OT- Walmart Acres

It is absolutely bogus the way folks rail on WalMart just because they are successful at what they do.

Wal-Mart came to town looking to build a distrbution center. They went out in the country and found a dairy farm on a major US highway; and offered the guy 3x what the land was worth.

His cows were at the auction the next sale.

I do agree we should as a nation save our farm land for farming but that is really a lost cause because of the city people moving to the country to get away from city life. The sad part about it is within a year or two these same people are complaining about the smell from the neighbors field; or that those chickens got to go because they wake you up when trying to sleep in on the weekend.
You know the type!!!!! !!!!!

I ripped on a True Value employee when they did not have a product I needed. I said I will run out to Walley Mart. He said Wal-Mart is a naughty word around here. My coment was -hey it's a week before x-mas on a Sat eve--5PM and you are giving me dirty looks because it is time to lock up---I will not set up a appointment to come to any store. Your boss is a very wealthy man who got this store from his parents--only child ordeal.

Wal-Mart is a sucess because of managment--giving us folks what we want, and 24/7. The old town stores controled the town concils because they spent time in the country clubs together with the concil men. Most town concils were made up of small town business men. They were the very wealth for the most part, and controled all the shots. Competition was screwed with getting permits, water sewer, and numerous other items that they had complaints about--never any names could be mentioned--hummmmm? Competition many times just gave up, and the old town stores just kept the good ol boy business profitable. Ever notice Wal-Mart stores, farm fleet stores, and Menards are often just outside the city limits when they first come to town?

As far as this crap about a shortage of farm land--check out Clayton County Iowa and add up the CRP acres. Most were terraced by tax dollars at a 70% rate. Not pro rated if they sold the farm the next day, yet the value was increased a whole bunch. Then to top it off it was often put in the ten year so young farmers had to compete in land rent with the government.

As far as I'm concerened like I have stated before, we are paying for the CRP land rent if you will. Why not pay a fair price to crop this as corn land and then turned into fuel for our military, State, Federal and city vehickles.

However, they do like to build their SUPERCENTERS with HUGE parking lots in FAST-GROWING towns - this suggests that WAL-MART is NOT the cause for their appearance!

ASK people who sprawl from the city why wal-marts are near them - they wanted them.

Here in Baltimore County, sprawl is done, property values have skyrocketed as farmers no longer sell land.

Everyone moved out of the Baltimore area and made small towns such as York, Hanover, Gettysburg, Lancaster in PA... COMPLETE HEILHOLES. Sprawl is the sole reason for Wal-Marts.

One thing put a smile on my face today, went for a walk to the top of our woods, and behind it is a really nice 23 acre field, where some of those units were originally proposed to be built, its been idle for about 8 years or so, my neighbor must have brought out the batwing mower, mowed it down, and the whole thing is turned over now, one of the kids is still out there on a JD 4440 with duals and a new heavy duty JD disc, in an adjacent field, he'll be burning the midnight oil tonight under the lights, about 200 acres in that section to do. That 23 acres they want to put 2 babe ruth fields in, it's a real wavy field about 500 yards long, wider at one end, with almost a 360 deg view on the crest, makes no sense at all, he must be planting everything this year, turned our one field today, might have time later to post some photos, really enjoy seeing those fields worked, he's been at it over 50 years here, in his 70's now. Soil looked great, been dry all week, burning ban in this county as of today, don't want even to think about a dr..ght !

Here's the deal: Wal-Mart comes in. They buy the land, they build the building and pave the parking lot. Then they sell the property to a local landlord, open the store, and pay rent on the building. That store you're shopping at is leased monthly and rent is paid on it. This is done because if things truly start to go south in any town, Wal-Mart Inc can pack up and be gone in just a few short weeks. They haven't really had to do it in practice, but it's a corporate contingency plan.

I don't like to single out a single company, but urban sprawl - I guess it's suburban sprawl - has consumed a lot of good farm land.

Got to point the finger at ourselves a little too tho, around me there have been a host of houses popping up in the fields - sons or daughters buying 10 acres from the old man & plopping a house down in a field. Seems like such a waste of good land, they are not farming, just want to be out in the country, work in town. I can understand that & folks are free to chase their dreams, but, houses popping up in fields is just hard to swallow. ;)

--->Paul

It does make me sad to see a real farm sold, and paved over with tar, and 100 beige houseas all looking the same put on it. (Or shopping mall, or huge discount store, or.....)

I'm not one to stop it, & I'm not mad at the person who sold, nor the fella that built the boring same houses.

But - I'm still a little sad by it.

--->Paul