Buncombe County eGov Weekly eZine - Volume: 1 Issue: 25

June 20 - 27, 2005

Is Your Cooler Healthy?

As summer starts, don't get caught with an unhealthy cooler. A cooler that's not cool can lead to spoiled food and a spoiled good time!

Here are some helpful tips:

Start with a clean cooler. You can make a safe all-purpose cleaner by mixing 2 Tbsp baking soda with 1 pint warm water in a spray bottle. Add a squeeze of lemon juice or a splash of vinegar to cut grease.
Start with some solid ice. Ice cubes tend to melt quickly and make a mess. Make your own ice blocks by freezing water in plastic milk jugs.
Start with frozen or very cold foods. Pack foods and drinks directly from refrigerator and freezer to cooler. Freeze as many items (like fresh meat and juice boxes) as possible. They’ll help keep other stuff cold.
Pack items in order of use. Place items that you will need last at the bottom of the cooler; first things to be eaten at the top. The less you move things around, the colder everything will stay.
Pack in portion-size, leak-proof containers. Use containers that hold the amount of food that you will need at one time. Make sure that lids fit tightly, or put containers into zip-lock plastic bags.
Pack foods separately. Cross-contamination between foods increases the risk of food-borne illnesses. Keep cooked and uncooked foods separate. Pack all meat products away from other foods.
Keep coolers in the trunk. The goal is to keep all food and beverages away from heat and direct sun as much as possible. In vans or trucks, keep your cooler covered or under other luggage.
Keep coolers in the shade. Once you arrive at your picnic spot or camping site, place the cooler away from the sun. Cover with a blanket or tarp if there is no natural shade available.
Keep coolers closed as much as possible. Every time you open a cooler, the inside temperature warms up slightly. Close the lid completely after each use; place a heavy object on top if necessary.
Clean your cooler when you return home using baking soda, water and vinegar. Remember, using chlorine bleach is dangerous. The use of chlorine bleach creates dangerous toxins such as dioxin, furans and other organochlorines. Once loose in the environment, these chemicals accumulate in both people and animals. Hundreds of studies have shown a direct link between dioxin exposure and cancer, birth defects, and developmental and reproductive disorders.

Source: NCPH, Adapted by the NC NET Program from Eat Right Montana materials

Be Careful About Travel Deals

All you have to do is give us your name and you get a FREE trip to Myrtle Beach! It’s that simple…or is it? Buyers beware of this marketing monster. This creature will do whatever it can to get your attention. Just giving your name and address when trying to win may seem harmless enough at the time. However, there may be more unpleasant surprises around the corner.

For example, “outstanding” travel deals often appear through fax machines at businesses. According to the The Morning Show on CBS, Selena Furr bought a travel deal and learned the hard way. She says, "I think the thing that got me suckered was the simple fact that I wanted to do something for my kids." All Furr wanted was a family vacation.

One day at work, she saw an offer that came over the fax machine: $299 per person for an all-inclusive trip to Cancun, plus a bonus trip to Orlando. Furr says, "I try to find a different place to go each year with the kids, and I was like, 'Well, this would be great.' Not having a lot of money, $299 is really a good deal for me to take my kids somewhere."

So Furr called the number on the fax, and decided she couldn't pass up the great offer: $746 dollars for hotel rooms, amenities, and taxes. She says, "I asked 'What other charges are there? Are there any other charges that I need to be aware of?' The answer was "No".

"I said, 'There's nothing else? I don't have to do anything else?' That's it. You just call them up. Let them know where you want to go, when you want to go."

Furr wanted to travel in June. The company said no problem, so she bought the trip, and was told to go to a Web site to pick her hotel. "Oh, it was just awesome," Furr says. "I'm looking at all these different resorts, and you see people playing beach volleyball; you see people laying out; you see the lobby is huge; you got this spiral staircase, and you know, everybody's just happy."

But Furr wasn't happy with what happened next. When she called the company with her hotel choice and exact travel dates, this is what she heard:

"I see here where you want to go in June. Well, that's peak season. So, we're going to have to charge you an extra $300," Furr recalls, "I'm like whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. What do you mean, peak season?"

And that's not all. Furr was also hit with hundreds more in upgrade charges to stay at the hotel she wanted. So much for the promise of "no extra fees." Furr's trip was now almost double the original price. "That's when I was like, 'Okay. I've been scammed,' " she says.

Travel scams consistently rank near the top of the list of complaints received by the Federal Trade Commission. In a recent action dubbed "Operation Travel Unravel," the FTC sued three travel companies for bilking consumers out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Attorney Generals in some 40 states have also announced cases and settlements involving fraudulent travel operators.

Fraudulent companies promote their travel packages through the mail, by phone and by unsolicited emails, or "spam." Recently, the FTC has noted an increase in fraudulent travel promotions advertised through unsolicited faxes - sometimes disguised to look like they're from a travel company the consumer may recognize.

