-Mart will cost the city hours of police time responding to the call, filling out paperwork, and possible court appearances. (8) In several small Southern communities, Wal-Mart has taken over the local economy only to skip town years later, leaving a withered tax base, no place to buy many staple goods, a 40%+ tax deficit and a subsequent blight on the community.
While a second Wal-Mart has recently been rejected in neighboring Hall County, the City of Gainesville tentatively adopted a millage rate that would require an increase in property taxes by a whopping 19.36 per cent. This increase is directly a result of extensive costly planning and economic development projects put into place there that are also permeating into White County that do not offset tax increases, as promised. The entry of Wal-Mart into our community will only compound the growth problem and cause economic instability.
Many insightful elected officials and community leaders across the country have put proactive ordinances into place to protect the local taxpayers and community businesses from Wal-Mart. Unfortunately, Cleveland and White County elected officials have failed to provide that vision, foresight, and protection. The skill sets, knowledge and traditions of the local community are lost with the entry of Wal-Marts and multinational corporations. There is an erosion of the richness and diversity of the community, neighborliness, and friendship. Control, capital and management decisions are moved to far away places and cheap labor displaces those we once knew as our neighbors and friends.
None of the parents or grandparents of those who have expressed they would prefer to buy shoes and shirts at Wal-Mart in White County would have placed their families at economic risk by the lure of cheap goods. Independence and self-sufficiency meant something to them. That wiser generation would not have fallen for the debt credit schemes or the inducement of grants that result in further restriction, subjugation and servitude that are being infused into Cleveland and White County, and promoted primarily by incumbent Commissioner Dennis Bergin. Those solid individuals and families I have had the pleasure of knowing would never have fallen for such trickery and chicanery
It is time to take a serious look at this situation for the good of the local rural community.
Conveniences are sometimes far more costly than what the promoters would ever tell you. The promotional rhetoric of a Wal-Mart in White County is nothing more than bait, and when the fish is hooked, the switch begins.
Teresa Stansel
Cleveland
To the editor:
I am completely shocked by the red carpet welcome that some of the local citizens have given to Wal-Mart by their silence and tacit consent. Some have expressed the convenience it will bring to purchase shoes and shirts, and that less effort and gas will be required to drive to other neighboring counties to acquire cheap foreign made goods. Have they forgotten their local businesses play a vital role in supporting and nurturing a community, and that Wal-Mart is typically associated with slaughtering the economic viability on main streets of rural America?
Here are a few Wal-Mart statistics. (1) Wal-Mart costs American taxpayers an estimated $1.6 billion each year in state and local subsidy programs. (2) One Wal-Mart store with 200 employees may result in an annual cost to federal taxpayers in excess of $420,750 (3) Costly premiums and strict eligibility requirements result in only two in five Wal-Mart employees being covered by the company's health care plan, compared to 66 percent nationally at large firms. (4) In Georgia, over 10,000 children of Wal-Mart employees are on state-funded healthcare. (5) In Arkansas, Wal-Mart's home state, nearly 4,000 employees receive public assistance, and the taxpayers bear over $39 million in medicaid costs. (6) Wal-Mart generates large numbers of police calls-far more than local businesses do. While someone caught shoplifting a $3 item from a local store might simply be told by the owner never to come back, that same $3 shoplifting incident at Wal-Mart will cost the city hours of police time responding to the call, filling out paperwork, and possible court appearances. (8) In several small Southern communities, Wal-Mart has taken over the local economy only to skip town years later, leaving a withered tax base, no place to buy many staple goods, a 40%+ tax deficit and a subsequent blight on the community.
While a second Wal-Mart has recently been rejected in neighboring Hall County, the City of Gainesville tentatively adopted a millage rate that would require an increase in property taxes by a whopping 19.36 per cent. This increase is directly a result of extensive costly planning and economic development projects put into place there that are also permeating into White County that do not offset tax increases, as promised. The entry of Wal-Mart into our community will only compound the growth problem and cause economic instability.
Many insightful elected officials and community leaders across the country have put proactive ordinances into place to protect the local taxpayers and community businesses from Wal-Mart. Unfortunately, Cleveland and White County elected officials have failed to provide that vision, foresight, and protection. The skill sets, knowledge and traditions of the local community are lost with the entry of Wal-Marts and multinational corporations. There is an erosion of the richness and diversity of the community, neighborliness, and friendship. Control, capital and management decisions are moved to far away places and cheap labor displaces those we once knew as our neighbors and friends.
None of the parents or grandparents of those who have expressed they would prefer to buy shoes and shirts at Wal-Mart in White County would have placed their families at economic risk by the lure of cheap goods. Independence and self-sufficiency meant something to them. That wiser generation would not have fallen for the debt credit schemes or the inducement of grants that result in further restriction, subjugation and servitude that are being infused into Cleveland and White County, and promoted primarily by incumbent Commissioner Dennis Bergin. Those solid individuals and families I have had the pleasure of knowing would never have fallen for such trickery and chicanery
It is time to take a serious look at this situation for the good of the local rural community.
Conveniences are sometimes far more costly than what the promoters would ever tell you. The promotional rhetoric of a Wal-Mart in White County is nothing more than bait, and when the fish is hooked, the switch begins.
Teresa Stansel
Cleveland