When I saw the headline for the article I want to talk about I almost didn’t bother to click on it. But it’s Saturday evening and you never know what tidbits you find when you just go exploring the internet. In any case seeing a headline for a story by TBD about some county shutting down a small business, which included words to the effect we won’t believe why I figured why not take a look?
First a bit of context. Vermicompost is, like more traditional composting you might be familiar with is an environmentally sound way to deal with organic waste. Vermicompost which uses certain species of worms improves upon traditional compost and creates an excellent fertilizer that us rich in nutrients and has no harmful effects on the environment. In fact there are studies that show it removes heavy metals that might go into the fertilizer by-product is creates. It even has far less smell than traditional compost. For more information here’s a Wikipedia link.
Well, a lady in Palm Beach County, FL started up a worm farm and vermicomposting operation. and in 2015 partnered up with the Palm Beach County Food Bank. They’d provide expired donations to Mel Corichi’s operation which she’d feed to her worms and create the vermicompost I just talked about and it would be used as the eco-friendly fertilizer it is. Local residents started opting into the program as well. Sounds great doesn’t it? A win-win for everyone and the environment too.
Alas, this is Flori-DUH and something that makes so much sense, that’s so effective and (horrors!) good for the environment just isn’t something even local govt. officials in FL are going to put up with. Corichi got a call from the county’s Solid Waste Authority telling her what she was doing was illegal, and she was forced to shut down the operation:
She explained to Palm Beach Daily News, “Whether or not it’s on the curb or in your house, if it’s trash, it’s the property of the Solid Waste Authority.”
The county told Corichi that it burns the county’s organic waste to generate electricity that powers 88,000 local homes.
“Apparently, my little composting operation could affect the county’s ability to do that,” Corichi told Palm Beach Daily News.
This is all bat-sh*t insane. However, this IS happening in Florida and Republicans have come to rule that state with a iron fist. Silly me, I grew and lived most of my life hearing conservatives were all about leaving individuals alone to make their own choices (except of course when it comes to reproductive rights) and being friendly to small business. Keep govt. OUT of small business’ business.
Incinerating trash/garbage to generate electricity (which is what that county does) seems on the surface like a good idea. However, it produces harmful environmental effects. As with so many things you have to look beyond the surface because the devil is in the details and sometimes those details are very inconvenient truths. Still, the idea that some county government claims that your garbage belongs to THEM, whether it’s in the bin outside for the trash collector on in the wastebasket in your kitchen doesn’t sound like what conservatives preach about leaving individuals alone to live their lives!
Again however this is f**king Florida and if they can find an excuse to shut down a small business owner running an environmentally friendly operation they WILL find an excuse to do it! I see stuff like this and wonder why the hell the Democratic Party in Florida long ago gave up and gave the GOP the kind of control it has there. That’s another, much longer discussion so I’ll not tackle it here.
But this anecdotal story illustrates a larger problem. Florida used to be a competitive state but now it’s a large bloc of electoral votes that are lost to us. And this story shows how pervasive conservative control has gotten there.
The logical extension of this is Ron Desanctomonius owns everything you own because he owns the garbage company which owns your, uhm, “pre-trash” stuff.
The ONLY remaining question is how far do you get away from the store in your car with your new purchases before it becomes his?
Or Casey’s?
So, she operated her business for over 7 years before the county *suddenly* decided she was “breaking the law?”
My guess is she wasn’t paying off the right people in the past couple of years.
RW Ron’s, FLORIDA GESTAPO!
I get my worms from Uncle Jim’s worm farm. nobody seems to care what I do with my garbage. Florida is pretty strange.
I think the fact that she was doing it and getting stuff from her neighbors most likely contributed to this. The STATE looked at it and decided it was losing money and that was that.
Like I always say about Florida, it’s not the heat, it’s the stupidity.
I have been a gardener for a very long time. I am no fan of any burning of waste. Where we live they do tap these dump sites for methane to store and burn at local large facilities as a source of heat. This sounds like an incinerator operation where they are just plain loading a furnace and lighting a match, not worried what might be in said trash. This is just plain slow suicide. But you can’t tell republicans what color the grass is.
That being said I have advocated for this very thing. Everyone from grocery stores to restaurants throw away vegetables at an alarming rate which leads to increased gas from decomposition in the landfills. Remember the tapping the landfills for methane gas. Now the simpler idea would be not to throw away the vegetables. Bread is also something that works. Meat not so much. Anyway, with our dying planet which republicans steadfastly deny because that would mean they gave a shit about something and they would rather lose an arm than admit that. But with this program you are taking care of a waste product while creating more food products. Of course you are cutting Monsanto out of there planet killing poison ☠️ to be spread indiscriminately all over America to kill every living thing including the humans that are theoretically going to eat what is grown on the farm ground in question. We truly are a stupid people. I been watching this farce advance for some time having grown up on a farm. I introduced organic fertilizer to our garden many years ago. The results were simply amazing. Now, for a primar on the subject. With a basic organic approach. You will have crops that are less susceptible to drought conditions, need less water, and are just all around healthier plants. But there you go, again! We are back at Monsanto since they don’t produce a line of organic fertilizer products. Just their nasty poisonous ☠️ crap. Did you know that ammonia nitrates, a key component in Monsantos products is also a key component in many explosive devices. Why Timothy Mcvee, the Oklahoma bomber had God knows how much of the shit in his bomb that brought down that building he blew up. I really haven’t heard of anyone blowing up a building with cowshit.
Well, what can you expect from a state which would elect a psuedo-christian right-wing religionist evilgelican hypocrate would-be fascist dictator like Ron Desatanist (the proper way to pronounce his name!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)