Left To Rot

This text accompanies a photo in the News & Record this morning.

"A fall tomato shortage has turned into a surplus that Florida growers say has forced them to abandon 60 million pounds on the vine in the past two weeks, generating pledges of help Tuesday from the state.

Help from the state? Sounds to me like the state is going to pay the growers for the tomatoes. The state should have said, "Look, If we're gonna buy these things, you're gonna pick 'em." And made them pick every one.

Last I heard Campbells still makes tomato soup and Hunts and Del Monte still can tomatoes. 60 million pounds of tomatoes would make a lot of soup or can tomatoes that could be put to use in food banks or homeless shelters in Florida. They could have made a deal with Campbells, Hunts, or Del Monte, or SOMEBODY to get the tomatoes processed. Maybe a one-time tax break for what it cost to do the processing?? Then they would of had probably 45 million pounds of usable tomatoes and soup in the food banks and homeless shelters.

The way it stands now the tomatoes are rotten, the growers will be paid for letting them rot, the Florida taxpayers will be out money, the homeless will still be hungry, and the food banks will still be wanting for food to give to the needy. And 60 million pounds of tomatoes rotted on the vines.

But that's how government works.