Recently, the Progressive Agriculture Organization (Pro Ag) and the Pennsylvania Farmers Union (PFU) held a dairy rally at the Roseville Grange in Brookville, Pa. (Jefferson County).

It was rewarding to witness two organizations standing side by side for the benefit of all dairy farmers. My husband and I have been members of PFU for many years and we are very aware of the legislative work they have done in Harrisburg, Pa.

I had heard some about Pro Ag, but I knew very little about their policies or things they have done. I met the manager of Pro Ag when I was in Washington, D.C., with the Farmers Union this past September. I was very impressed with his concern and dedication for all dairy farmers.

He explained S-1645 (commonly known as the Specter-Casey Bill) to me and I soon became a strong advocate for the bill.

I decided that a dairy rally was needed in Jefferson County. Our area is very aware of the critical problems facing all dairy farmers, but we are very much in the dark regarding workable solutions to the crisis.

Arden Tewksbury from Pro Ag gave a very interesting in-depth explanation of S-1645. His presentation was something our area needed.

S-1645 does adopt a new pricing formula for milk based on the dairy farmers cost of production. The bill also contains a very workable and understandable milk supply-management program.

Also, the bothersome imports of casein and milk protein concentrates are addressed. Larry Breech, president of PFU, was present and indicated PFU’s support for S-1645.

Breech also indicated that the entire board of directors of the National Farmers Union had voted to support the bill. It was obvious that nearly everyone at the meeting was supporting S-1645.

As I said earlier, our area appeared to be immune from this type of information. Yup, everyone knew the problems, but we were not aware of the solutions. Now we are. Yes, we are strongly behind S-1645. Several farmers spoke at the meeting acknowledging how critical this crisis was on their farms.

Peter Winkley, staff member of Congressman Glenn Thompson, spoke about the activities the congressman had supported for dairy farmers. Earlier in the morning my husband and I joined Tewksbury for breakfast with Congressman Thompson. We are counting on him to support the bill when it is introduced in the House of Representatives.

My husband and I are members of the Holstein Association. However, their proposal (not a bill), falls way short of the needs of dairy farmers. I would urge the Holstein people to set aside their proposal and throw their support behind S-1645. Thank you.

Rita Shaffer

Brookville, Pa.

I am very disturbed at your “poll” this week regarding whether or not Issue 2 will improve livestock treatment in Ohio. You could, at the very least, have a choice that indicates people think that livestock treatment is, and has been, overwhelmingly humane in Ohio.

Your choices indicate that all animals have been raised inhumanely on our farms, leading one to speculate that you are siding with these animal rights terrorists. Please consider all opinions, even when doing a simple poll.

Also, I would like you to consider questioning people who write in regarding abuse of our farm animals and have them state: 1.) Who is doing this; 2.) Where and when the abuse took place; 3.) What they — themselves had seen with their own eyes (no hearsay) and 4.) Why they thought that particular episode was abusive.

We farmers have a right to know who is accusing us of abuse, and have a right to defend our actions.

I am certain that the vast majority of abuse claims are completely unfounded by people who have never stepped foot on a farm and the public should be shown this fact.

Colleen Michaels

Matamoras, Ohio

A big “thank you” for the support and endorsement of passing State Issue 2.

This issue was supported by small farmers, large farmers and non-farmers, organic, non-organic, grain, livestock, fruit and vegetable farmers, plus the nursery and landscaping industry, independents, democrats, republicans, and tea parties — across the board, we had support.

With the majority of Ohio citizens being three generations removed from agriculture, there was a great amount of educating required to make the voters aware of the details and to understand the issue — many of you helped with this, and your efforts paid off.

This is just the beginning of Ohio’s battle with “out of state activists” and we must continue to work together to prove to the citizens of Ohio, the passing of State Issue 2 will be a benefit to all of Ohio.

Ohioans should not be regulated by out of state interests — we will have our own Ohio Livestock Standards Board. State Issue 2 passed with 64-36 percent of Ohio votes.

A message from Bob Stallman, president of the American Farm Bureau said, “Ohio voters made a solid statement and acknowledged the role farmers play in caring for farm animals and providing a safe and quality food supply in the Buckeye State. Clearly, Ohio is blazing a new trail for other states to follow on the issue of livestock care and well-being. It is clear voters in the state know farmers share their values regarding the care of animals.”

We will need your continued help and support to continue with our mission of helping the agriculture industry survive in Ohio.

Pearle Burlingame

Canfield, Ohio

(The author is organization director of the Mahoning County Farm Bureau.)

When you find yourself in a hole the first thing to do is stop digging.

The hole here is caused by a faulty applied pollution test EPA used to implement the CWA and the digging deeper is EPA’s resistance to correct this test, which presently ignores all the pollution caused by nitrogenous (urine and protein) waste.

This waste not only exerts an oxygen demand (like fecal waste), but also is a fertilizer for algae.

Furthermore, this incorrect application also makes it impossible to evaluate the real treatment performances and effluent waste loadings of sewage treatment plants, by themselves already enough reasons to correct this test.

