Add this one to the ever growing lists of citizens who are suffering from the effects of the failed model of agriculture called CAFOs- Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations

I live in the town of Eden, NY.  There is a dairy farm that has added many cows in recent months.  He has close to 400 cows on around 5 acres.  It is located less than a quarter mile from town center and is surrounded by residential housing.  The stench is overwhelming and is actually penetrating the walls of my house and making me feel ill.  This despite sub-zero temperatures.

I have filed a complaint with the NY DEC Buffalo office as of today (2-2-05) They say “odors” are not yet regulated but may soon be.  He was not aware of EPA Clean Air regulations but said they are looking to regulate ammonia.  The NY Farm Bureau web site says they are being enforced. The NY DEC guy said that it just so happened that they had someone coming out to TEST THE WATER at the West Church Street Dairy Farm on 2-3-05!  I guess they’ve had several complaints about overflowing “lagoons” and ground water contamination from the heavy rains this summer.  The owner has been spreading liquid sewage all over the fields for over a week.  Not sure how this will affect the DEC test readings on Thursday but I can tell you one thing; the sewage melted the snow away despite very cold temperatures.

I am waiting for contact from the Town of Eden supervisor Glenn Nellis in regards to this issue.  The stench has been constant since January 19, 2005.  There is also a playground within 300 yards of this massive waste storage lagoon.

Also note:  A residential development has been proposed and is expected to be approved .  This development is a stone’s throw from this farm and it’s offensive lagoon.  24 lots of 1/2 acre each.  I can’t imagine what the new owners will do when they buy these lots and realize that they are next to a toxic waste site.

I need help.  My house stinks, my car stinks, my basement stinks, my clothes even stink. I can taste it in my mouth.  I can’t imagine what the Mexicans who work on this farm feel like after a day in this Hell hole.  Are they provided with respirators per OSHA requirements?

Gregg Kaczmarczk
Eden. NY
Erie County

Ms Navarro comments on her visit to CAFO neighbors in Locke, New York

Four years ago I took a Journey to a small town in New York to witness for myself something that was then very new to me, Agribusiness: The new wave of farming that is sweeping our nation. By the time I left New York, I was filled with more emotions than I could handle. Shocked, appalled, confused, disappointed, heart broken, and sympathetic to the people I met and what they were going through. I felt like I had just visited some third world country; only never left the good old US of A.

I cried the. majority of my car ride back to llinois. Over and over again I could see and hear Fred Coon saying to me, “Now that you know all this, what are you going to do when you get back to Illinois?” I spent the next year or so researching factory fanning, talking to anyone and everyone I could about this not-so-new or unique problem and trying to do something to help my newfound friends in Cayuga County New York with their heart breaking problem.

In June of 2001, I had an article published in The Progressive Populist entitled, “Agribusiness Uses Farm Laws as Cover”. The article highlighted the plight of the Coon family and their neighbor who face a daily battle for clean air and water because of their “farmer” neighbor, who tlten owned 7,000 dairy cows. Since that time, much has changed, sadly, at the expense of the people who simply want to exercise their rights to live in a healthy and peaceful community. Tragically, they are realizing that what they are looking for can no longer be found in a place that their families’ ancestry of 200+years did. So much for the American Dream. So much for the roots that made this country what it is. After all, when it comes to hundreds of years of family history vs. money, it is foolish to think the values this country was founded on could win.

After my article on this topic was published, I received countless e-mails and phone calls. One such phone cll was from the Assistant Attorney General, Gene Kelly. He spent time on the phone with me trying to clear up my misunderstandings of our previous conversations, since within my article it had looked like his office had not properly handled this case.

It has been over three years since that article was written, and you know what Gene? The families surrounding the farmer still have e-coli and other bacteria in their water. The air is no cleaner to breathe; many adults and children use inhalers daily. The Coon pond is still filled with an un-named sediment because no state agency will come out and test it to give it a name. I can also tll you of other things that have happened:

The dairy farmer has increased his herd to 12,000 cows, heifers and calves.

Pearl Coon passed away, of course her living conditions next door to this farmer played no role at all on her weakening health.

Since their rights were ignored and violated with no repercussions.or regulation from town, county, state or federal governments, other aggressive agribusinesses in the area decided to adopt the practices of this “model CAFO” and expansion has increased in the area.

The families in the community banded together and hired a lawyer to take their farmer neighbor to court. They had a court date set for spring of 2003, which was moved to 2004. Yes, you guessed it, that date has now been moved again. One by one, families that once banded together in this fight have found that the toll on their physical and emotional health, as well as concerns for their children’s health and well being, have begun to move away.

