A bill working its way through the Missouri Senate, Senate Bill 391, would overturn a health ordinance passed several years ago by the Worth County Commission. It would prohibit counties from passing rules and regulations on any agricultural operations that are more stringent than regulations at the state level.
Currently, Worth County has one animal confinement operation near Irena. Several years ago, in response to another effort to put in a hog confinement operation south of Grant City, Worth County commissioners passed a massive health ordinance that imposed strict licensing requirements, required public hearings on such operations every year, and placed the Tri-County Health Department in charge of regulating them. The passage of the ordinance followed two raucous meetings in the Courtroom lobby in which both supporters and opponents of hog confinement operations argued over the ordinance.
About 25 years ago, a hog confinement company sought to locate a facility south of Sheridan and set up a public meeting to discuss the plan in the back of the Bank building. There were a lot of people present. About halfway through the presentation, the late Hale Sanders stood up and walked out of the presentation. The facility was never built. That, in part, was what prompted the City of Sheridan to dig two wells, one on the north end and one on the south end of town, to protect the city water supply against any possible manure runoff.
In 2010, at the Ketcham Center at North Central Missouri College in Trenton, what was billed as a public hearing for Premium Standard (now Smithfield) over a massive lawsuit that the state was filing against them turned into a gigantic pep rally for Premium Standard. Over 3,000 people filled the facility as speaker after speaker touted the economic benefits that the operation brought to the area. The operation was built after the area was gutted even more than usual by the Farm Crisis of the 1980’s. The state was seeking to enforce environmental laws that it said that Premium Standard was in breach of.
The Missouri Cattlemen’s Association is pushing Senate Bill 391 hard. Its president, Bobby Simpson, testified in favor of the legislation, saying the present policy does not provide regulatory certainty. He said in his testimony, “Counties should not have the power to put law-abiding people out of business. There are stringent laws, rules, and regulations rooted in sound science at the state level to ensure people, animals, the land, and its resources are protected.”
Other supporters say that the present policy keeps young people from taking up farming. Traves Merrick, a 5th generation farmer from Miller (MO) testified that the average age of a farmer is now almost 60, and less than five percent are under 35. He testified, “If we do not repopulate the land with the next generation, consumers will be paying more for food, and more of it will have to be imported.” As part of his trade war with China, President Donald Trump has imposed massive tariffs on Chinese goods.
Opponents cite environmental and water quality concerns. They also cite odor problems. While the hog facility just south of the Worth-Gentry County line was in operation, periodic winds would blow the odor north, and people could smell the odor as far north as Grant City. We can smell the odor from the hog operation between Sheridan and Bedford about once or twice a year; the late columnist Mickey Floyd, who lived farther away, west of town, swore he smelled the odor from the facility regularly.
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