In today's News & Record, Lorillard Tobacco chairman, president and CEO, Murray S. Kessler writes an LTE promising $1 Million to the Greensboro Performing Arts Center.
No mention of the fact that the actual deal allows Lorillard up to 10 years to pay or that they can back out of the deal at any time they wish. Now that's commitment!
But worse than that is the slap in the face to the very East Greensboro community where Lorillard Inc makes the cigarettes they sell. No one, I repeat, no one who works for Lorillard Inc lives in the neighborhood around Lorillard Tobacco here in East Greensboro. And why would they when the stench emitted from the manufacture of menthol cigarettes turns your stomach and they can afford to move away.
Ask Lorillard's neighbors about menthol day. Don't get caught downwind.
And therein lies one of the many problems with the entire development model promoted by Mayor Robbie Perkins and the developer class elites who run Greensboro: When people do not work in the same neighborhoods in which they live those same people fail to become vested in the neighborhoods in which they work. Why should they? Their children don't breath the air, fear the crime or live in the smog left behind by the cars they drive into that neighborhood in which they work but are oblivious to what is going on outside the confines of their fenced-in secure compound monitored 24/7 by armed security guards and closed circuit TV cameras. All is well in their world, even the stench that permeates the neighborhood doesn't penetrate their air conditioned offices. I know, I've been inside their offices. As for the workers in their plant I cannot say.
Greensboro's leaders will be happy to tout Lorillard's economic impact on Greensboro as a whole but what's Lorillard's economic impact on East Greensboro? Some of their employees buy lunch in East Greensboro restaurants or fill up their gas tanks. How much of the cost of a gallon of gasoline gets reinvested locally? If we're lucky, a penny or two. And then only if the convenience store is locally owned and operated.
Yes, Murray S. Kessler, member of the local country club crowd, Greensboro's elite, is happy to be seen as giving to charity-- a $Million Dollars to Greensboro's wealthiest families-- from money he gained by helping to destroy my very own East Greensboro neighborhood. I'm sure your friends and family are proud of your accomplishments.
