Monday, March 16, 2009
40 Jealous Whores / Hannan / Politics Tim "The Undertaker" Garrett Fearlessly Fights to Protect His, and O'Charley's, Bottom Line
Posted by Caleb Hannan on Mon, Mar 16, 2009 at 6:26 AM
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The state Board of Health is all set to require restaurants to post nutritional info on their menus. Labeling is already standard in California, New York City and Philly and is being considered by the feds. 
Given that every third Tennessean has to go sideways through a turnstile, it's hard to argue that forcing Starbucks to tell you your grande mocha amounts to a banana split before breakfast is a threat worthy of legislation. Unless you're at-large council member Tim Garrett.
The Goodlettsville funeral director is one of three Metro members filing a bill on Tuesday seeking to undercut the mandate. (Conspiracy Alert: Unhealthy living lines this man's pockets!) Garrett says he's not necessarily against the idea of menu labeling, "but I am against the Board using its broad authority to tell Davidson County's businesses what to do."
Not wanting to be Bigfoot'ed by appointed state authorities is reasonable. But Garrett's intentions are made dubious considering he refused to commit to offering a menu labeling bill of his own, then spent five minutes trying to explain why it's unfair to make McDonald's show their work. (The Board's mandate only applies to chains with 15 or more locations nationwide, so no mom-and-pops will be threatened.)
Big Fast Food, we've found your next lobbyist.
Comments (4)
Showing 1-4 of 4
snce most chain already provide calorie and other information at their locations, I don't know why the Nashville Board of Health needs to mandate calories only. In fact many locally based chains such as O'Charley's, J. Alexander's and Fat Mo's will have to unergo considerable expense to comply
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Posted by
Dan Haskell
on 03/16/2009 at 9:25 AM
Yet another example of government sticking it's nose into something that is none of it's business.
Posted by
Gilbert Martin
on 03/16/2009 at 10:52 AM
