West Coast Connection Forum
Lifestyle => Tha G-Spot => Topic started by: Elano on August 06, 2008, 12:03:46 AM
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The City Council is putting South Los Angeles on a diet.
The council voted unanimously Tuesday to place a moratorium on new fast-food restaurants in an impoverished swath of the city with a proliferation of such eateries and above-average rates of obesity.
The action is believed to be the first of its kind by a major city to protect public health.
"Our communities have an extreme shortage of quality foods," City Councilman Bernard Parks said.
The yearlong moratorium is intended to give the city time to attract restaurants that serve healthier food.
Representatives of fast-food chains said they support the goal of better diets but believe they are being unfairly targeted. They say they already offer healthier food items on their menus.
"It's not where you eat, it's what you eat," said Andrew Pudzer, president and chief executive of CKE Restaurants, parent company of Carl's Jr. "We were willing to work with the city on that, but they obviously weren't interested."
The California Restaurant Association and its members will consider a legal challenge of the ordinance, said Andrew Casana, a spokesman for the association.
Research has shown that people will change eating habits when different foods are offered, but cost is a key factor in poor communities, said Kelly D. Brownell, director of Yale University's Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity.
"Cheap, unhealthy food and lack of access to healthy food is a recipe for obesity,"
Brownell said. "Diets improve when healthy food establishments enter these neighborhoods."
Some customers said they weren't sure limiting fast food was a good idea.
South Los Angeles resident Curtis English acknowledged that fast food is loaded with calories and cholesterol. But since he's unemployed and does not have a car, it serves as a cheap, convenient staple for him.
On Monday, he ate breakfast and lunch — a sausage burrito and double cheeseburger, respectively — at a McDonald's a few blocks from home for just $2.39.
"I don't think there's too many fast-food places," he said. "People like it."
Others welcomed an opportunity to get different kinds of food into their neighborhood.
"They should open more healthy places," Dorothy Meighan said outside a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet. "There's too much fried stuff."
Councilwoman Jan Perry said that's the view that repeatedly surfaced at the five community meetings she held during the past two years. Residents are tired of fast food, and many don't have cars to drive to places with other choices, she said.
Los Angeles' ban comes at a time when governments of all levels are increasingly viewing menus as a matter of public health. On Friday, California became the first state in the nation to bar trans fats, which lowers levels of good cholesterol and increases bad cholesterol.
The fast-food moratorium falls under the council's purview of land-use planning.
"We want to ensure developable land is developed to provide choices," Perry said. "There is not a lot of food choice in South L.A. If people want to go grocery shopping or to a full-service, sit-down restaurant, this is something that is not readily available."
The moratorium, which can be extended up to a year, only affects standalone restaurants, not eateries located in malls or strip shopping centers. It defines fast-food restaurants as those that do not offer table service and provide a limited menu of pre-prepared or quickly heated food in disposable wrapping.
The definition exempts "fast-food casual" restaurants such as El Pollo Loco, Subway and Pastagina, which do not have drive-through windows or heat lamps and prepare fresh food to order.
The ordinance also makes it harder for existing fast-food restaurants to expand or remodel.
Fast-food restaurants have found themselves in the frying pan in a number of cities. Some places, including Carmel-by-the Sea and Calistoga, have barred "formula" restaurants altogether.
Others have placed a cap on them. Arcata allows a maximum of nine fast-food eateries. Others have prohibited the restaurants in certain areas.
Most initiatives were designed to preserve a city's historic character. The Los Angeles bid is one of the few that cite residents' health.
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ok....
kinda stupid, no need to tell people what they can and can't eat
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first off, its no NEW fast food restaurants. LA doesnt really have much room for new anything lol. The idea of having healthier food for people...especially in lower income neighborhoods is great. But lets be real, all this shit is gonna do is create more business for the fast food restaurants that are already there. Saying that current fast food restaurants offer healthy items on the menu now, is bullshit lol. Most of the time those items arent that healthy...not to mention, those items dont ever seem to make the $1 menu. If youre fuckin broke...are u gonna get the double cheeseburger for $1, or the grilled chicken sandwich for $4?
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good call, fuckin shouldn't be eatin' wendy's and carl's jr. all the time.
