EPA regulations will stifle farmers in Bradley County

This is worth another post! I am feeling pretty prophetic right now! Wow the Presidents Executive Order version of Cap and trade did not waste any time attacking our farmers with their environmental BS! Read again, this was posted approximately a month ago on this site! My connection to Facebook has been altered also and many articles are vanishing from this site! Guess 1st amendment rights only applies to select groups and only if it doesn’t offend anyone!

The far reaching of the effects of the EPA via The Clean Air Act will soon be stifling our Bradley County farmers and their businesses by regulating and fining them for the amount of GHG (GreenHouse Gases) their farm animals and produce emit!

Sound outrageous, to bad to to be true? As, we sleep, the Obama Administration is bypassing any resistance from many organizations and citizens to essentially pass elements of the defunct Cap and Trade Act which still lives with the existance of the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) via the Clean Air Act!

Since 1970 the Clean Air Act has been a bill passed by Congress. The most ominous sign regarding this bill is that many are revising and amending the bill as frequently as in 1990, 1997, 2005, April 2007 and as recently as July 1, 2011. This tells me that through many decades current administrations are still making this Act relevant. The premise that it is still around, is that it perhaps oozes of international involvement and is an important cog in the sustainable community wheel.

In 2007, the EPA was given authority to regulate GHG’s by an opinion of the US Supreme Court on cars and vehicles. On January 2, 2011, these regulations will apply to “stationary emitters” ie farms, produce and Agricultural businesses. July 1, 2011 Entities emitting only GHG’s will be required to obtain permits under the Clean Air Act.

This will greatly be enhanced by the current Executive Order 13575 and 13576 to further regulate “the rural community” by the Presidents Council on Rural Development. Makes sense to me that once they fine,tax and regulate you out of existence, they claim your land and convert it to some type of “Government Playground.”

Under the Clean Air Act, once the GHG’s emission rules become final, certain provisions that are expected to impose potentially costly and burdensome requirements on agriculture, farms, small business and the economy in general.

Title V of the Act requires “major sources” by statute, this means farms, business, etc that emit more than 100 tons of pollutants per year to obtain permits to continue operating and even stiffer permit fines and fees for those emitting 250 tons per year. This new amendment will regulate many farms not previously included.

The USDA recently commented to the EPA that “even very small farms would meet the 100 tons per year emission thresholds. Many of our farms in Bradley County will be included in this threshold and face many new regulations with fines and fees just to operate.
According to the USDA, in America, these regulations will directly affect 99% of Dairy Producers, 96.8% of hog inventory, 95% of hog production, and 90% of beef production. This will result in many farms across the Country and Bradley County to face stiff fines, taxes, fees and tons of new regulation. The USDA lows balls the impact on local farmers in the 100s of millions.

The EPA realizes this will be “a significant impact” on farmers and that permitting authorities will be “overwhelmed” by the increase numbers of entities subject to these new GHG requirements. So, they have introduced “ a tailoring rule” to introduce this to our farmers slowly over the next few years.

For the record the Farm Bureau has spoken out against the new regulations and I would encourage you to contact your local Farm Bureau and encourage they resist this with a vengeance, before it is too late.

How will these new regulations impact you in Bradley County. With these fines, taxes and regulations how can any farmers in the country or Bradley County survive.

Estimated per offense penalties, taxes and fines per event;
1) $ 175.00 per dairy cow
2) $ 87.50 per head of beef cattle
3) $ 20.00 per hog

Can you see how the fines, permits and taxes could add up quickly with a large farm or the immediate impact on a small Bradley County farmer, just barely making it day to day to have thousands per event added to his or her debt load.

With this thought in mind the EPA’s budget has been increased by 34 % recently and an estimated 43 million being dedicated to the enforcement of these new GHG regulations. Ozone meters will be placed in the general vicinity of every applicable farm and monitored for your farms emissions of GHG’s with expectations to decrease your emissions by 70%. That is unobtainable according to many farmers and will result in many of our farmers simply going out of business and losing their land. This new enforement of regulations are expected to cost the farmers 4.2 billion annually according to EPA estimates.

Of course, this cost will be passed on to the consumer by the farmer which will reflect higher food prices and further strain on your personal budget. The Green movement must be halted, bad science and estimates are driving this regulation, speak up now or lose the whole farm.

God Bless our farmers, we must keep them alive and well and out from under government control. They are the backbone of our country and should remain so.

Details of this article obtained from the Florida Farm Bureau, the USDA and EPA websites. Thanks for you contribution to this article.

