http://www.slate.com/id/2196397/

This story blows me away. Blocking new fast food restaurants in areas basically based on race and income. Sometimes the well meaning are the most racist people I know. This "You're poor and black and too uneducated/manipulated/stupid to make your own eating decisions. So let us help/make them for you." just astonishes me. Patronizing and racist, what a great combination.

I could understand incenting other types of restaurants and grocery stores to come into an area but banning certain types is being unreal.

If this is true, then they may have a legitimate avenue to pursue. You can also use other zoning techniques to discourage certain methods of development. For example, do you want a drive thru speaker right next to your backyard fence?

I agree with you in general, however. The supporters kept making the liquor store argument, and my response to that is that I think trying to disperse liquor store placement is also stupid.

This is a pretty serious problem in several areas across the country:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_desert

But I agree that it is a bad way of going about it. Do we know that they haven't tried incentives in the past and they simply didn't work?

Agreed, but I highly doubt that Whole Foods will jump on the chance to fill the vacuum left in Compton. You'll be replacing bad food choices with no food choices.

I don't know this and the story nor any related have not mentioned it. Nor did the story provide figures that obesiety is only an issue in the poor and predominately black areas of LA. I'd have less of a problem with this story if it were an LA wide ban on new fast food joints. In the 21st century we are supposed to be far past treating ethnic and socio-economic groups of people as utter idiots, too stupid to be able to make the same decisions regarding their lives as other groups do.

Did you read the wikipedia article? A lot of this has to do with access, not choice. Traditional grocery stores are simply too far away to be accessed by people in these areas who do not have cars. The elderly are one of the biggest groups affected, as many of them only have the option of walking or taking the bus and can't be expected to patronize the Trader Joe's that is 10+ miles away. LA is so huge (it defines the word "sprawl") that the problem is only magnified there.

Many food deserts are actually a product of the "white flight" phenomenon of the post WWII-era. White residents pulled out of these areas as black residents moved in, and the grocery stores went with them, leading to blight and food deserts.

I still want to know how many miles away a store has to be in order to classify a food desert.

Then I want to take a map of Boise and pinpoint all the stores to see if one exists under the common definitions.

EDIT: Oh, and what is defined as a "store"? Does the evil Wal-Mart count?

Is it a SuperWalMart? They DO sell vegetables. They're genetically-enhanced, pesticide-coated vegetables from Chile, but the are vegetables.

A Wal-Mart or a Ralph's would be a huge improvement.

Tis true. A local economy can't survive on tennis shoes and baby clothes alone.

I don't agree that it has so much to do with being poor and black as it does the latter part of your statement. People are fucking stupid and uneducated, to the point that many can't even make the proper decisions about what to eat on a daily basis. Sometimes the smart people need to step up.

i don't think it's entirely distance but availabilty. if grocery stores are spread out in a community but everyone in that community has a car, it's not a food desert.

The only food stores in bad neighborhoods are corner stores and "Save A Lot". I'm pretty sure McDonald's is healthier than 90% of what Save A Lot sells (and less likely to make you sick).

Alright, here's a website that might be able to answer this question!

http://find.mapmuse.com/

Here's a view of Boise that has all the Albertsons and Winco stores listed. At first glance, I don't see any location that's more than 2 miles away, with the exception of the far south which is kind of an "old rich" area. And this isn't counting Fred Meyer (which this website doesn't have listed) or Wal-Mart (which they don't have the Boise locations for).

http://find.mapmuse.com/re1/map_brand_m ... INCO_FOODS,

Walk into your local corner store where they know you a little. Tell them if they start to carry apples that you will buy 5 a week. I'm pretty sure by week's end that the store will be more than happy to sell you some apples.

I wish I could find the David Chappelle "WacArnolds" skit on youtube

It's not that either. Restaurant.. grocery stores.. these are businesses. Businesses will only operate in places where profit can be safely made, it's the core of their very nature. The LA ghettos are not profitable places for low margin businesses, most ghettos aren't. Sh*t fast food places McDonalds can exist there because they have the margins to survive. These elected idiots think that eliminating the competition will bring healthier restaurants into the area? What do they think Trader Joe's is itching to move into South Central, but McDonald's was somehow stopping them? If they want it to stop being a fucking ghetto, they have to eliminate the ghetto mindset and getting rid of McDonalds, probably one of the few reliable employers, isn't gonna help that.

I wish that post wasn't full of truth.

And here's an update I made with the stores that were missing. I know Boise isn't exactly an impoverished city, but I still couldn't find any huge area more than two miles away from a store.