O Christmas Tree! O Christmas Tree!

Kudos To Our Local Walmart

I usually give Walmart, in general, quite a bit of grief because of what I see locally and how Walmart seems to be this machine that feeds on greed, deception, and slight of hand. That’s not why I’m here today. today I actually have something nice to say about our local Walmart Supercenter. My son and I found ourselves out at our local Walmart Supercenter on Sunday afternoon because we were looking for a deep fryer since it appears that mine took a dive off the deep end never to be working again. It was a good fryer but it was time for her to be retired after 15 years. Anyway, we headed out to the closest and most convenient place to shop. Now, this is not normal behavior for me because I actually can’t stand going to Walmart for so many reasons. The top of those reasons being the people skills there suck ass, the lines are always long, and it always seems that the one person I get to talk to acts like they are doing me a favor. So, I avoid this place like the plague.

I actually had no intention on going to Walmart, but since I was at the Home Depot that shares the parking lot I bit the bullet and made the choice just to deal with it. I got something unexpected, I found what I was looking for, experienced no line, it was on sale a considerable amount lower than anybody by $20, and I had found a parking spot right up front. What I expected to take a few miserable hours actually took me less than 15 minutes from the time I parked until I got back in my car. I actually left with a smile, like I just got one over on Walmart. Then, the reason for this post, as we exited the store, I saw the huge sign which pointed out that this Walmart would be closed from 9pm Tuesday night until 5am Thursday morning. Which was a shocker, I have never seen this Walmart closed, ever, not even for 30 seconds.

As you can tell I am both shocked and pleased. I was in and out like a flash of lightning and Walmart will be letting their people have Christmas day off to be with their families. As fantastic as that may sound I still wonder quietly at what price it will be to the employees. Walmart isn’t known for paid holiday time off. Will the regularly scheduled employees be getting a paid holiday? I have searched on the internet for answers, found none. A friend at work whose wife has been a part time employee of that Walmart for 15 years stated that she will just have the day off without pay and she doesn’t know about everyone else. So who knows. The important part is that this Walmart will be closed for a whopping 32 hours over Christmas, and for that alone I give them a thumbs up instead of my normal solo bird.

USDA Is Playing Secret Santa

While the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) sounded a lot like Scrooge this year by threatening to cut nutrition assistance for low income women and children, it was behaving like a secret Santa to special interests spreading good cheer and taxpayer dollars through the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program. Here are more than a few other examples how the program spent $50 million to ring in the holidays early in 2013.

Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree. Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Clause. And the Virginia Christmas Tree Growers Association is one of the six projects involving Christmas trees that was funded. These included shearing, marketing and promoting Christmas trees. The program also supported at least five ornamental plant initiatives, including a project to “to increase consumers’ awareness and preference for Florida-grown ornamental plants by investigating determinants of consumer purchasing behavior such as personal health and wellness benefits and environmental and economic benefits and by developing contextually relevant marketing strategies to increase plant sales” and another to support seminars on ornamental plants at the South Carolina Nursery and Landscape Association conference.

Visions of Sugar plums Dancing in Their Heads. The Specialty Crop Block Grant Program had a sweet tooth for sugar producers this year and gave the plum growers reason to dance. The California Dried Plum Board received taxpayer dollars “to enhance the market for” prunes in Japan and South Korea. Funding was provided for “developing and implementing a comprehensive social media marketing campaign” for the Vermont Maple Sugar Makers’ Association, “organizing and promoting a Maple Weekend including a recipe contest, tours of sugarhouses, restaurant participation, and promotional activities” with the Massachusetts Maple Producers Association, and partnering with the Michigan Maple Syrup Association “to increase the profitability of Michigan maple syrup producers by developing planting stock for new sugar bushes with a higher sap sugar”.

Global Santa Tracker. Just like Santa with his bag full of toys, the USDA Specialty Crop Block Grant Program traveled around the world this year spreading joy, with more than ten grants paying for international junkets. These included conducting the “USA Pear Road Show” in China, sending representatives from the Oklahoma Pecan Growers Association to international tradeshows, bringing wine connoisseurs from China to Washington state, supporting the participation of Puerto Rican coffee producers in the Specialty Coffee Association of Europe trade shows, hosting seminars on “cooking with pistachios and prunes” in Japan and South Korea, putting on “meetings, product showcases, trade tastings, and educational seminars” for Oregon producers in Asia, facilitating a bean grower field day in Mexico, supporting attendance at domestic and international trade shows for Michigan groups and companies, and assisting with a “trade development mission” to Vietnam, the Philippines and Hong Kong.

Holiday Wine and Spirits. Santa may enjoy a glass of milk with cookies to get him through a busy evening of delivering holiday gifts and cheer, but the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program showed a preference for wine. The program funded 35 wine related projects this year. These included creating two smart phone apps to help “navigate to the next winery,” promoting wine trails and sales, improving wine tasting room satisfaction, and developing a West Virginia wine trail publication, and hosting a Wine Pavilion at the South Dakota State Fair.

Making a List and Checking It Twice. When making a list of duplicative government programs, the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program is sure to be on it at least twice since it mirrors in many ways at least two other USDA programs, the Market Access Program and Value Added Producer Grants. While not all of the projects funded by the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program were wasteful, nearly all were eligible for funding from other federal programs making the program unnecessary. The largest proportion of grants was provided for marketing and promotion, such as social media for strawberries and a YouTube video about the proper handling of watermelons.

The Partridge in a Pear Tree: The “USA Pear Road Show,” promoting pears as far away as China, was one of the two pear related projects funded this year by the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program. While a flight to China was included, no partridge was actually involved in either project.

Information found for this “Your Tax Dollars @ Work” post was done by using a Google search. Information compiled from multiple public websites & media outlets.