Doom and Gloom

I know I'm negative. That's one of my better qualities. But I'm going to try to bring little bits of sunshine to the blog now and again.

The local newspaper is The Mount Vernon News. It's not very good. It takes clear sides on many issues, usually on the front page. The editorials are reserved for angry Liberal college professors and assbackwards xenophobic Christians.

The big news item locally has been a proposed small CAFO (confined animal feeding operation) just outside of town. A local farmer intends on building two chicken sheds to house approx. 75,000 birds at a time. This was reported almost a month ago. Since that time there have been five front page articles discussing the farm and the surrounding issues and several Letters to the Ed promoting individuals views (including, I think, the proposing farmer?). THIS IS GOOD. I'm pretty certain that the Mount Vernon News has a very set rate of sales. It's hard to gin up a local concern that would sell better than posting American Idol results on the front page. That small town Ohio has enough people to care to cause a small paper to pay attention is AWESOME.

My neighbors are concerned about the problems involved with safely removing tons of chickenshit. They are concerned with the loss of family farmers if regulations and concerns keep this farm from going forward. They're concerned about the economic impact of the building and maintaining of an operation this size. They're concerned about the source of city water and possible contaminants. Three cheers for an informed citizenry!