Administrative Rules Subcommittee of the Arkansas Legislature, December 19, 2024, 9 am

Please click this link to Send an Email to the Arkansas Administrative Rules subcommittee to support a permanent moratorium on CAFOs in the Buffalo River Watershed and thorough public notification about CAFOs.   Please add your own comments (be civil!) and include your name and address.

*Note: If the link won't open on your computer, try with your phone. Some older computers or those without a default email app may have difficulty.

When BRWA was organized in 2013 we had two simple(!) goals: 1) to close the C&H hog CAFO and; 2) to secure a permanent moratorium prohibiting any future hog CAFOs in the Buffalo River watershed. We accomplished the first in 2019 with closure of C&H and the second is now within reach. The two  rules regarding the moratorium are scheduled to be discussed by the Administrative Rules subcommittee of the Arkansas legislature on December 19th. While both rules contain the moratorium language, we know that Arkansas Farm Bureau and others oppose a moratorium and are working hard to defeat it. BRWA board members will attend this meeting and will provide oral testimony to the subcommittee. Please help strengthen our comments by submitting your own through the link below.  

The agenda for this meeting includes discussion of both the Department of Energy and Environment's revised Regulation 6 as well as the Department of Agriculture's version of Regulation 5, now titled the Liquid Animal Waste Management Systems Rule.

Both of these regulations include provisions for a permanent moratorium on future swine CAFO permits in the Buffalo National River watershed. BRWA fully supports the moratorium language in both rules and we support Reg 6 in its entirety.

However, the proposed Reg 5 language proposes extremely weak public notice requirements with notice only required somewhere on the Ag Department's obscure web site. We urge the Rules subcommittee to reject Reg 5 and require further revision to public notice to match the language in Reg 6, which requires notice to neighboring landowners, signage at the CAFO site, publication in the local newspaper and notification log local authorities.

Please join us in urging members of the Rules subcommittee to approve Regulation 6 and reject Regulation 5.  

Thank you!