Could Eureka’s scourge of shopping cart bandits and their war on our disease-free children (think of the children) be coming to an end? In its latest monthly newsletter, the city announced it’s going medieval, appointing a “shopping cart czar” (no joke) to bring an end to Eureka’s greatest dilemma: people stealing shopping carts and pushing their stuff around in them.
Of course, the inconvenience to grocery owners isn’t the only thing we’re dealing with. Everyone knows that people who steal shopping carts are dirty, disheveled and diseased, and can you imagine if you touched a cart that one of those grossies had touched before you? Well, some budding R.L Stine at city hall can imagine that, and he or she wrote a chilling speculative fiction novella about the horrors of shopping-cart-contracted hepatitis. Read at your own risk below. (It must be noted that Hepatitis C is typically transmitted through blood to blood contact, like sharing needles, according to the CDC. If a shopping cart is covered in blood, it’s probably best to select a different one and notify store staff.)
And while we’re at it, let’s nominate some more pressing problems that call for the appointment of czars; I’m thinking we need a dog poop czar, a bicyclists-on-sidewalks czar, a cruise ship czar and a people-rummaging-through-your-recycling-at-night-czar. Name yours in the comments.
A mom walks into a grocery store carrying her child. Her arm is sore and she sits him down in the shopping cart she just pulled from the rack of carts just outside the store.
Starting to shop she puts fruit, vegetables, and other various products into the cart, while moms not looking the child starts to lick the cart. As she turns around to see what the child is doing she insists he stop putting his mouth on the cart as there are germs etc. Unfortunately She has no idea where this cart has been in the last several days. Being pushed down the street piled high with trash, personal items, syringes and other unspeakable items.
The cart was pushed by a person with Hepatitis C and other communicable diseases and has not washed in weeks. It was stolen from the store for personal use. The cart was ultimately returned without sterilization and put back into service.
The first thing ones notices when driving into town are shopping carts…carts are everywhere. Carts are used for barbeques, transportation of animals, property and even people. Random and abandoned carts are unsightly and add to the disorder people notice and feel uncomfortable with. People deciding whether to stay for the night or go to the next town view them as a sign of disorder and keep right on moving past Eureka. Carts can also facilitate property crime as there has to be a way to transport stolen property.
To combat the problem, Eureka City Council passed a new ordinance to reduce the incident of stolen shopping carts by holding the thieves and businesses accountable. One business with excellent practices has very few carts stolen while another cannot keep them in stock. One company prevents their costly departure, another won’t accept them even if brought back.
For further information, please call police officer Eddie Wilson who is the Shopping Cart Czar with problems, complaints and suggestions. He can be reached at (707) 441-4060.
This article appears in Albert and the Baskets.
Now that you mention it we should have a Shopping Cart Sterilization Czar (I prefer Tsar) to make sure all carts are STERILIZED before reuse. Can you imagine if that imaginary kid with his grimy fingers up his nose with Hepatitis X was sitting in your cart just before you got there and then you TOUCHED IT ?!?
Oh great; how much is this new Czar going to cost us? I feel another ballot proposition coming on….
Oh great; I feel another ballot proposition coming on. I’ll bet Czars don’t come cheap….
City attorney who doesn’t lie to dying council members czar? Keep the city manager for more than 2 weeks czar. A drilling through Pine Hill czar. Oh, and an entrance sign to Eureka czar. Funded thru Measure Q.
It isn’t every city that adds such a creative, compelling short story to its official newsletter. I’m looking forward to the next installment.
The city could adopt some carts as “green carts” and people who NEED a place to put their belongings can use the carts without being treated as criminals. The Eureka City Council has found yet another excuse for the EPD to mess with people who have nothing, and make the stores more hostile to homeless people. Of course, the council does not try and figure out a way to alleviate the need for people to take stores’ shopping carts. And scientifically (as Grant Scott Go-Forth pointed out) the City’s Hep C horror story is impossible.
What I found most interesting at a City Council meeting addressing vagrant shopping carts is that they had received no negative comments from retailers who were told they would be expected to pay a fee (fine) if their shopping carts were recovered by the City or else be required to place loss prevention mechanisms in place: security guards or locking wheels on carts. I agree that we have a problem, but why should of the owner of the shopping cart be fined when they don’t take prescribed measures to prevents its “repurposing”? Shopping carts are expensive, and I think most store owners are doing what they consider necessary and cost-effective to retain them.
How about a Head Czar to watch over all the other Czars?
These carts are expensive. But why continually pick on homeless or other destitute people? Why not give them an alternative to use instead of shopping carts that the general public must use to get groceries? I find it very insensitive to expect these people to live on the street and carry their belongings on their backs. Why not give them ALL a decent place to get off the street and keep their things without threat of someone stealing what little they have.
When did all of us “fortunate” become so jaded and selfish to NOT see that we are ALL only a step or two up from being on the street pushing our clothes around everywhere we go?
As far as retrieving and cleaning the carts, well common sense tells us that that responsibility should be on the shoulders of the owner, however they decide to do it.
This article and comments has made me realize just how filthy and disgusting shopping carts are and how much I detest putting any of my fresh veggies or fresh baked bread or anything into them, PERIOD!
I suggest mandatory, immediate, Federal shopping cart legislation that addresses all the associated problems with these necessary evils. Can you just imagine how many plagues and infestations have been caused by an innocent shopper just using a cart? UGH!