Is it profiling?
By Mike Masterson
Posted: March 4, 2014 at 2:26 a.m.

Questions for candidates
In the ongoing campaign for governor between Republican Asa Hutchinson and Democrat Mike Ross, I believe each candidate during their statewide campaign stops should be asked some simple yet hardball questions about the state’s wrongheaded permitting of that hog factory in our treasured Buffalo National River watershed. Below are six I feel they each should answer honestly rather than in typical political doublespeak.
In fact, they are welcome to respond in this space at my email address and I will gladly tell the state.
What legislation would you support to protect our land and rivers in karst areas of north Arkansas from factory hog farms?
What’s your specific position on the role of the state Pollution Control and Ecology Commission, the Department of Environmental Quality, and the governor’s office toward adequately protecting Arkansas’ precious groundwater and surface waters from agricultural pollution?
Which is more significant to you, protecting the business of the Cargill-sponsored hog factory or the state’s tourism business of the Buffalo River?
What would you specifically do to resolve the ongoing matter of this hog factory versus the pollution of the Buffalo River?
Would you take whatever actions are necessary to reinstate the moratorium on factory hog farms in the state’s ultra-sensitive karst regions, in particular, for the Buffalo National River watershed?
Would you appoint members to the Pollution Control and Ecology Commission with ties to the agricultural industry, or those with scientific/ environmental backgrounds?