By Benjamin Hardy
ArkTimes
For over three years now, a fight has raged over C&H Hog Farm, a large concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) in Mt. Judea that houses some 6,500 swine near Big Creek, a tributary of the Buffalo National River. Environmentalists have long feared that liquid hog waste — which the farm spreads on its surrounding acreage — would seep into the region's porous geology and find its way into the beloved river. Last August, the Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission enacted a five-year moratorium on new large-scale factory hog farms in the Buffalo watershed with the backing of Governor Hutchinson and the legislature. The ban did not affect existing permits, such as the one held by C&H.
But a facility near Deer (Newton County) called EC Farms may have found a loophole that will allow it to serve as a disposal site for up to 6.7 million gallons of liquid hog waste annually.
EC Farms is owned by Ellis Campbell, a cousin of C&H owners Richard and Phillip Campbell. Until this year, it held a permit for a relatively small hog-farming operation — about 300 animals — but the farm seems to have been closed since 2013. The permit, however, remained active. This summer, EC Farms applied for a permit modification (rather than a new permit) that would allow it to "land farm" hog waste originating with another facility — specifically, C&H. When the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality granted the modification in July, the state environmental regulator gave the go-ahead to EC Farms to spread millions of gallons of pig manure on its property each year.
ADEQ's decision to grant the modification attracted critical public comments from defenders of the Buffalo River, and three area residents — Carol Bitting, Lin Wellford and Dr. Nancy Haller, who call themselves "The Three Grandmothers" — petitioned for an appeal. At a Nov. 16 hearing at ADEQ headquarters in North Little Rock, PC&E Commission administrative judge Charlie Moulton heard arguments over whether the permit should stand. The room was packed.
"I can say unequivocally this is the most well-attended motion hearing I've ever had," Moulton said.
Attorney Richard Mays represented the three petitioners. He told Moulton that the modified permit is "a roundabout way for C&H farms to avoid getting a permit to distribute this waste. The amount of this waste is the critical issue. You've got a 6,000-animal operation ... [generating] millions of gallons of waste." After the hearing, Mays said he believed C&H's own on-site waste storage and disposal capacity was nearing its limit and so the farm needed to find a place to dump the excess.
Tracy Rothermel, general counsel for the ADEQ director's office, argued that the appeal should be dismissed, citing problems with how the petitioners worded their appeal and saying they failed to outline their full legal and factual objections. Bill Waddell, an attorney for EC Farms owner Ellis Campbell, agreed with ADEQ.
Lin Wellford said she and the others didn't realize they needed a lawyer when they first petitioned. (Mays only began representing them after the fact.) She told a reporter that the EC Farms permit modification was "choreographed to get around the moratorium" on new CAFOs in the Buffalo watershed. Wellford questioned why ADEQ, the state's environmental regulator, was using taxpayer dollars to defend EC Farms while "the Buffalo River is being allowed to be degraded."
Wellford noted in her appeal that allowing C&H to use other fields for its pig waste will skew the validity of the University of Arkansas's monitoring efforts of pollution on Big Creek. She said the runoff from EC will also impact Shop Creek and the Little Buffalo, adding. "This is seven more miles of this National River being imperiled, all to allow one hog CAFO to operate."
"This [river] is supposed to exist as a resource for my grandchildren and your grandchildren," Wellford said.
Waddell, the counsel for EC Farms, told the judge that his client "has tried to comply with the regulations in asking for a permit. He's not asking for any favoritism."
Moulton found much fault with the petitioners' complaints and agreed with Rothermel. But he also questioned whether ADEQ had the authority to convert EC Farms' hog-farming permit into a new permit.
"You're basically converting one type of facility to another ... a sow facility to a land farming facility," he said. "[Those are] two different types of permits, isn't that what happened?"
Rothermel said the permit simply "evolved." She told Moulton that "it isn't really a new permit. ... Aspects were removed from the permit, and then updated aspects were added." However, Moulton pointed out that ADEQ's regulations identify two different types of permits that operate under two different regulations. "That's not my language. That's the department's language," he said.
Moulton said he needed both parties to deliver briefs on the issue by Tuesday, Nov. 29. If another hearing is necessary, it will be held Dec. 5 or 6 at 9 a.m., the judge said.*
*The print edition of this article mistakenly stated the next hearing date as Nov. 29.