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whatever, there's plenty already anyways
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saw this on Jimmy Kimmel the other night
they were going up to any fatass and asking them to sign a fake pettition
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ok....
kinda stupid, no need to tell people what they can and can't eat
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^unfortunately, people are too stupid to make the right choices on their own...
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^ so what? that's their problem
you think the government should tell you where you can eat?
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If anyone thinks this is gonna change anything, they're retarded.
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Fuck that. If people can't keep their fast food intake at a reasonable level, thats their problem. If they wanna be fat, then let them be fat. If they want to dig themselves an early grave, let them.
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It a societal problem. In America we are trained at a young age to have everything instantly so no one will take the time out to cook a healthy meal. I can't wait for this country to collapse
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Niggers don't know how to live so we must enforce laws to teach them like retards and kindergartners.
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Niggers don't know how to live so we must enforce laws to teach them like retards and kindergartners.
lol.
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ok....
kinda stupid, no need to tell people what they can and can't eat
Oh yes they can. What will they think of next?
You CAN'T BAN fuckin' restaurants, what the hell is this shit? How ridiculous! Mannnnnnnnnnnnnnn. Everybody needs to calm down about this fuckin' healthy food shit. Shrinking the sizes, and amounts, it's all bullshit. Now banning fast food??? LMAO! Yo, I don't know man.
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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Los Angeles residents are notorious for worrying about their waistlines and if two Los Angeles County Supervisors have it their way, calorie counting while dining out in the city may get easier.
Supervisors Zev Yaroslavsky and Michael Antonovich will present a proposed ordinance to the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors next week that would force fast-food chains and restaurants to display the number of calories alongside the price of items on their menus.
The new law is intended to decrease obesity among Los adults and children in America's second-largest city.
While Los Angeles has a reputation as a mecca of diet and exercise crazes, the county's Department of Public Health says residents are less fit than many realize.
The percentage of obese adults in Los Angeles county increased 46 percent over eight years, to 20.9 percent in 2005 from 14.3 percent in 1997, according to the county Department of Public Health.
"The menu should be as informative of what its effect is on one's waistline as it is on their pocketbooks," Yaroslavsky said. "Not ingesting 800 calories in a meal makes a huge difference to one's health and quality of life."
New York already has a similar ordinance in place. Fast-food and casual-dining chains in the Big Apple can be fined $2,000 for not displaying calorie counts.
The California Restaurant Association, an industry trade group, is skeptical about whether the ordinance will actually tackle L.A's obesity problem.
"If we're going to fight obesity we need to teach folks about nutrition and proper eating," CRA spokesman Daniel Conway said. "I question whether this ordinance will have a real meaningful impact on people's behavior in terms of what they eat and how much they exercise."
The association has sued two Northern California counties for passing similar laws.
The industry group says its bill, which is to be voted on in the California legislature by the end of the month, will give restaurants statewide the choice of whether to make nutritional information available either on a brochure or in a menu.
"We recognize our customers do want this information, but most of the customers don't want this information forced on them every time. It's as much as a mandate on our customers as it is on our restaurants," Conway said.
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In case anyone thinks this law is actually gonna do something except garner media attention, look at the outline of the law:
No new fast food chains are allowed to be built within the next 12 months.
No existing fast food chains are being shut down.
No "healthier alternatives" will be built.
Therefore, this entire law is a piece of shit, and a waste of tax payers hard-earned dollar. People in low income areas buy fast food because it's afforable and convenient. Poor people can't afford organic mushrooms n shit like that.
How about this: fund programming that will give people a better understanding about nutrition and how that will increase the longevity of your life. Instead of Governor Schwarzeneggar taking away funding from education, how about actually increasing it for a change, and putting it to good use?
California is going to hell.
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^ so what? that's their problem
you think the government should tell you where you can eat?
no...but it's better to have a bunch of healthy restaurants being built as opposed to a bunch of dirtsauce fast food spots.
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^ so what? that's their problem
you think the government should tell you where you can eat?
no...but it's better to have a bunch of healthy restaurants being built as opposed to a bunch of dirtsauce fast food spots.
Won't happen though so it's a waste of tax dollars.
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if they're just not building any new fast foods spots then whatever...we'll see how well these new "healthy" places do when after six months of serving pricier, bland food. the masses of working blue collar people and those who just enjoy a tasty burger or cheap food will make the biggest statement on this fucktardary thru the numbers.