More Big Stinky Dairy Business Coming: An e-mail correspondent informs us that Riverview Farms of Morris, Minnesota, wants to build a 5,000-head concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO)... you know, like the operation that is stinking people out of house and home up by Thief River Falls. 5,000 cows (plus 4,000 heifers, say opponents) crowded onto 160 acres upstream from the wellheads of Milbank's water supply -- what could go wrong there? Opponents say CAFOs lower property values, hire few if any local workers, and increase costs for the county with heavy truck traffic tearing up county roads.
Meanwhile, Secretary of
Oil Pipelines A-Comin': Another landowner, James Bush up by Britton, has settled with TransCanada out of court. Pipeline should be coming soon to backyards in the Jim River Valley. TransCanada is also making the rounds out in West River to get folks ready for an even bigger pipeline. Folks at the informational meetings TransCanada has held in Buffalo, Faith, and Philip sound pretty keen on running 900,000 barrels a day of the dirtiest oil in the world through their backyards. Haakon County Commissioner Neal "Obie" Brunskill says the pipeline sounds like a "good deal... if things work out like they're saying."
Just remember, Obie: when something does go wrong with the pipeline, Big Oil's strategy is to offer little to nothing in compensation, then fight you in court until many of the people affected are broke or dead. It works for Exxon; it'll work for TransCanada.
Pine Ridge Radio Prefers Self-Sufficiency: Meanwhile, our Indian neighbors take the do-it-yourself approach to energy. KILI Radio just got the first large-scale wind turbine on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The 300-foot tower should save the radio station $12,000 a year in electric bills and maybe even bring them a little revenue as they sell excess power back to LaCreek Electric. And if they're getting the wind out in Porcupine that we're getting here at Lake Herman, KILI should sound extra loud today.
Joe Bartmann, Mowing Menace: Montrose blogger and visionary Joe Bartmann committed one of the cardinal sins of town living: he let some of his grass grow for three straight weeks. Funny thing is, no one complained. Joe found that letting the weeds grow taller actually made it easier to pull them out. The longer grass staved off the dandelions.
Joe reports that he usually mows long anyway, leaving it 3.5 to 4 inches long. "A little bit longer grass is better grass," says Joe: it has more leaf to catch the sun and dew, needs less chemicals, keeps the weeds down, and grows more evenly and slowly than crewcut lawns. Go figure!
Joe also reports first garden radishes of the season. Radish and butter sandwiches -- ah, the good life!
Enjoy your sandwich, Joe. And everybody -- get out and enjoy your backyard this weekend.
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Update 19:17: An alert reader catches my goof from this morning: Bill Even is the Secretary of Agriculture. Secretary of State Chris Nelson generally does not take official positions on feedlots and big dairy development.
The same alert reader offers his correction and more:
Bill Even is not Secretary of State, get your facts straight, he is Secretary of Agriculture.
You need to read and understand what is on the website before you start running your mouth. The immigration refers to farmers from other countries bringing their capitol here to make a living. Is that a bad thing? What is the problem with dairy farms, they produce milk that is processed in SD creating more jobs.
People like you need to move to CA or NY!!!!!
The reader apparently prefers foreign investors and immigrant labor to us locals. Sounds a lot like the dairy industry: they could make a lot more money if they just didn't have to put up with the people who actually live here.
CAFO's: I don't know if putting them next to a water source is that great of an idea. I know someone that has a pretty decent size cattle operation and does it stink! Especially by the hole they run all of the manure in. Yuk! These same people also used immigrant workers. I never thought about why, just assumed they were the only people that applied for the job. If you think about it, there are just as many unskilled people that are born and raised as their are unskilled immigrant workers. Not sure if they locals just don't want the job or what.
ReplyDeletePIPELINE: I think we should see how this first one works out before adding an even bigger one on the other side of the state. I do support the TransCanada line along with the refinery in Elk Point, but lets take one step at a time.
WIND: I think there should be wind turbines everywhere! It's clean energy and everyone knows how much wind this state has. Throw one in my back yard right now and I could light up the whole town!
MOWING: That's funny! I never thought of that. All of this time I have wasted time mowing and paying to have my lawn treated, all I really had to do was just let it grown. Not sure if I can sell my neighbors on this idea.
:-)
Congratulations, caheidelberger, on being the first one, as far as I know, to get the word out on the Internet to the public about the proposed Riverview Farms 5,000-cow dairy for Kilborn Township, Grant County, South Dakota, which would sell milk to Valley Queen Cheese Factory, Inc., of Milbank. Kilborn Township has a resistance group called Concerned Citizens of Grant County. Personally, I might have named it C.A.F.O. S.N.A.F.U. If anybody wants information about the situation, you may contact me.
ReplyDeleteHere is what is going on in Grant County. The Riverview Farms permit request is supposed to be publicly discussed on the August commissioners meeting. However, there is to soon be a public hearing to discuss making Grant County's CAFO 1/2-mile setback a longer distance. Kilborn Township's battle is getting more publicity in the local weekly newspaper and on the local radio station and in the Watertown Public Opinion.
ReplyDeleteWe need to stop the CAFO's Please get the word out to everyone we must put up defenses now!!! I beg all townships look at your zoning laws and stop these things before they even start.
ReplyDeletePlease all who read this site write to your papers and local goverments get this rolling to say NO we dont want your CAFO's in South Dakota.
Please also look into how we can stop this that has started in Kilborn Township.
Can anyone tell me has this dairy actual bought the land??
Thank you,
Thank you
As far as I know, Riverview Farms has purchased an option to buy the land.
ReplyDeleteThe Grant County Planning and Zoning Board will hold a public hearing to consider the dairy permit request on August 13.
The public hearing to discuss making Grant County's CAFO 1/2-mile setback a longer distance should be sooner than that, perhaps on about July 21.
We would like for the law to be that the bigger the CAFO is, the longer distance the setback is.
We were told at the Tuesday July 8 Grant County commissioners meeting that the public hearing about CAFO setbacks could be held after a 10-day period after the Wednesday July 9 Planning and Zoning Commission meeting including 2 public notices about it in the Wednesday weekly county newspaper, which would put the meeting somewhere in the end of July, you would think. The Wednesday weekly county newspaper assumed as much. Today I heard that the public hearing about CAFO setbacks will be held no earlier than August 6 or 7.
ReplyDeleteIdeally, Grant County commissioners would issue no new CAFO permits ever again so as to help level the playing field for family farms.
First of all, you have a huge misconception about CAFO's. Your use of Excel Dairy "stinking residents out of their homes" is judging a large batch of eggs by just pulling out one and finding blood. If you would research the dairies currently managed by Riverview Farms, you would find that they run with very few odors. The dairy proposed for your township would boost your local economy and would not "push out" family farms. In fact, it will give local farmers more options to market their crops and to purchase cheap fertilizer.
ReplyDelete