This nitrogenous waste contributes to eutrophication, resulting in dead zones and while EPA blames farmers for excessive fertilizer usage and runoffs, it ignores all the fertilizer used to grow food ending up in municipal sewage, where it is not required to be treated.

Let’s get out of this hole and apply the test correctly and when that is done many solutions are not only possible, but also economically feasible OR are we going to blame farmers also for the world’s overpopulation, because they are growing food?

Peter Maier

Stansbury Park, Utah

The Columbiana County Health Department Cancer Detection Clinic Levy is going to appear on the ballot Nov. 3.

This .2 mill replacement levy is fully endorsed by the American Cancer Society Advisory Board of Columbiana County. We hope voters will decide to help in the mission to reduce cancer incidence and mortality.

This ballot levy will provide a number of different cancer screenings. The American Cancer Society has concrete evidence that screenings can detect cancer at an early stage and treatment is much more successful.

We fully support this levy.

Bryon Anzevino

Canfield, Ohio

I want to urge everyone to vote yes for Issue 2. It’s a shame that laws need to be created to protect us from outside minority interests who want to do away with animal agriculture.

So why not have someone who knows about agriculture help review the current standards and update them with any needed changes?

I have heard from many people about their concerns on how the board will work. From the legislators I have talked with, they say the board will be structured much like the other boards that are already formed under the state constitution.

Each board member would have a three-year term. The beginning terms would be staggered. This would not be a salary position, but a voluntary one reimbursed for expenses.

This way, when a new governor is elected there will not be a total change in the board right away. The expert people that are chosen for the board will most likely be recommended by industry leaders such as the pork, dairy and poultry producers.

Corn and soybean growers are among some of the others that may also have input. They will have to be approved by the legislators.

This is not a certainty, the ballot issue allows the General Assembly to enact laws that it deems necessary to carry out the purpose of Issue 2.

Other states are looking at what we do here in Ohio with Issue 2. We will be the first state to stand up against the minority interests. When Issue 2 passes, they will try to model their state programs after ours.

Let’s set the standard for the nation by voting yes on Issue 2.

Doug Martig

Berlin Center

Voters will decide whether or not to amend Ohio’s Constitution for the purpose of creating a 13-member Livestock Care Standards Board that will essentially govern every aspect of Ohio’s agriculture community where livestock is concerned.

I must admit that having not been engaged actively in farming for some years, I really didn’t pay too much attention to this issue.

With so many good folks behind this ballot initiative, my position in this matter is difficult, but as always, I believe all Americans who cherish freedom need to stand in the gap whether in a big way or small way and often even at their own personal consequence.

The creation of this board would shift responsibility from individuals to government. Not only is that an eroding of our liberties but who can say government always does or knows best?

At a time when government’s size, scope and intervention in our lives should be getting smaller, this proposal moves to enlarge it.

Bigger government at any level is a tenant of socialism. This bill will give a “new” board authority along with expanded authority to the governor, the legislature and to the leader of each chamber.

With this expansion comes costs, regulations and greater intervention by government in the lives of Ohioans. Does this make sense in an era when state budget deficits already approach $1 billion?

This ballot initiative is being toted as necessary to supposedly “thwart” efforts by PETA and the National Humane Society from gaining a foothold in our state. It is widely published that passage of this amendment will in no way keep these organizations from bringing ballot measures in the future and that they intend to do so.

While these organizations are indeed bad for Ohio to say that we should give away “inches” of our freedom and liberties in order to prevent them from taking “miles” of it is a dangerous position at best.

Further, in reality, what Issue 2 would do is to give them the proverbial camel’s nose in the tent. This amendment may actually make it easier for these organizations to shape policy in Ohio — instead of having to convince a majority of Ohioans to vote for a ballot initiative they propose, they would simply have to gain the majority of an audience of 13 to shape Ohio livestock policy.

In any event, when the only reason you are voting for something is out of fear, it probably isn’t good policy to begin with. I would remind you that it is not the first time these groups have been at work.

In 1998, there was a ballot initiative to ban certain hunting in Ohio. Against seemingly impossible odds, the Division of Wildlife and others made their case to voters and those measures were soundly defeated.

What would have happened if instead we would have said “OK, you can take our right to hunt these animals in exchange for leaving us alone to hunt the rest?” The entire fundamental right of hunting and wisdom of sound wildlife management would have been laid in ruin.

That being said, I must vote NO on Issue 2.

David Nally

Issue 2 — What does it do? A lot of us really don’t know. Maybe no on really knows.

The hope is it will keep animal rights legislation from changing farming in Ohio, thereby securing present methods and costs. The biggest threat such legislation can produce is the loss of yet another American industry.

We enacted laws that made it easy for foreign competition to take our industry from this country and move industrial production to China and other foreign countries. The promoters hailed a cleaner environment and safer workplace, but the sting of lost jobs is haunting America.