In 2002, community residents, along with myself and other environmental organizations met with one of the lawyers at the Attorney General’s office, hoping they would find reason to take this case and bring justice to the community. The night before, we made sure we had all our information ready. We made note of laws that were broken, other states that had fought and won in similar cases, and under what laws and regulations they found justice. We had a chronological time line of events that had happened. Even the Attorney General’s office had 17 depositions from residents supporting this case.

One of the first things that he explained to us was how our government works:
a. When you have a health related problem or concern, you call the Health Department.

b. When you have an environmental problem or concern, you cll the DEC (Department of Environmental Conservation).

Consequently, if we were finding incompetence with any of these agencies, it is again, the Attorney General’s Office that would provide legal council for the state agencies it represents. This is true EVEN IF they did not necessarily agree with their ‘client,’ or if their client was wrong.

We had also asked where their investigation had led them, what they had found etc. He could not give us any of that information, again, as he legally represents the DEC. We asked that since the DEC office was on the upper floors of the building we were in, that he call up to their office and ask an agent who COULD explain where the investigation was, to come down and tell us. We had especially been anxious to get this information at that moment since they never answered any of our previous attempts at communication. Again, he stated that he would not do that to his ‘client.’

I visited with Fred and Pearl in 2002 before our meeting with the Attorney General’s Office. We stood outside, around his pond and optimistically talked about how one day this pond would be crystal clear again. How we would have a huge party and all jump in for a swim, just as many generations before did. Fred smiled and you could see how much he wanted to believe that. Then he sadly said he knew that since it takes nature 20 years to repair itself, he knows he will not be here to see it when it happens.

For three years this family and an entire community whole-heartedly believed that this office was doing a full investigation, and that one day soon, this “farmer” would be brought to trial and have to answer to the judicial system for his actions. What we found instead was that for all these years they were humored and appeased into thinking someone in our government was on their side.

The last of the families who have lived in this community and had hoped to win this David and GoHath battle, are now being told by their doctors that for their own physical health, they need to move from their homes and out of this community. What a sad day for everyone but the Eldred brothers and Willet Dairy. Now, instead of renting land from people in the community, they can just buy up the whole community and continue with their expansion. In the meantime, current residents will just have to work to rebuild 200+ years of family history somewhere else.

reprinted from MOONSHADOWS, Nov. 2004
Shadow Publications POB 255
Sycamore, Ill 60178
http://www.mnshadows.com

Soil and Water Conservation Society
Connie Mather 5H Route 3, Lock, NY 13092
February 26, 2004

Neighbors Perspective and Action Appeal
My name is Connie Mather. I am part of a growing group of citizens looking for ways to protect our families, our properties and our natural resources from the effects of CAFO’s (also known as factory farms), in rural upstate New York. I’d like to share with you the words of a famous politician on agricultural policy:

“... To put an end to our backwardness in agriculture and to provide the country with the largest possible amount of market grain, cotton, and so forth, it was necessary to pass to large-scale farming, for only large-scale farming can employ modem machinery, utilize all the achievements of agricultural science and provide the largest possible quantity of market produce. [we] took the path of organizing large farms because it enabled us, in the course of several years, to cover the entire country with large farms and provide the country with the largest possible quantity of market produce. “

This is a pretty good description of the course of agriculture in this country and in New York State over the last few decades. This comes from a speech of Joseph Stalin in 1946, in Moscow, as presented to a meeting of voters of the Stalin Electoral District. History tells us that the collective farms, so similar to the government subsidized corporate factory farms of the USA today, were a devastating failure. In the 70’s the USDA asked our successful USA farmers to make trips to Soviet Russia to help them. After studying the situation there, our agriculturalists recommended that the workers be given small plots of land that they could grow their own product on. The smaller plots out-produced the larger collective farms by such incredible numbers that it offered a whole new perspective on smaller farms as sustainable to the Soviets. I have to wonder why the USA, at great expense to the taxpayers, is now subsidizing and promoting the same kind of “advanced farming” that failed so miserably in the U.S.S.R, while doing little to support the sustainable smaller farms so integral to the health of our rural society.

Now I would like to address factory farming on a more personal note, from a neighbor’s perspective.

