Letter: Deserving donors?
To the editor,
A tale of two mega-donors
Recently Cal Poly announced that they were naming their new wine center after Justin and J. Lohr, both who donated $2.5 million to the construction of a new wine and viticulture center.
On one hand, J. Lohr has been an unpretentious, and gracious pillar of the community for the past 25 years, having developed a million case operation with affordable wines. A true shepherd of the land, J.Lohr has been very generous to the community by quietly sharing their facility for myriad educational and community events.
On the other hand, Justin, owned and operated by the Wonderful Company, a $4 billion dollar conglomerate, has been less than a stellar neighbor. A couple of years ago, they moonscaped over 300 acres of native oak trees to develop a new vineyard. Fortunately, they were caught doing illegal grading and had to terminate this effort. A 22 acre planned reservoir would have depleted neighboring wells.
Perhaps Cal Poly should have been more conscious of the negative aspects of the Wonderful Company and Justin’s debacle. Oh well, money talks!
Dave King
Paso Robles
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