A Tennessee woman, for example, received an unsolicited fax at her office advertising a vacation trip to Orlando, Cocoa Beach and the Bahamas. The letterhead on the fax looked exactly like the one used by her employer's travel group, and she thought the unbelievably low price was a special employee benefit. Anxious to take advantage of the offer, she quickly booked her trip. As it turned out, the company had no affiliation with the woman's employer, and she never received the tickets she paid for.

Before buying a vacation package - particularly one advertised at an unrealistically low price - the FTC encourages you to:

Know who you're dealing with.
Check out the company's track record.
Verify arrangements before you pay.
Use a credit card to make your purchase.
Investigate charter flights.
Learn the vocabulary.
Watch out for "instant travel agent" offers.

Beware! It's Tick Time

Summer is such a great time for playing ball, walking, hiking and just sitting in the grass relaxing. Unfortunately, it’s also a great time for ticks. Ticks typically live in the woods, tall grass and brush. They climb onto pets and people when they pass.

The best way to avoid ticks all together is by doing the following:

Avoid walking through fields and other areas with high grass
Inspect family and pets after being outside
Keep grass and shrubs in your yard trimmed (ticks avoid direct sunlight and will not infest areas that are well maintained
Treating lawns is of little benefit since this is not a preferred habitat for ticks. If insecticides are used, treatment should be concentrated in areas where pets, rodents, and other potential wild hosts of ticks are likely to frequent, e.g., dog house, fenceline, and along margins between wooded or brushy areas and the lawn. Carbaryl (Sevin), chlorpyrifos, and diazinon are effective materials, as is permethrin. Make 1-2 applications -- the first during April or May when ticks are detected, and another, if needed, in early July. A good way to determine if ticks are present is to drag a 3x3-ft white flannel or cotton sheet through suspected areas. Ticks will attach to the sheet and be visible against the white background.

If you do find a tick on your pet or a family member, remove it immediately. Using fine-point tweezers, grasp the tick just behind the point of attachment and pull slowly and steadily until the tick is dislodged. Vaseline, matches and other alternate methods of removal should be avoided. Wash the bite area, apply antiseptic and cover with a band-aid.

Ticks can cause sickness. Two serious illnesses are Lyme Disease and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever.

If you suspect that you or a family member have the symptoms please contact your family physician immediately.

Free & Confidential Walk-in HIV Testing in Asheville

Free and confidential walk-in HIV testing will be available at sites throughout Asheville from June 24 until June 30.

WHAT: Free and confidential walk-in HIV testing will be available at sites throughout Asheville from June 24 until June 30. This event has been organized by a group of community partners in observance of National HIV Testing Day.

WHY: More than a million Americans are now believed to be living with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. One out of every four persons living with HIV is unaware that they are infected. There are many reasons to know your HIV status. If a test result is positive, health care and treatment are available. Those with positive test results can avoid passing HIV to others. Those with negative test results can make healthy choices in order to remain HIV-negative.

WHO: Everyone has a past. Everyone is at risk. If you’ve never been tested, or if you’ve had unprotected sex or shared a needle since your last test, now is the time to get an HIV test.

For complete details and locations see the Walk-in HIV Testing Flyer.

County Commissioners Meeting Agenda

The Buncombe County Commissioners will hold their second regular meeting for the month of June on Tuesday, June 21st. The meeting will begin at 4:30pm in Room 204 of the County Courthouse.

Here is their complete agenda. You can watch the Commissioners in action on BCTV Charter Cable Channel 2 on Tuesdays & Thursdays at 8 pm - Wednesdays at 3:00 pm and Saturdays & Sundays at 9 am. You may also watch the meetings via streaming video on the County's website.

Did You Know?

NC Agriculture Cost Share Program Deadline is July 15th.

The Buncombe Soil & Water Conservation District expects to receive its annual cost share allocation from the State for non-point source pollution control from agricultural activities. These funds are available to farmers to install conservation practices which help decrease the amount of sediment, nitrogen, phosphorus, chemicals and other pollutants in the surface and ground waters of the State.

To find out how to sign up, see the complete article.

You can get a low-cost rabies shot for your pet.

Rabies Shot Clinic

Date: Saturday, June 25, 9 am to 1 pm
Location: North Windy Ridge Elementary (directions)
Cost: Rabies shot $5.00 per pet

The cost is $5 per pet. To receive a three-year rabies vaccine, you MUST bring the one-year certificate with you. Please make sure to bring restraints for all your pets.

For more information please call the Asheville Humane Society at 236-3885.

You Can Volunteer With the Board of Elections

Add your name to the list of people to work Election Day. Every year Election Services of Buncombe County needs hundreds of people to man the election voting locations. These are the people who ask voters for their name and address, operate the election voting machines and help voters to cast to their vote.

For more information on the opportunities available, see the Volunteer with Us section of the website.