Pineapples not banned in city, host panel says

By Jean Torkelson, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published July 9, 2008 at 9 p.m.

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Enough with the jokes. And enough about the pineapples, OK?

The Denver 2008 Host Committee, feeling skewered by buzz that it had banned pineapples and other nonenvironmentally friendly items at the Democratic National Convention, blasted the notion in a news release Wednesday, calling it a "frivolous food fight" and "misinformation" circulated in the media.

"No food service establishment or business is being told what to serve. No convention guest is being told what to eat. No food item of any kind is being banned from being served at any event," Parry Burnap, the committee's greening director, was quoted in the release as saying.

Denver City Councilman Charlie Brown isn't buying it.

"They're backing out. They're embarrassed. What they're doing is trying to cover themselves," jeered Brown, who sent out a newsletter calling the host committee "food control zealots" whose environmental demands, like the use of only organically grown food, could increase the costs for caterers by 50 percent.

One Denver caterer softened Brown's assessment, saying the host committee only requested that they steer people away from items like pineapples, which require precious fuel to get here.

"Nobody ever told us, 'You can't do this.' They always said, 'Here is a list of guidelines and we'd appreciate it if you could follow this and here's an item we'd rather you not serve,' " said John Schafer, general manager of the Hyatt Regency Denver.

Among the "rather nots" are pineapples. Along with plastic water bottles and Styrofoam, pineapples are environmental no-nos.

"Roughly for every pound of pineapple flown into Denver, you could expect about two pounds of carbon dioxide emissions," said John Talberth of the Center for Sustainable Economy, an environmental group that calculates so-called carbon footprints.

The mere mention of a pineapple ban sent Chris Lopez, communications director of the host committee, into a fit of laughter Wednesday.

Bottom line: Pineapples aren't banned, Lopez said.

Brown suggested the only real laughter was coming via comedians like Jay Leno, who have been skewering the tough "green" guidelines that the host committee laid out for potential vendors.

For Schafer, the solution is simple: "We will tell (customers), 'These are the green alternatives and these are the less-green alternatives,' but if people ask for something, we're not going to tell them they can't have it. That's not the kind of business we're in."

torkelsonj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5055

Pineapple's carbon footprint

* Roughly every pound of pineapple flown into Denver produces 2 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions. That makes its carbon footprint four times larger than roughly 50 other categories of fruits.

* Low footprint alternatives: Colorado peaches or apricots.

• July 10, 2008

  5:27 a.m.

  Suggest removal

  plotz writes:

  It has been mentioned many times that the current DNC and Obama are really closet socialist/marxists. This proves the point. In the early days of the Soviet Union and also in other communist type countries. Certain foods, books, materials and so on were considered counter revolutionary and thus banned if not worse. Nowadays, it is called "nonenvironmentally friendly". Same thinking different terminology.

• July 10, 2008

  8:48 a.m.

  Suggest removal

  280Pagoda writes:

  What are we wasting our time on?

  With the war in Iraq and Afghanistan raging, Pakistan becoming a staging ground for militants looking to get cozy with a power that does have the atomic bomb, Iran sending missiles toward Israel while beating the war drums, unemployment skyrocketing, oil headed for $150 a barrel and record levels of foreclosures of homes making millions of the middle class homeless and disenfranchised, we are wasting time arguing about what fruit should be offered at the DNC convention?

  To put this in perspective, delegates are coming to Denver to put forth the first black presidential candidate, an old guard black leader (Jesse Jackson) is threatening under his breath to separate Obama from his fruit (right out of the 18th Century KKK history book), and whether eating pineapple is politically correct or not is what the DNC and our media are spending our precious time arguing about?

  Seems like the fruit we should be worried about are already in charge and making decisions.

• July 10, 2008

  10:13 a.m.

  Suggest removal

  Monica030 writes:

  First certain plants are banned, then they try to ban pineapples...when will the madness end?

• July 10, 2008

  12:41 p.m.

  Suggest removal

  Susancnw writes:

  I thought Obama was biracial, not black.

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