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UPDATE: Instant Survey-Your Opinion

Council Resolution Supporting "Meatless Mondays"? After 24 Hrs, Instant Survey Says...


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(Updated May 19, 2015, 7:25 a.m.) -- Roughly twenty-four hours after inviting readers to participate in an instant survey of their opinions regarding a May 19 City Council agenda item, seeking to put the City of Long Beach on record as supporting "Meatless Mondays" (agendized by Councilmembers Austin, Gonzalez and Price, details below), the results as of 7:25 a.m. May 19 are:

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13.73%"This is a progressive action I support. I want the City Council to do more things like this. Vote Yes."
64.71%"What I eat is none of City Hall's business. Get busy and do your jobs. Vote "no" or make motion to "receive and file" (take no action.)"
39.22%"Where are the clowns, send in the clowns, don't worry, they're here."

(Respondents could click more than one response, and some did; the third choice measures the intensity of response on this issue.)

Below are salient text comments received; we anonymized the answers only because we didn't say we'd publish respondents' names:

Fix pot holes, lower crime, strengthen police officer morale..meatless Monday isn't necessary
Why is local government building pressure to consider this in the first place? Why is our local politicians wanting to dictate our lives to what we eat in our private lives? Where is our freedom to choose, should this pass? Please do not invade what little privacy we do have presently. Let the people continue to choose their own based on their welfare, not the politicians @ City Hall in Long Beach.
The City Council has degenerated into a bunch of raving fools. Corrupt, paid off fools, fat and happy eating out on the taxpayers dollars with the Council slush funds. I wish some one in the Second District cared about the potholes on Broadway, the slumlords at 4th/5th Streets and Orange, the cars speeding at Cerritos and Broadway, that do not stop or slow down for the elderly and children trying to cross the street. Fascist nannyism masquerading as democracy. It is absolutely not the business of government to tell me what to eat, where to eat, or how to prepare my food. Perhaps the Second District elected person should figure out a way to pay for more police, since today, at 3:15 PM, I drove past new...gang graffiti at 7th /Alamitos. Gang shootings kill people, not cuisine.
The easiest way for many to eat at home is to make a few large meals a week. The largest being made on Sunday which we hope will get us through Wed lunch or at least Tue lunch.. Creating a whole new meatless meal Monday would be difficult and wasteful to us.
...Check out farmsanctuary.org Look at their Project "Someone, not Something". This isn't about health, or ecology. This is about Animal Rights. This feels like someone is trying to further an agenda. Roberto Uranga is my Councilperson
I do want people (including me) to start eating better. However, I wouldn't count on the Long Beach City Council having any influence on residents in bringing this about. How can you have any confidence in, and be influenced by, people who will spend our money and give away our land as this Council proposes with the new civic center fiasco? Uranga #2 is my councilmember.
What a total waste of time. The City Council needs to focus on solving real problems instead of having meaningless discussions over the "resolution du jour".
WTF??? lets start dictating how many kids people should have too...

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Neither of the three choices. I support the council resolution on Meatless Mondays but I don't necessarily want them to do any more resolutions like this. But what am I going to eat today? I don't know. Maybe I'll go piscatorial. Maybe I'll eat macaroni & cheese. Maybe I'll have tofu. Maybe I'll have chicken. I won't have turkey because it's not Thanksgiving. Besides, I despise turkey, even on Thanksgiving. I guess we're going to have leftover tri-tip for Monday tonight. What does the survey mean by telling City Council "Get busy and do your jobs."? They are doing their jobs. "Meatless Mondays" is on the Tuesday agenda. Just because the resolution passes doesn't mean every Long Beacher can't eat meat on Mondays. City Council are clowns? I thought the political clowns were the 2016 Republican presidential nominees: Jeb Bush, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Lindsay Graham, Rick Perry, Carly Fiorina, Chris Christie, Mike Huckabee. I can assure you that Al Austin, Lena Gonzalez, and Suzie Price are NOT clowns. Nor are Suja Lowenthal, Daryl Supernaw, Stacy Mungo, Dee Andrews, Roberto Uranga, and Rex Richardson. They're just elected officials elected by the voters in their districts...
While this may be a good idea, I think the council has more important matters to address. I encourage them all to "receive and file" this agenda item. I am an 8th district resident represented by Al Austin.
There are more pressing concerns than talking about this. What about a more aggressive action on Water Conservation?
I am VEGAN - for all the reasons given in the agendizing memo - which are WEIGHTY and which I take SERIOUSLY I therefore find the recommended action to be ineffectual and even CYNICAL SYMBOLISM. It's like telling folks in this DROUGHT not to water the lawn one day a week. It's like saying we should have MURDER-FREE MONDAYS. A SUSTAINABLE community would not be promoting a port and airport based on unsustainable levels of global trade and carbon energy use.
Beef eat grass Rabbits eat grass Pigs eat slop Chickens eat feed Fish eat plankton Iguanas eat flies The creatures above eat things I do not. The creatures above are all delicious.