Arkansasonline
By Emily Walkenhorst
The Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality on Dec. 1 will receive the results of a drilling study conducted at C&H Hog Farms in Mount Judea, the department said Wednesday.
The department also will host the researchers for a public presentation at 1 p.m. that day at the agency's 5301 Northshore Drive headquarters in North Little Rock.
After the presentation, the department will post the report on its website at www.adeq.state.ar.us/water/bbri/c-and-h/drilling.aspx, along with field notes, photographs and videos taken by Harbor Environmental -- the contractor hired for the project.
Researchers conducted the drilling project to detect whether one of the manure ponds had been leaking. The drilling project came about after the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance raised concerns about electroresistivity imaging research at C&H Hog Farms, which the group obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.
Harbor Environmental of Little Rock was hired to design the project for $75,000 and selected Cascade Drilling of Memphis as the subcontractor to carry out the drilling.
C&H's owners have allowed research to be conducted on-site for years and maintain that the farm doesn't have any problems with hog manure leaking.
C&H, near Mount Judea in Newton County, sits on Big Creek about 6 miles from where it converges with the Buffalo River. It is the only federally classified large hog farm in the river's watershed and is permitted to house up to 6,000 piglets and 2,503 sows.
The Buffalo River had 1.46 million visitors last year, the third-highest total since it became a national river and the highest since a record count of 1.55 million in 2009.
"We look forward to receiving the results of the drilling study," department Director Becky Keogh said in a statement. "We have invited Harbor to present its findings in a public venue so all interested parties will receive the data and report at the same time. I am pleased that the report has been completed a month ahead of schedule, while conforming to rigorous quality controls and assurances" that are essential to such a review.
Gordon Watkins, president of the Buffalo River Watershed Alliance, said he was glad representatives from Harbor would be available to answer questions.
"We'll be anxious to see that data and what it says," he said.
Metro on 11/24/2016
Print Headline: Hog-farm data's release date set
Arkansas Times
Posted: November 17, 2016 at 5:45 a.m.
An administrative law judge will decide on a motion to dismiss or a motion for summary judgment on an appeal of an environmental permit modification that would allow a farmer to spread up to 6.7 million gallons of hog manure on his property in the Buffalo River watershed.
At the hearing on the motions Wednesday, about 50 people watched quietly in what Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission Administrative Law Judge Charles Moulton called the "most well-attended motion hearing I've ever held" in his more than 30 years of experience.
The hearing touched on a contentious issue in recent years for people who support the Buffalo National River: the balance between large animal agriculture and protection of the river, or whether a balance can be achieved at all.
The farmer in question Wednesday was Ellis Campbell, a cousin of Richard and Phillip Campbell of C&H Hog Farms in Mount Judea. Ellis Campbell, owner of EC Farms, applied to have his environmental permit modified to allow him to apply hog manure that comes from his cousins' farm onto his land. C&H has been accused of posing a pollution risk to the river because of its federally classified "large" size, although state-funded researchers are still monitoring the farm to see if it has polluted at all, and have so far released no definite finding.
At the hearing, Bill Waddell, attorney for Campbell, and Tracy Rothermel and Basil Hicks of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality asked Moulton to dismiss the appeal by three Arkansans of a permit modification issued to Campbell by the department that allows him to spread hog manure on his land. They argued the permit had been approved according to regulations and that the petitions of appeal did not clearly state their factual basis for objecting to the permit's modifications or properly reference public comments. Without clearer objections, Waddell argued, further hearings would be challenging for the appellees.
"If they're going to do something more than they list, then that's clearly off limits because we can't guess as to what we're going to be defending here," Waddell said.
Richard Mays, attorney for the three women who appealed the permit modifications, argued that the modifications allowing for manure application were "tantamount" to adding another hog farm in the watershed, which would be prohibited under a 5-year moratorium on medium or large hog farms in the watershed.
"It's a way of getting around the regulation, that's what it is," Mays said.
In a hearing that lasted more than two hours, Moulton told Mays that he wasn't sure that concern or other concerns Mays mentioned had been specifically outlined in the petitions as required by law. But Moulton said one of Mays' clients, Carol Bitting, made a legitimate case that Campbell should have applied for a new permit instead of seeking a modification to his existing permit, which was for the operation of a small hog farm.
