Editor’s Note: This is a draft of a hypothetical letter to new billionaire Mr. John H. Tyson, Chairman Tyson Foods by Wendy Martin. It was read into the record at the Northampton Board of Supervisors meeting.
In contrast we Northamptonites are privileged to live in a priceless ecosystem, comprised of at least a billion worth I’d wager of natural assets, often foregoing monetary benefits in order to enjoy & sustain them.
Dear Chairman Tyson –
Due to 1) the ongoing attempt to rezone our bicoastal county which is almost an island at the tip of the Delmarva Peninsula–not landlocked like you in Arkansas, and more recently due to 2) learning you’re eager to expand here, we became curious about you. Ancestry.com informs that your English surname is a nickname for someone with a fiery temperament, from Old French tison ‘firebrand’.
Since your self admitted dramatic rebirth 25 years ago (after your wild years!) you’ve made incredible strides growing the family business while returning much to your community educationally and spiritually in the workplace. You rank among America’s most prominent business men.
You are so successful that one wonders if you need to enlarge the empire. There are concerns. For cost cutting and to counteract high employee turnover you endorse increased automation, hence fewer jobs. In spite of your company’s success many contract growers for years have experienced declining or no profits. Will you be shifting focus upon quality rather than quantity which can command a premium similar to our one-of-a-kind ecosystem?
Especially when the world seems increasingly at risk for unexpected contagion & contamination?
Northampton’s persistent erratic winds. the ever present threat of hurricanes, occasional tornado, easily can propel your aromas pathogens & particulates – like gossip – in a jiffy. Why risk spoiling your image and ours by mucking up such an idyllic landscape, one encompassed by a spectacular aquaculture and thriving tourism industry?
Among your diverse interests are travel, music, art, golf, deep sea fishing, philanthropy — with service on numerous boards including Mr. Thoreau’s hangout the Walden Woods Project. Your bird’s-eye view of he world must be jaw dropping. Have you visited Northampton? Thoreau would’ve craved it.
Are you attracted to Virginia’s history of regulatory leniency? Fortunately Northampton is too small and fragile to satisfy your disposal needs. With your extraordinary track record of awards and service it boggles the mind that you’d contemplate expanding industrial contract farming and manure shoveling onto our narrow paradise which averages 6 miles width, if that. Fourteen years ago it was reported “contract farming…turns farmers into tractor drivers and manure shovelers. Tyson has a long history of doing this in the poultry industry.”
In closing we suggest you pause for the late Dr. Wayne Dyer’s (1940-2015) creation, his favorite film ‘The Shift’ – is free to watch since his recent passing – through yesterday. Hopefully the link might still work for you: http://www.drwaynedyer.com/the-shift-movie-watch-now utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=email_Dyer_the_shift&utm_source=10026843&utm_id=6379WS&utm_content=6379
WS
Please also refer to the 6/15/2003 Northampton County Sensitive Natural Resource Areas Report and Recommendations along with the most critical document: designation of our SSA (1997) http://www.epa.gov/reg3wapd/drinking/ssa/columbiayorktown.htm which spells out the acute vulnerability of our ground water for which there is no alternative source. Nearly everyone — approximately 85% of our population — relies upon private wells.
Thank you.
Respectfully,
Wendy Martin, I want to commend you on writing such an insightful and personal letter to the Chairman of the board for Tyson’s Foods. I think your letter went to the heart of the matter. For those who missed her point, the Eastern Shore of Virginia and specifically Northampton County represents a small microcosm of the fragility of the world. You have limited resources. Defile those resources and you will have limited survivability. Whether that survivability represents health, economy or just plain old sustainability, you will have screwed the pooch (so to speak) and will no longer be able to live affordably in that environment. End of story. Thank you again for having the courage and the fortitude to extend such an intelligent and well-meaning letter directly to the top. I pray he not only reads it, but takes your message to heart.
“Write on” Chris and Wendy. The Northampton County Board of Supervisors has set the industrial table to have the poultry industry give what probably will be a glossy and rosy assessment of the poultry industry at their 5 pm September work session on September 28th,. It is nearly unfathomable that we, as taxpayers and supporters of this great county merely get three minutes to address these elected officials about our concerns and issues during regular meetings. Yet Mr. Satterfield will get an unlimited time to present the chicken industry’s anticipated one-sided and unbalanced plea asking the Board to refrain from actions that may further protect this county and its resources from an impending encroachment of massive factory and industrial-type chicken houses
Simultaneously, County Administrator Nunez recently released a proposed calendar directing the Board to finish their rezoning act by the end of the year, apparently feeling threatened by the prospects of newly-elected supervisors that may not be so easily manipulated taking their seats in January.
It is simply fascinating to see this re-zoning vehicle, with its tires flattened, its rims bent, and its cracked and broken engine smoking and misfiring being towed towards the finish line by an administrator who appears to have motivations other than our best interest as her prime mover.
All of our caring and concerned eyes will be on the Board’s actions tomorrow night and in the immediate future regarding our natural resource and economic future. We are confident that we will be successful in thwarting the majority of the Board’s attempts to turn Northampton County into something it simply can never be, and invite them respectfully to “step into the light” and work TOGETHER with us to move this county forward in a sustainable and profitable future.
Ken and Mary Dufty
Thank you, Mr. Chandler, for such kind though overwhelming remarks. I and many others continue to appreciate your keen professional assessment to the BoS as presented here on August 30th.
My guess is that most of you all are eating chicken twice a week……..your obsession with that jungle bird is becoming sick.
Mr. Bell, not nearly as sick as the next two generations will be once layer upon layer of nitrogen and phosphorous rich “Jungle Bird” has been spread over those lush green fields and infiltrate those clear blue waters you call home. Please return your head back into the sand. Some of us have real work to do.
Mmmmmm………dat chickin sure am good.