State Senate leaders want less regulation of corporate hog farms in North Carolina. Under their plan, hog farms will be exempted from new state pollution control rules. Meanwhile, the farms will also escape public scrutiny over what they dump in our water and air.
Between provisions in the Senate-passed version of the budget and the Farm Act (Senate Bill 315), senators are fighting for hog farms. This is a “coordinated and multi-pronged attack” on state pollution controls affecting the hog industry.
Among the assaults on public health are:
- Delaying the implementation on new state permitting rules. These rules would tighten pollution control requirements on hog operations in flood plains.
- Exempting an array of agriculture documents from public record requirements. These documents have been important to reporters covering hog pollution problems. Similarly, hog farm neighbors need access to these records. The documents have served as evidence in successful lawsuits to prove pollution damage.
- Exempting hog farms which use hog waste to generate burnable “biogas” from odor control rules.
- Weakening the long-standing state moratorium on waste lagoon and spray field systems. For instance, new or expanded farms using these hyper-polluting systems are currently banned. In short, the new attack would permit these systems to be more widely used.
Consequently, environmentalists have a lot to say about the delay on hog pollution controls.
North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) Secretary Michael Regan criticized the delay in new pollution rules.
“After a lengthy and transparent process involving discussions with numerous stakeholders from all walks of life and a review of more than 6,500 public comments, DEQ revised three permits to provide more certainty to farmers and communities. The Senate’s budget provision, unlike our permit process or even a proposed bill, lacks transparency and justification.”
NCLCV Director of Governmental Relations Dan Crawford is urging opposition to the Senate’s budget. He stated:
“We’ve waited too many years already for common-sense protections. We can’t afford any more polluter handouts while hog farms poison our most vulnerable citizens on a daily basis.”
Likewise, Valerie Baron, Staff Attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), added:
“The state Senate leadership is hellbent on playing games with North Carolinians’ water quality. Delaying implementation of the few overdue safeguards that would actually protect communities from polluted water and information about whether lagoons are leaking is deeply disturbing–and it has to end. North Carolinians deserve better.”
But these protests did not sway Senate leaders. Pro-environment senators made moves to prevent the delay of the new regulations, but they had their efforts blocked on the Senate floor last week. The Senate’s version of the budget is going to negotiations with the House. The House budget did not include the offending provision. Therefore, it is now up to our representatives to protect us from corporate hog farm pollution.
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