Regulation 5, section 5.601 of the Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission's environmental regulations states that a "separate permit may be issued for a land application site if the operator submits an application" meeting certain criteria. Moulton said the Regulation 5, titled "Liquid Animal Waste Management Systems," appears to offer two different permits under its umbrella: one for a hog farm and another for land application. Land application refers to the applying of substances such as manure to the ground.
Campbell's active permit at the time he requested to have it modified allowed for him to have 300 sows on his property and to apply their manure on his land. But Moulton wondered if Regulation 5, section 5.601 required him to submit a new application if he was no longer operating a farm and was only accepting waste from his cousin's operation in another part of the county.
Rothermel argued that a new permit wasn't required because hog manure was already allowed under the previous version of the permit.
"It's not being permitted for anything new," she said.
Further, Waddell argued, Regulation 5, section 5.601 uses the word "may" rather than "shall," meaning a separate permit wouldn't be required.
Bitting argued in her public comment on the modification that "a separate permit must be obtained for waste application only." Bitting then referenced Regulation 5, section 5.601 in her appeal.
Moulton asked the parties' attorneys to submit briefs by Nov. 29 on whether EC Farms should have applied for a new permit. Moulton said he would try to rule on other aspects of the parties' motions before then.
Ellis Campbell first received a permit for a small hog farm and the application of those hogs' manure on his land in Newton County in 1998, according to Department of Environmental Quality records.
In 2013, he ceased operations at what was then called C&C Hog Barn, but his permit was still active and paid for and had not expired. In 2015, he applied to modify the permit to allow for the application of C&H Farms' hog manure.
This summer, Bitting, Nancy Haller, Lin Wellford and the National Park Service appealed the approval of the permit modification. Bitting and Haller live in Newton County, and Wellford lives in Carroll County. The National Park Service eventually requested to withdraw from its appeal after being unable to obtain legal counsel, according to an Aug. 30 filing.
Metro on 11/17/2016
By Mike Masterson
More than 100 showed up at the Don Nelms fine art gallery in Jasper last week to raise funds in support of our Buffalo National River. Some came from families who've lived five generations in the Buffalo watershed.
Just as significant will be those who care equally for the Buffalo taking time to turn out Wednesday morning at 9:30 at the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality (cough) building, 5301 Northshore Drive in North Little Rock.
That's when a representative of the agency will hear an appeal by the "Three Grandmothers" opposing the permit that allows C&H Hog Farms of Mount Judea to spray waste generated by their operation across even more acres of karst terrain on the long-dormant C&C Hog Barn farm owned by one of the same families within the Little Buffalo River and Buffalo National River watershed.
Dr. Nancy Haller, Carol Bitting and Lin Wellford have retained attorney Richard Mays in their valid appeal to stop the state's initial wrongheaded modification to their present wrongheaded permit. They believe the facts were not adequately researched before approving this permit modification, and doing so further threatens the country's first national river.
It's bad enough the Department of Environmental Quality, purported guardians of our environment, so quickly and quietly permitted the hog factory into this sacred region. Now they blindly approve spraying millions of gallons of raw waste onto hundreds of additional acres.
So if you live anywhere near Little Rock and care about the Buffalo, I'm sure these ladies and most of our state's population would surely appreciate seeing your supportive faces.
by Max Brantley
November 14, 2016
Coming this week: A Pollution Control and Ecology Commission hearing Wednesday morning on the appeal of state approval of a modified permit for a farm to spread waste from the C and H hog factory feeding operation at Mount Judea on land in the Buffalo River watershed. Several petitioners, including the National Park Service, have expressed concern that the permit for EC Farms creates a potential for damage to the Buffalo River, Little Buffalo River and Big Creek. Arguments against the permit have been dismissed by the state as irrelevant because this is modification of an existing permit, not a new permit. Wrote the Park Service:
"We continue to be concemed that the permit itself should be reviewed, given that the area is underlain with karst terrain and the potential for significant affects to the watershed remain. Due consideration of real and potential impacts must be made in light of ongoing discoveries and interpretations of hydrogeological data suggesting waste conductivity in the underlying karst system beneath many of the proposed spreading fields. Finally, we believe that this action constitutes a modification in the operation of C&H Hog Farm with the potential to introduce more waste into an already stressed ecosystem."
