“Why I won’t be shopping at Asheville’s new Publix … yet”

[hupso title=”#AVL Author @DavidLaMotte: Why I won’t be shopping at Asheville’s new @Publix … yet” url=”https://ciw-online.org/blog/2015/05/asheville-oped/”]

Asheville residents holding a protest at the early-morning Publix opening in their town last week
Asheville residents protesting with CIW at the early-morning Publix opening in their town last week

In local op/ed, Asheville author calls out Publix for “standing in the way of fairness”… 

Publix’s grand opening in Asheville, North Carolina, earlier this month was not quite the celebration the Florida-based supermarket had planned.  Both on the morning of the supermarket’s opening day, and on the first Saturday afterwards, lively Fair Food protests greeted Publix executives and customers alike as they visited the new store.  The protesters included people from across the spectrum of the vibrant, progressive college town, from students to religious leaders to local families, children in tow.

But the protests didn’t stop there.  In fact, the Asheville community is just getting started in ramping up its opposition to the new supermarket chain in their midst.  Early this morning, the Asheville Citizen-Times was delivered to newsstands and homes around the city featuring a superb op/ed from widely-respected local author, David LaMotte.  In a succinct, thoughtful letter, David sends Publix — once his childhood supermarket — a clear message: Until you show sincere respect for human rights, you can’t be my supermarket.  

Here is David’s op / ed in full:

Citizen_Times

Why I won’t be shopping at Asheville’s new Publix … yet

I first learned to ride a bike on the red brick road in front of my family’s house in the beach town of Sarasota, Florida.  When I grew old enough to ride it beyond our block, one of my favorite destinations was the Publix grocery store about a mile from our house.  As a child, it was just a store where I could buy a Reese’s cup when I had saved up enough change, and where Mom did the shopping once a week or so.

Two weeks ago, Publix opened its first Asheville store, with more rumored to be on the way.  You’d think I might be lining up at the door with the people who were there to celebrate, but I wasn’t, and I won’t be shopping there until they have stopped standing in the way of fairness for the people who make the produce on their shelves possible.

The Fair Food Program is a historic partnership among farm workers, tomato growers, and 13 leading food corporations.  These companies require more humane labor standards from their Florida tomato suppliers and pay one penny per pound to improve workers’ pay, agreeing to buy only from tomato growers that are part of the program.

This is not a fringe project of coercion.  The vast majority of Florida tomato growers are now a part of the Fair Food Program, and participating corporations include Walmart, McDonald’s, and Whole Foods.  The program was heralded in the Washington Post as “one of the great human rights success stories of our day,” and was called “the best workplace monitoring program in the US” in the New York Times.

Asheville students at Publix protest (April 2015)
Asheville students at Publix protest in April

Publix, however, has for five years rejected farm workers’ and consumers’ calls for justice. Instead, they dismiss it as a ‘‘labor dispute,’’ when it is truly a partnership, developed in close collaboration between farm workers, growers, and corporations.

I first visited Immokalee, Florida, where the Fair Food Program was born, when I was about 12 years old, on a Habitat for Humanity work trip. I saw people living in cardboard refrigerator boxes in the tomato fields, and I worked with and began to know some of the farm workers, who were enduring extremely difficult conditions in order to provide for their families.

Tomato pickers are paid by the 32-lb. bucket, not by the hour. That’s just a bit less than my 6-year-old son weighs. After filling the bucket, they must literally run with it and throw it up to a person standing on top of a truck who dumps it in and tosses it back down. They usually do this for 10 hours a day. For each bucket, they are paid 50 cents, a rate that has remained virtually unchanged since I first visited Immokalee 35 years ago. To make a minimum wage, a worker must pick roughly 2.5 tons of tomatoes a day. Most of them survive on less than $12,000 a year. Abuse of every kind has been common, from wage theft, to physical and verbal abuse, to sexual harassment, and in the most extreme cases, slavery.

This bleak landscape is changing, however, due to the Fair Food Program.  I visited with people from Immokalee on a recent trip to Florida and heard news of progress — tens of thousands of farm workers working on Fair Food Program farms are now ensured basic protections, among them required shade and water, other critical health and safety protections, and a zero tolerance policy for slavery and sexual violence. Since 2011, over $16 million has been distributed to farm workers’ paychecks through the penny-per-pound premium.

Along with these stories of success however, came stories of continued struggle, notably the struggle to be heard by Publix.  As long as Publix remains outside of the program, they create a market for produce where the abuses of the past can continue to persist.

In the AC-T, Kim Reynolds, Publix media and communications manager, was quoted as saying, “Being involved as responsible citizens in our communities is part of our mission statement.”  I look forward to Publix living up to that mission statement and joining the Fair Food Program. Until then, I hope you’ll join me in standing in the mainstream on this issue, with 13 major food corporations and the overwhelming majority of Florida’s tomato growers, against the abuse of farm workers. When Publix signs on, I will see you there (I’ll be the guy in the front of the line with the Reese’s Cup, just for old times’ sake).

David LaMotte is an author, musician and speaker who lives in Black Mountain with his wife and 6-year-old son. His latest book is Worldchanging 101: Challenging the Myth of Powerlessness.

Publix can expect to hear much more from David and his fellow Fair Food fans from the Tarheel state in the months ahead as they continue to ramp up their demand for real social responsibility from Asheville’s newest corporate citizen.