How Corporate Agribusiness Is Quietly Seizing The Heartland with ‘Right To Farm’ Laws

[RiverLover]

How Corporate Agribusiness Is Quietly Seizing The Heartland with ‘Right To Farm’ Laws
3/26/15



Corporate agribusinesses have managed to convince voters across the Midwest to approve vaguely-worded measures that could have wide ranging impacts, from preventing environmental legislation against factory farms to allowing animal mistreatment in slaughterhouses. These right-to-farm laws are gaining traction in big ag states across the country, but opponents say they are nothing more than a continued “power grab” by corporate agribusinesses.

Oklahoma lawmakers advanced a bill last week which would put a right-to-farm measure on the ballot for voters to decide on in 2016. The Missouri Supreme Court is weighing a lawsuit challenging the state’s right-to-farm constitutional amendment, which voters narrowly approved last year.

A similar measure was killed in the Indiana Senate last month.

The vague language in right-to-farm amendments can prevent states or localities from regulating any number of issues, from pollution, pesticide use, or animal abuse, no matter how much evidence there may be that a certain practice or company is harming the environment. It also makes it much harder to stop factory farms from poisoning water or air quality with noxious animal waste, or even keep track of repeat offenders.

...“Why wouldn’t you support right-to-farm? Especially in the heartland, we have such a great history of farming and it sounds perfectly harmless,” Adam Mason, state policy director for the Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement which has been fighting similar measures in Iowa, told ThinkProgress. “We see this as another power grab by the corporate ag industry....

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2015/03/26/3638977/right-to-farm-midwest/

[mopinko]

1. i've seen this article going around, and i'm confused. all the states already have

right to farm laws. except michigan, which recently repealed theirs.
these are very old laws.

[RiverLover]

3. I think the article is just trying to raise awareness, not claim it happened yesterday.

Like it says, most people have no clue.

[Snarkoleptic]

2. Michigan has such laws and many average citizens have a narrow view sold to them.

The simplistic version that's peddled is in the form of a scenario where a subdivision pops up at the edge of a farmers land and the nascent residents fight to shut down the ag. operation due to smells, noise, dust, chemical drift, etc. I would think that most people who move near a farm know there are externalities they can't control.

Real estate appraisals have a section "external obsolescence", which roughly breaks down the decrease in value that's caused by being near an airport, hog farm, railroad hub, etc., so people are paying less by accepting a location near such a facility.

All of this horse sense goes out the window, however, when a large factory farm outfit decides to put a feedlot on old farmer Jone's property. I view North Carolina as the worst case scenario, with the high density hog farms, liquid waste lagoons and polluted groundwater.

**Updated to recognize Mopinko's comment that the Michigan law appears to have been repealed**

[mopinko]

4. they also peddled it

as dealing w some white trash w a yard full of chickens next to your mcmansion.
urban farmers take a ton of grief just because we exist.