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Just EXACTLY How does something like this get started? Please break it down for us... In detail. We really would like to understand the process behind how an item like this gets before the council, and what determines its validity in order to move forward on spending time/resources? If this health item is that important, the community should be educated in the full scope of who brought the item to the table, why these three particular council members were chosen, and the forethought behind it all. . Is this something to make Long Beach look more progressive in the mainstream? . Is it Truly a Health Conscious Item? . Or, is this one of those sleight of hand tricks, Look Here, while the rest of the council does something behind our backs over there?...
Needs follow through w/ LB Public Health office i.e. awareness and promotion funding
Do the Councilmembers really feel their job is that boring that they have to think of ways to show their total ignorance of the important issues facing them.
Snackless Saturdays: a leading cause of obesity and litter. Ban Nestlé Products from Long Beach. I doubt this could be enacted, though.
My type 2 diabetes requires me to eat animal protein with each meal. Stop trying to have a one size fits all situation for everything and everyone.
Although every day is meatless for me, I am not in favor of political action of this sort.
I have been a vegetarian since September of 1989. Please don't do this, vegetarianism already gets so much bad press and making people feel like they need to go meatless actually makes them resent us more. Anyone who wants to go meatless can do it anytime.
There are so many important issues that need attention in our city. It is laughable that these clowns would waste staff, council time, and tax payers money on this issue.

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The survey is ongoing. If you haven't participated yet, read the agendizing memo, click the advocacy link, then let us know your opinions below.

Councilmembers Austin, Gonzalez and Price state in their agendizing memo:

Long Beach has a proven track-record of promoting healthy and sustainable communities, including programs to address childhood obesity prevention, and the Healthy Snack and Beverage Policies.

The Meatless Monday campaign is a global movement to encourage individuals and organizations to cut meat from one's diet one day a week for personal health and Environmental benefits. The initiative, which originated as an FDA food efficiency campaign during World Wars I and II, was developed by The Monday Campaigns, in association with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, with the goal of promoting healthy, environmentally sustainable diets.

A number of cities have passed resolutions in recent years in support of the Meatless Monday campaign, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, Oakland, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. Hundreds of schools, colleges and universities also support the campaign. Many studies have shown that a decrease in meat consumption and an increase in fruits, vegetables and other plant-based foods can have significant health benefits, including a reduced risk for several chronic degenerative diseases and conditions, including obesity, hypertension, diabetes and some types of cancer.

Recent studies and reports have also demonstrated that we can lower our carbon footprint simply by reducing the amount of animal-based foods we eat. It also takes significantly more water to produce a pound of beef or chicken than comparable amounts of most plant-based foods.

FISCAL IMPACT: There is no fiscal impact with the resolution.

The "Meatless Monday" campaign has an advocacy website at this link.

So...what do you want your Councilmember to do? We offer a flash survey below...with room for your quick comments in your own words. Please let us know who are your Councilmember is; you can remain anonymous if you wish.

Create your own user feedback survey

Further to follow.




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