I live in a small hamlet called East Genoa, by what has become one of the largest dairy CAFO’s in the Northeastern United States. It is one of about 23 dairy CAFO’s that reside in the once beautiful Finger Lakes Region of the Empire State. My husband and I moved to this agricultural district and bought 10 acres in hopes of raising our son in a clean, safe environment. I was going to try to teach school and fulfill a lifelong goal of having a successful organic strawberry u-pick farm, with a possible second high-profit low yield crop to allow for back-up diversity if needed. I was raised on a farm in Pennsylvania and knew that I wanted to farm as a second profession after teaching for 10 years in Philadelphia. None of that was to happen. Staying outdoors, getting healthy enough, or affording water filtering systems and sources has made that impossible here.
First of all, most days of the year, the stench on my property and in my house is so bad that it makes us sick. I mean it makes us literally SICK. I didn’t need to see the research results of latest studies of ammonia and hydrogen sulfide emissions to believe that the CAFO next door is emitting noxious gases. I didn’t need more research studies that showed the particulate matter and the ascetic acid from the silage bunkers are making it very near impossible to work outside or sleep inside in my house many nights.

Year-round spraying of liquid manure has made most of the fields around my home simply dumping grounds for seas of waste. In our community, upwards of 7500 bovine creatures contribute to huge cesspools that are uncovered and “geo” lined. For those of you who are wondering about “geo’ lined pits, that means no cement or synthetic linings, just holes dug into the ground. The detergents and any bad milk that can’t be sold is also dumped or piped into those open lakes of manure, along with the hormones and antibiotics tbat might be in the milk and manure. After that waste ferments for an undetermined amount of time, it is sprayed from the backs of huge tankards the size of tractor-trailers, onto the land or the snow. Summer, fall, winter, spring, it doesn’t matter. The waste is thrown on the fields. I am not a soil specialist, but somehow I can’t see whcre soil is benefiting from that kind of dumping. I see the runoff going into road ditches and small tributaries as I drive along the road. Those waterways feed the lakes of Cayuga and Owasco.

Huge trucks and large farm machinery barrel down the highways (Route 34 is yards away from my front door), The roads get wet with liquid manure, it dries and with the heavy traffic, becomes a fine dust that enters our home, our barn, our cars, and our lungs. Mowing the lawn, tending to our few animals or trying to garden is usually a “noxious affair”, after which we are sometimes sick with respiratory illnesses, headaches and even dizziness and nausea. This year, we couldn’t put up Christmas lights or decorations for the winter holidays because we couldn’t stay outside in the smell long enough to put up the lights.

In my opinion, the unnatural environment that the dairy creates has created an unnatural number of mosquitoes and flies.

Mosquito swarms seem to be a growing problem in our fields, yard and gardens. Could it be that the swarms of mosquitoes are coming from the thousands of tires that cover the silage bunkers kitty-cornered from our property? For the rest of the residents in Cayuga County, a fine of $35.00 per tire is levied if we have tires on our properties. That is because the County Health Department believes that tires lying around are breeding grounds for mosquitoes that carry West Nile Virus! Maybe those farm-exempt tires are marked somehow so the mosquitoes won’t breed there.

Swarming flies are also in abundance where we live. Even if the smell doesn’t get us if we try to BB-Q, the flies will swarm our food and us on a really busy spreading day. This type of swarming in excess is being sighted all around rural America where CAFOs proliferate.

One of the most disappointing aspects of living here is seeing the creeks, brooks and wetlands disappear.

Expanding numbers of livestock means expanded amounts of water consumed by my corporate neighbors. According to one management plan, each cow needs about 30 to 60 gallons of water a day. What that has meant for our communities is that wetlands are drained into large holding ponds, and small, once pristine brooks and creeks now are intermittently flowing, or diverted into holding ponds, or they are so contaminated with runoff that you can’t recognize them. Runoff of liquid wastes into our tributaries and sometimes directly into the Finger Lakes is common. I believe this runoff is inevitable because of the year round spreading and the volume of waste that needs to be gotten rid of by ever-expanding dairies. The marine life has suffered significantly with this violation and mismanagement of our precious natural resources. Currently, there is no mandatory testing of the waste from the CAFO’s in NY State before it is applied, so we have no idea what is ending up in our soil and water resources.

As a former educator, I believe that if you as professionals, educators and scientists alike, truly understand what is happening in the name of “advanced farming” in New York, you will take ethical and appropriate actions to rectify the policies and the lack of enforcement that allows these factory farms to assault every aspect of the lives of the rural peoples of New York State. The people of this region of New York have a strong heritage of political and social courage. This area was the center of the Women’s Rights Movement, an integral part of the Underground Railroad, and was the seed of strong religious movements. This heritage is reflected in the spirit of the real farmers and residents who are now mobilized and taking whatever actions they can to save our rural society and defend our Constitutional rights to protect our properties. Sustainable agriculture has a long, proud history of economic success, environmental stewardship,
conservation of natural resources and quality food production. We need your support.

