Adopt-a-Farm Idea Hoping to Take Root

There’s Adopt-a-Pet, Adopt-a-School and Adopt-a-Grandparent, and now Oceanside businessman Skip Arthur wants to come to the rescue of the financially beleaguered American farmer by starting--get this--Adopt-a-Farm Family.

Arthur envisions a national campaign in which Americans from coast to coast send a few dollars--or corporations send big bucks--to a bank trust account set up by his nonprofit American Family Dream Inc. But Inc. kind of takes the warmth out of it, so we’ll just call it American Family Dream.

American Family Dream would come to the rescue of farmers who are losing their land to foreclosure, their own dreams being put on the auction block.

The charity would buy the farm, deed 49% of it back to the farmer and retain 51% ownership. Then, all contributors to American Family Dream would own a piece of the farm.

For three or five years, the farmer would not have to make payments on the farm, but instead could concentrate fully on making a profit, with the help of “farm efficiency experts” offered by American Family Dream.

Then, after a few years, the farmer would be given the opportunity to start making payments on the mortgage, eventually regaining full ownership.

“If the farmer realizes that he just can’t make a profit at his farm and that just maybe he doesn’t belong in the farm business, that 49% would revert to American Family Dream. It would be a farm that belongs to a charity,” Arthur said.

The Adopt-a-Farm Family has one more little twist: The farmer would agree to allow donors to the charity to come out and visit him on the farm, so they could feel their investment under their fingernails.

“We want a clasping of hands, so to speak, between the farmer and those who donate to the American Family Dream,” Arthur explained. “Imagine Mr. and Mrs. Brown and their two children who have never touched base with earth on a farm. The Browns think, gosh, rather than go to the lake or the mountains for vacation, let’s take a week’s vacation and work on a farm!

“I’m telling you, that’ll catch people’s imagination,” Arthur says passionately. “Of course, people would have to pay their own transportation and their own food, but imagine the beauty of a family going out to the farm, learning how plants are planted and harvested, how the cows are milked and the chickens are fed. It could build the most beautiful bond of friendship you could imagine.” (Maybe the farmer could take a few days off while the Browns tend to things.)

This idea of Arthur’s is two weeks old; he is trying to win the interest of Bank of America in setting up the trust account, reasoning that since the bank has had some poor experience with farm loans, it would want to promote an infusion of new capital in farms.

Arthur also is lining up North County civic leaders to attend a meeting on Thursday to win their interest and to determine if they’ll sit on the board of directors of American Family Dream. Imagine the burden of that kind of title!

And, he’s writing letters to the nation’s 1,500 largest corporations, asking their help in sponsoring a nationwide newspaper ad campaign to promote the American Family Dream.

Wouldn’t you know that it would take Corporate America to sponsor an American Family Dream.

Wafer Wars

In our Religion-Is-Business Department, we bring you these related items:

- Manna may come from Heaven, but altar breads generally come from one of two places: either a New Jersey commercial baker or a convent of Roman Catholic sisters in San Diego.

The problem is, the local sisters--who need the money from baking wafers to help pay for their contemplative life style--are losing business to the New Jersey outfit.

“They’ve got more automated equipment than we do, so they can sell their communion wafers a little cheaper than we can,” said Sister Paula Thompson, prioress at the Benedictine Convent of Perpetual Adoration.

Thompson said Christian pastors do not necessarily pay attention to where they buy their altar breads, looking instead for the best price around.

“We are trying to send out the good word that it would be good for local pastors to patronize someone locally,” she said. “We are a monastic order and our primary call is to prayer, but we still have to be involved in money-making to support ourselves, and this is our living.

“The other day I was at Mission (San Diego) de Acala, and I noticed that they use the New Jersey bread. That’s really frustrating.”

A thousand 1 1/2-inch communion wafers go for $8.10, plus shipping. Whole wheat costs more.

- San Diego County’s newest radio station will begin broadcasting this week out of San Marcos: KPRZ (or “K-Praise”). It’s 10,000 watts of 24-hour Christian broadcasting.

“We’re not here to replace going to church, but to supplement it,” said station spokesman Tom Le Vine.

The station will feature traditional and contemporary Christian music, teaching programs and talk shows.

- The oldest hotel in San Diego is at it again: Mission San Luis Rey in Oceanside is marketing its “summer spiritual vacations.”

And such a deal it is. For $125, two people get a double-occupancy room (a one-time seminary room) from Monday through Friday, breakfast and dinner and use of the mission’s swimming pool, tennis court and volleyball courts, plus all the peace they can absorb.

The mission might serve as the home base for out-of-state tourists as they set off for more traditional attractions like Disneyland, Sea World and the San Diego Zoo.

The Franciscan fathers who operate the 188-year-old mission have no problem booking the retreat center on weekends, and figure they can generate some extra income during the otherwise quiet weekdays by offering these cheap accommodations.

So, you see, you don’t have to put Uncle Harry in the spare bedroom.