EPA responds to “hay is pollutant” article in Bradley County News

Farmers in Bradley County be very alert and wary of the EPA! As this article, they are coming after the small farmer, the little guy!

The EPA, the Federal Government should not be anywhere near our farmers! The EPA should get their hands off their farms, period!

The federal government should not be citing farmers for feeding their cattle hay, the cow digesting the hay, creating feces that normally comes out of a cows behind, hitting the ground, a rains comes and washes it into a nearby stream, the sun coming out evaporating the feces, discharging a gas, then cite him for damaging the ozone and a stream downhill from his farm. This is making me mad and I am only being
sympathetic to our much needed farmers!

As noted the representative from the EPA is quick to point out that the citation doesn’t mention the word “hay” one time but it does mention feed, foliage and the production of feed! Well, if it ain’t hay then what is it! Last I checked and when I saw my grandpappy feed his cattle he fed his animals the hay he grew! I should know I baled much of it as a kid for a plate of cornbread and pinto beans as payment!

Farmers, take this to a whole new level! I can notify and make a stink and use my 1st amendment rights to do so, but it will be up to you to contact your elected officials to stop the EPA! You think that this will only happen in Billings Montana or Kansas, no it won’t stop there! It will be in Bradley County because our elected officials are fostering an environment for the EPA, the United Nations via agenda 21 to step into our communities and wipe you off the map with regulations just as they are attempting to do to Mr. Callicrate. Many elected officials in this town are oblivious to the Socialist creep that is infesting our county and country, but a few are in the know and if you look closely it will be quickly evident who they are once you become educated about what they are doing. Let’s stop the EPA from regulating our farmers into the ground!

CHECK THIS OUT ON MR CALLICRATES PERSONAL SITE HE HAS POSTED THE EPA CITATION AND PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO THE WORDING AND ASK YOURSELF how much of the cited regulations are just normal activity on a farm and then imagine the EPA walking onto your property and see what citations you would get! This is unvelieveable to me!

You will have to highlight it and copy this address then search it, it would not allow me to copy the link to this page!

Click to access EPA-complaint1.pdf

Here is a copy of the letter sent by a representative of the EPA to me!

By Karl Brooks, EPA Region 7 Administrator

A Kansas feedlot operator is trying to make hay by falsely claiming that EPA defined hay as a water pollutant.

The owner of the Callicrate Feeding Company has been spinning a “hay-as-pollutant” myth through the blogosphere for a couple of weeks now. While the company is certainly entitled to its own opinions about EPA, the company is not entitled to its own set of facts.

Here are the facts. On August 15, EPA’s Region 7, which includes Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and nine tribal nations, took action to correct several serious environmental violations at the Callicrate Feeding Company in St. Francis, Kansas. EPA found water permit violations at Callicrate’s operation that needed to be addressed. The compliance order was not based on hay. Nor would EPA have issued such an action based on hay.

To be clear: The order had nothing to do with hay. At no place in the 11-page order is the word “hay” mentioned. Nor is there mention of alfalfa or grass.

EPA cited the Callicrate operation for failure to control harmful runoff, maintain adequate manure storage capacity, keep adequate operation records, and meet the state and federal requirements of its nutrient management plan. Compliance Order (PDF) (11 pp, 1.5MB, About PDF)

EPA inspectors observed silage, and dried distillers grains within the uncontrolled feedstock storage area.

When stored inappropriately, the silage and grains can turn into a liquid material that contains contaminants detrimental to water quality. EPA inspectors also observed slaughter wastes being stored outside in an uncontrolled area. The EPA order was based on those contaminants and the other violations mentioned above.

The Callicrate facility is permitted by the State of Kansas for a capacity of 12,000 head of beef cattle and had 3,200 head at the time of the inspection. Under EPA definitions, 1,000 head of beef is considered a large Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO). This is not a small operation. The permitted capacity puts the company in the top five percent of the largest animal feeding operations in Region 7.

This action by EPA was issued to correct problems. Less than two weeks after the order was issued, Callicrate’s attorney informed us that the company had already taken action to address the problems identified in EPA’s order.

We have some indication of how other producers have perceived this fracas in a feedlot. Region 7’s offer to meet with Kansas cattle producers to discuss CAFO enforcement was warmly received and we will be meeting within days. Drover/Cattle Network published an article debunking the “hay-as-pollutant” myth.

As that article concludes: “But as the industry confronts and negotiates these genuine regulatory issues, R-CALF’s claim that ‘EPA declares hay a pollutant to antagonize small and mid-sized U.S. cattle feeders’ is unnecessary, inflammatory hyperbole.”

Brooks is administrator for U.S. EPA Region 7 that includes Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and nine tribal nations.