This may be the ultimate example of free will.
All big cities have to deal with rat problems to some extent. But generally, everybody does their best to try to limit the presence of the rodents instead of attracting them.
That’s apparently the problem the city of Chicago is dealing with (along with plenty of others) after a Chicago billionaire won’t stop paying people to spread expensive nuts around one of the city’s most popular neighborhoods.
It all started when residents near Lincoln Park noticed a growing rat problem – and noticed that there were nuts scattered around the holes they were living in. As one resident put it:
“It’s like a luxury mélange of really nice nuts. I’m talking brazil nuts, walnuts. And I was looking, and I’m no arborist, but these do not come from these trees. These are not acorns.”
This has apparently been going on for multiple years at this point, and residents have caught people spreading the nuts around the rat habitat. But when confronted, the culprits reportedly become hostile and refuse to answer why they’re doing it. According to yet another nearby resident:
“I noticed all these holes, and then there were nuts around these holes, then I put two and two together later in summer when I saw rats coming out of the holes. Apparently, there are people who are feeding the rats. They say they are feeding the squirrels but in fact they are feeding the rats. My wife and I have confronted these people and they get aggressive. They started swearing at us.”
Well it turns out the reason these people are spreading the nuts is that…they were hired to by a Chicago billionaire.
The city says that for more than three years, 94-year-old Barre Seid has been paying people to spread nuts around the park, fueling the rat infestation and frustrating residents. And the city has tried to put an end to it by issuing him citations, but…he’s a billionaire, so he just pays them and keeps going with his bizarre rat-feeding operation.
Seid is the former owner of Tripp Lite, an electrical products manufacturer, who made headlines in 2020 for donating the company to conservative political action committee Marble Freedom Trust. At the time, with the company valued at $1.65 billion, it was the single largest donation to a political organization in history.
According to Chicago alderman Timmy Knudson, the city is out of options after the fines and warnings have failed to stop the billionaire from feeding the rats:
“We’ve never dealt with the situation where it’s like ‘feed for hire’ for lack of a better term – where someone’s paying several employees to feed the animals in the surrounding area. Typically, when you ticket somebody it stops their bad behavior. This has not stopped it. If anything, the behavior is increased – the feeding has increased since we’ve been ticketing them.”
And it’s gotten to the point where the city councilman is pushing for the city to file a lawsuit against Seid for damage to the park.
So why is he doing it?
Well, nobody really knows. There are theories that he’s attempting to run a nearby farmer’s market out of the area, or drive down property values in the area, while others simply think he’s a senile old man who likes feeding wildlife. But when reporters have gone to his home to ask why he’s paying people to feed the rats, they haven’t been able to get an answer.
It’s a bizarre situation that’s no doubt frustrating for residents, but honestly as somebody who doesn’t have to deal with the rat problem, it’s kind of funny that some 94-year-old billionaire is using his fortune to buy expensive nuts to feed to rodents and create problems for his neighbors.
Excellent – albeit unsanitary and annoying – use of free will.
