CCI To Rock DNR's EPC Meeting Tuesday
TIME FOR SOME ACTION! Bus-load of CCI Members To Stand Up For Clean Water During Tuesday’s EPC Meeting
Members have ordered a bus to accommodate the large number of people from across Iowa scheduled to drive into Des Moines February 17 for a Clean Water Day of Action starting at 10:30am at the monthly Environmental Protection Commission Meeting (EPC) held at the Iowa Department of Natural Resources’ (DNR’s) Air Quality Control building, 7900 Hickman Road.
Members say they will present case studies of factory farm pollution across Iowa that is not being addressed by the DNR and will demand:
Factory farm inspections that fix problems, prevent spills, and result in permits;
Clean Water Act permits for every factory farm so they are forced to play by stronger rules or get shut down with a “three strikes and you’re out” policy;
Stiff fines and penalties large enough to deter illegal pollution.
Members believe that Governor Branstad and his DNR Director Chuck Gipp are still not enforcing the Clean Water Act against factory farm polluters, even six months after a work plan agreement was signed between the state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to bring Iowa into compliance with federal law.
“It’s time for some action, DNR,” said Larry Ginter, a member and independent family farmer from Rhodes, Iowa. “We need inspections that find problems and prevent pollution and Clean Water Act permits for every factory farm that include a three-strikes-and-you're-out rule so these factory farms are either forced to play by stronger rules or shut down.”
At least 76 manure spills were reported to the DNR in 2013, and that doesn’t include 11 emergency exemptions to apply liquid manure on snow and frozen-covered ground the DNR has approved this winter that will almost certainly result in runoff and water pollution once temperatures rise.
Members will also call out five of the eight EPC commissioners for their ties to the corporate factory farm industry. According to public documents on file with the DNR, EPC Commissioner:
Gene Ver Steeg owns confinements housing 20,000 corporate hogs and had a manure spill last fall
Brent Rastetter owns two confinements housing 9,200 corporate hogs and is the CEO of Quality Ag Builders Inc, a company that builds factory farm confinements and manure pits
Max Smith owns a hog gestation factory farm that houses 4,117 corporate hogs
Nancy Couser owns feedlots and confinements housing 5,200 cattle
Cindy Greiman with her husband owns feedlots and confinements housing 3,794 cattle
EPC commissioners are appointed by the governor.
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