Grey County Update: Food and Future

Through you Honourable Warden Andrea Matrosovs,

It was wonderful to see our soup kitchen O'Share being recognized for their important work in helping our community. In fact their service may be more important than some may realize, will give a historical example later in this email.
Also glad to hear that Councillor Boddy managed to contact the province through MPP Paul Vickers to resolve the drama with the busses.

After consulting with Scott and Tara it seems it may be best to make the 25 year plan presentation in an upcoming  official correspondence, since then can include video link that will not be limited to 10 minutes, and so can better convey the information. At that point council can decide if they wish to keep it as is, or escalate it to a delegation, staff report or something more.

Pertinent to yesterdays council meeting in the 25 year report you will learn:

• Why food prices have been rising since 2014
• What is the future trajectory of food and fuel prices based on current trends
• What are the likely societal effects for each 5 year segment from 2025-2050.
  
• And what we can do about it at the county and municipal level.
  

As a teaser, while as already shared our next five years should be relatively peaceful, by the time fuel gets to $5-7/l (likely in the 2035-2040 range), median household (50th percentile) will be spending roughly 60-80% of their income on food. This is what is known as "revolutionary" territory, with French, Mexican and Russian revolutions happening in that range of money spent on food.

The French Revolution is perhaps one of the best documented examples, where people in Paris where spending 50-80% of their income on bread, and when they went to the palace to ask for cheaper bread they were rebuffed, and colloquially the queen said "let them eat cake". The heads o the monarchy of course were rolling shortly thereafter. 

A lesser known though perhaps more pertinent tale from the French revolution concerns a mayor, who after the revolution had completed felt he was safe siding with the official government positions, rather than showing compassion to his own constituents.
"For three hours, they argued with the mayor, demanding that the price of grain, 50 percent higher than the year before, be drastically reduced. For his part, the fifty-one-year-old Simonneau robustly defended the government’s view that interfering in the market was counterproductive because “Liberty in commerce is the principal source of abundance.” By evening, tempers had begun to unravel. Feeling himself threatened, Simonneau ordered a detachment of National Guards with him to fire on the crowd. The soldiers refused, and the enraged crowd began to strike at the mayor with their weapons. He was clubbed and punched to the ground, then stabbed with scythes and pitchforks, and at last finished off, it was said, by a bullet from one of his own soldiers." From "Owning the Earth" by Andro Linklater

So services like O'Share that are feeding the marginalized may be helping prevent hangry mobs from showing up at City Hall, and that is certainly something to be grateful for. Though right now and for next 5 years median family is projected to be spending less than 40% on food, so shouldn't have to worry too much. 

Of course much like how the shelter is temporary accommodation,  soup kitchens are also a temporary measure, and it will make sense to start leaning more on community gardens, and rural transition focused policies which are within the power of the county and municipalities to achieve. I have shared some ideas with Senior Planner Scott Taylor, so you could probably ask him for some potential options. Will also provide more detail in the upcoming 25 year plan correspondence.

As the Confederation of Planets in service to the Infinite Creator has said:
2007/0731: "There are those in your culture who are hungry. Go to a soup kitchen, or whatever place is in your culture, where meals are prepared for those who cannot pay and who do not have homes. Help to prepare the food. Serve it with love. And as you clean the pots and pans, give prayers of gratitude and thankfulness that those that were hungry have now been fed."

May you be blessed,