What we really need is a national policy that stops animal rights legislation from sending yet another industry to foreign countries — not another state-by-state “knee jerk” reaction.

Those who wish to buy meat and eggs from animals cared for in a special way should and do have the right to do so. Yes, those who treat animals poorly should be stopped and to the best of my knowledge, we already have laws to curb such violators.

Laws that mandate a particular type of animal husbandry should be found unconstitutional.

While I am not opposed to Issue 2, I am opposed to making yet another Constitutional amendment. Perhaps we should stop amending the Constitution before we lose sight of its original purpose.

Kim Edwards
Sunbury, Ohio

I recently attended a meeting where a representative of the Farm Bureau made a 20-minute Power Point presentation arguing that without Issue 2, Ohio agriculture will be threatened by outside animal rights activists that will put thousands of Ohio family farmers out of business.

What he didn’t say was Issue 2 is a Constitutional amendment that establishes a livestock care board appointed by the governor to codify animal treatment on farms.

He also failed to say that the governor, Ohio Department of Agriculture and the legislature already have all the power they need to make regulations about how animals are treated on farms.

The problem is a legislative process requires citizen input and public hearings. A board appointed through a Constitutional amendment has no such public oversight.

Why a Constitutional amendment? People are beginning to learn about treatment practices of growing animals for human consumption that are unnecessarily cruel and produce animal products that can be unsafe to eat.

The Humane Society of the United States has proposed legislation in some states that phase out three of these practices: gestation crates for sows, fattening stalls for veal, and chicken cages so small they cannot open their wings.

Rather than opening a discussion to educate us about the “safety and efficiency” of industrial farm methods, agribusiness is taking a pre-emptive measure (cloaking it in the words of “family farms” and “local food”) to protect their industrial methods.

The gentleman from the Farm Bureau even went so far as to say that caged birds are actually better off than free-range birds because they are protected from predators, dirt and disease.

This is the kind of “expert” thinking that will be enshrined in this appointed panel to regulate how animals can be treated.

The Farm Bureau is spending millions to scare farmers into thinking this amendment will protect them from outside agitators who plan to come to Ohio and make us all become vegans.

Fortunately, those of us who want choice to buy meat that has been raised humanely are now organizing to defeat this measure. There is a Web site — www.ohioact.org — with more information.

The Ohio Department of Agriculture has been promoting CAFOs since Director Daley invited the German factory farmer, Anton Pohlman, to set up Buckeye Eggs in the 1990s. Now, there are close to 200 CAFOs permitted through the Ohio EPA in our state.

Animal treatment in these kinds of facilities is only one of the issues. Pollution from waste lagoons, flies, antibiotic use, disease and many environmental disasters have been documented by the Centers for Disease Control.

Yet these are the kinds of facilities that produce our meat and the money to support the Issue 2 campaign. The Farm Bureau believes these kinds of farms are the future of farming in Ohio.

There can be a different future for farming in Ohio, but only if we are vigilant and aware of what we are up against as we try to rebuild a sustainable farming community.

Mary K. Holmes
Gates Mills, Ohio

There is no guaranteed seat for a production livestock producer. The board consists of 13 members: three family farmers, two veterinarians, one food safety expert, one representative of a local humane society, two members from statewide farm organizations, the dean of an Ohio agriculture college and two members representing Ohio consumers.

It does not specify that there be livestock family farmers, nor does it specify that the veterinarians be production livestock veterinarians. The intentions of the current governor may be to appoint production livestock farmers, but will a governor 10, 20 or 50 years from now do the same.

It gives the government more unchecked power. Giving this power to a small group of people could allow for regulations that may not meet the standards of the people.

If the board sways to far one way or the other, we could end up with a livestock system that totally disregards animal welfare, or if PETA or HSUS could grab control, they could ban animal agriculture and the sale of animal products in Ohio.

My biggest concern is that this could become more bad PR for animal agriculture and give PETA and HSUS more ammunition to fight with.

This will not stop a ballot initiative like California’s Proposition 2 which banned farrowing crates and layer cages in California.

An individual representing a group for Issue 2 said that “they would have to collect more signatures to propose an amendment to the Constitution, than to propose a law, therefore slowing there efforts.”

The fact is they will still run an amendment to the Constitution that will try to repeal this one and insert their own version of animal care. PETA and HSUS would have to get signatures of 10 percent of the electors on a petition to present an amendment to the electors.

They could still run a restrictive ballot issue like the one in California. This will not educate people about production livestock agriculture in Ohio.
The fact is, whether we pass this or not we will still have to face the problem of educating the people of Ohio on the facts of production animal agriculture.

The truth is, we will always be one election day away from losing animal agriculture in Ohio until we embrace the need to educate the people of the facts and benefits of animal agriculture.

We will not save animal agriculture with ballot initiatives — it will be saved by the decisions of consumers. Regardless of the outcome, Ohio farmers will continue to devote themselves to proper animal care that will lead to abundant, safe and efficient production of animal products to feed the world.

Brandon Lawwill
Bethel, Ohio