What would Sam Walton do?

What would Sam Walton do?

I mean about the nation’s drug problem.

Walton was an entrepreneur whose Wal-Mart stores changed the face of retailing and is number one on in the list of top ten companies in the world with annual revenues of close to $500 billion.

Exxon Mobile, by the way ranks sixth and Apple ranks 9^th.

Sam died in 1992, but Wal-Mart, with headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas continues to dominate thanks to its legendary focus on individual customers and service.

We need people who think like Sam Walton to respond to the nation’s enormous drug problem.

What brought all of this to mind was Wal-Mart’s announcement last week that it is testing a new strategy that would enable customers to call the local store, place an order and have an employee drop it off on the way home.

Neat, I thought, I’ll order five bags of mulch and have them deliver it. (For those unfamiliar with bags of mulch, They’re a pretty heavy lift).

The delivery test is being conducted in three stores in Northwest Arkansas. In making the announcement, Wal Mart president Doug McMillon sees this new initiative as “a ladder of opportunity for employees” who will remain essential to the company but with somewhat altered job descriptions.

This has been the Wal-Mart way from the beginning more than 50 years ago.

“It’s our mission,” Sam Walton said at the time, “to create opportunities so people can live better. We consider it our responsibility to make a positive impact in the communities we serve. Whether it’s through the grants we provide or through the inspiring volunteer efforts of Wal-Mart associates, we are passionate about helping people live better. One community at a time.”

And that’s our goal at ODAT. We sell sobriety. We try to help people get over their addictions, one neighborhood at a time, one community at a time.

Federal and state governments have a role to play—mostly in reducing the supply of drugs, but the real work focuses on changing lives by offering recovery and a plan of action for every addicted person.

There are two federal agencies that supply useful information about addiction and recovery—Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services (SAMHSA) and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)—and there are also state agencies that can help.

In Little Rock, we had a “drug czar” position that didn’t pan out and a state agency–Office of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Program)–that was closed four years ago. We did have a statewide one-time prescription drug prevention program that was successful as far as it went.

President Trump has had conversations with N.J. Governor Chris Christie about addressing the nation’s drug abuse problem and their published deliberations further remind me that the real work takes place in local communities and neighborhoods. Federal, state and local governments should resist the impulse to over-manage and encourage entrepreneurs to develop and implement plans. Like ODAT for example. We actually have a plan.

Gov. Christie, who sees the need for action, doesn’t really have a plan that I know of, and President Trump, a teetotaler whose older brother was an alcoholic knows something about addiction but not much about recovery. His older brother, Fred, died of alcoholism in 1981 at the age of 43.

To put it briefly, the plan we have in mind is local, entrepreneurial, 12-step focused and Christian faith-based. Because of our non-profit status, we will fund it, as we have in the past, mainly through private donations and grants.

 

The Little Rock Roundtable

Our proposal for Little Rock is to create a faith-based organization that will mobilize the substantial assets of our community in a freedom from drugs initiative. We have named our proposed organization, “The Roundtable,” evoking, as it does, positive feelings of compassion, steadfastness, courage, honor, chivalry and nobility.

Members of our proposed “Little Rock Roundtable” will represent churches, hospitals, schools, businesses, prison systems, veterans groups, lawyers, legislators and others. Some will be in recovery themselves.

The 12^th century roundtable had 12 members and we propose to begin with that. We have also been influenced by Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town” and by the extraordinarily positive response of communities (including my hometown of Summit, N.J.) to the enormous challenges of World War II.

Members of the roundtable, as we envision it, will be men and women of faith with a special interest in helping people overcome their addictions to alcohol and other drugs.

Community assets and focus

            Little Rock’s assets include excellent hospitals (dealing with both mental health and drug addiction problems), community-focused and entrepreneurial churches, traditional 12 step programs and a history of proactively dealing with addictions dating back to 1940. The plan is focused on:

• Reducing the demand for alcohol and other drugs by promoting recovery while maintaining adequate law enforcement protection to limit the supply.
• Forming collaborations with other organizations with complementary objectives such as the Christian-based City Connections.
• Promoting healthy lifestyles in spirit, mind and body.
• Encouraging the interest and support of the current Arkansas administration, which has challenged the state to respond more proactively to the drug problem Giving people access to a better life. One community at a time.

Sam once said, “It’s our mission to create opportunities so people can live better. We consider it our responsibility to make a positive impact in the communities we serve. Whether it’s through the grants we provide to the thousands of organizations that share our mission or through the inspiring volunteer efforts of Walmart associates, we are passionate about helping people live better. One community at a time.”

We think Sam Walton would approve of our plan to reduce drug addiction beginning with our local communities. We hope you do too.