The American Public Health Association has already asked for a moratorium on the building of all new CAFO’s until the empirical and anecdotal evidence can be considered. They have concluded, based on the research already reported, that there seem to be health risks to the workers on CAFO’s and to the residents of rural communities surrounding the CAFO’s.

I am here today to implore you, as Water and Soil Conservationists, to support that moratorium, and based on the very credible research already established, to take this a step further, and

CALL FOR A MORATORIUM ON ALL EXPANSION OF EXISTING FACTORY FARMS UNTIL THE EPA, DEC AND STATE AND COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENTS CAN MAN THEMSELVES WITH ENOUGH PERSONNEL AND ENFORCEABLE REGULATIONS TO ENSURE THE HALT TO THE DESECRATION OF NEW YORK’S NATURAL RESOURCES AND THE HEALTH OF ITS RURAL SOCIETY.

Big corporate mega dairies are swallowing up our family farms. Some of these farms are aggressively pursuing some of my neighboring farmer’s lands, to increase their size. 

Farm Wives United
POB 165
North Java, NY 14113
http://www.farmwivesunited.org

Testimony for P A Dairy Crisis Hearing @ Keystone College 11/17/03

My fiance and I are dairy fanners from Cayuga County, which is in the Finger Lakes region of Central New York. We both come from long lines of family farmers.

I have been asked to come speak here today to tell you about what I see happening in my county.

Fanners in general tend not to talk about their problems, lest you be considered a poor fanner or bad businessperson. This is just not true any more.

Who else in this country is expected to make a living, pay taxes, and raise a family on the wages they earned 25 years ago? Our veterinarians, dentists, carpenters, and even our garbage haulers seem to be entitled to a cost of living increase. Why not farmers?

In my own home county of picturesque rolling hills and beautiful lakes, we are seeing a change-taking place. And it scares me.

Big corporate mega dairies are swallowing up our family farms. Some of these farms are aggressively pursuing some of my neighboring farmer’s lands, to increase their size.

Two examples I can give you:
One is of a smaller dairy fanner whose lands adjoin a 3000+-head CAFO operation. This dairy farmer told me that on several occasions the CAFO owner has come into the smaller farmer’s barn seeking to buy him out. His last visit was to ask him “How much longer do you think you are going to be able to stay in business? Because I want your land?
Another example is of a CAFO owner suing a neighboring crop farmer for some of his farmland. This lawsuit is costing the smaller crop farmer thousands of dollars in legal fees. The CAFO owner’s intent appears to be forcing the crop farmer into bankruptcy.

Recently six of the largest dairy farms in our county were awarded $2.8 million dollars in taxpayers’ money just to study their manure problems. I do not want my tax money going to support this type of “Farmer’s Help”. What do you think that this money would do for the many other farmers who are currently doing a good job with their manure?

These larger farms have banded together and collectively bargained for bigger milk prices and lower hauling fees than their smaller farm neighbors are entitled to, even though the milk may go to the same plant for processing.

These farms have paid financial advisors who aggressively pursue as much subsidy and grant money as they can get. And they also hire professional public relation firms to project them in a favorable light.

I am definitely not against subsidies and grants to help farmers. However, I feel that the farmers that the American consumers want to see producing their food, and the ones that truly need the help just are not getting it.
I have also heard that some of the large dairy farmers in our area are lobbying our senators, telling them that the farmers in our county need money to pay for new housing for their workers. New Housing? We went without a furnace last winter in our farmhouse because of low milk prices. And we still don’t have the money to pay for one.

I have thought many times of quitting farming, and if I could have talked my fiancée into it, we would be out already. Not because I don’t love what we do, but because of the stress level that lower milk prices than the cost of production incurs upon us. However, he has refused to quit. And a quote that was often said of his father, who was a Navy pilot at the end of World War II, a Cornell graduate, and a prosperous dairy farmer. “You can tell a Dutch, but you can’t tell him much”.

So I started to investigate, read and educate myself on why we aren’t getting more money for our milk. And, what I have found out about what is going on behind our backs by some big co-ops and corporations that claim to speak in the name of the farmer has disgusted me. Some of which you will hear testimony on today.

I also see that part of our own land grant universities are perpetuating the decline in family farms. And also destroying our rural communities.
The Co-ops, land grants, and big business all have power to speak on the behalf of large farms. Who has the power to return to the public what they want? A family sized dairy farm. There is a real problem with the imbalance of power.
What I have learned so far has made me very angry, and I don’t want to quit anymore. It’s one thing to quit farming as a personnel choice, but it is entirely different to be forced out. I want to stand up and be heard.

Thank you

A Cayuga County Farmer
Farm Wives United