The record submitted for the hearing can be found here. Carol Bitting, one of those appealing the modified permit, contends the waste will be spread over "cave-riddled" areas south of Jasper along Highway 7. She worries about trucks that will be hauling hog waste and also says the permit change will reduce the frequency of monitoring. Reduced monitoring could lead to more runoff into water of nutrients that can promote algae growth in streams in the watershed, she argues.
Posted: November 13, 2016 at 3:02 a.m.
NWAOnline
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has approved of and disapproved of parts of the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality's water quality regulations nearly three years after the state submitted the regulations for review.
The announcement of the review comes as the department plans for another review process in 2017 and is in the middle of a public stakeholder process of reviewing and potentially revising the water quality assessment methods it uses to determine whether a water body is "impaired."
Among the parts approved by the EPA are the first numeric nutrient standards in Arkansas: two standards for Beaver Lake that Beaver Water District officials said would help the district protect the drinking water for Northwest Arkansas. Those standards were not in dispute by the EPA, but were on hold while the EPA and the state Department of Environmental Quality debated other elements of the state's water regulations during the EPA's review.
Most of the state's water regulation changes were approved by the EPA, although some elements of the state's water quality standards approved by the EPA have yet to be reviewed under the federal Endangered Species Act, which would require the consultation of additional federal agencies.
Among the parts disapproved are two items previously rejected by the EPA regarding mineral concentrations in Flat Creek and modifications to how the state determines "turbidity," which refers to how clear the water is, that removed a reference to the impact of waste discharges and set two different standards depending on when water samples were taken.
One item the EPA has disputed previously was not contested by the EPA in the review: Allowable minerals levels in Arkansas' varying "ecoregions." State regulations had previously outlined standards for allowable minerals levels in water bodies that covered the state by ecoregions, which were given different standards according to the geographical area if a water body did not already have site-specific standards.
In 2014, the state Pollution Control and Ecology Commission approved changing state standards to treat those standards as guidelines, rather than requirements. At the time, officials argued that the standards had been created arbitrarily decades before and did not necessarily reflect the natural conditions of the water bodies. The change came at the recommendation of the Department of Environmental Quality after a series of working groups to revise the state's water quality standards.
The EPA rejected that change, arguing that it stripped water bodies of protective standards.
On Oct. 31, the EPA wrote in its 183-page review of Arkansas water quality standards that it would take no action, stating that it "also recognizes the current state of the science and that the agency's own efforts related to the development of recommended minerals criteria are ongoing."
Instead, the EPA requested that the state Department of Environmental Quality come up with an approach to adopt new standards within the next 12 months, also outlining interim goals leading up to the eventual adoption of the new standards.
"The main point of interest is the no action that was taken on 2.511B as it relates to ecoregion values," said Caleb Osborne, associate director in charge of the office of water quality for the state department. "The state has agreed with the EPA that we're going to have 12 months to develop an approach and path forward," he added.
With the EPA taking no action, that means the state's change to water regulations to make ecoregion standards guidelines instead of requirements still will not be effective under the Clean Water Act, but the EPA and the state will coordinate when needed on developing new standards.
The Beaver Lake standards approved by the EPA after years of waiting were designed to limit the amount of nutrients in Beaver Lake, said Beaver Water District Manager of Environmental Quality Bob Morgan.
"The lake is not receiving the protection of the standard that we hoped that it would have," Morgan said in an interview before the standards were approved. "It's not keeping us from doing anything. ... If an issue popped up and the standard was in place, then there's a mechanism in state law that starts toward getting issues worked out."
The Beaver Water District provides drinking water to more than 330,000 Northwest Arkansans.
A collaboration of groups developed the nutrient standards after years of studying, including the Beaver Water District, the EPA, the Department of Environmental Quality, the U.S. Geological Survey, FTN Associates, the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and the Arkansas Water Research Center.
The standards limit the amount of chlorophyll in the lake to 8 micrograms per liter and sets a standard of secchi transparency at 1.1 meters. The levels of chlorophyll in water can indicate algae levels, and secchi transparency refers to the clarity of water.
Morgan said the new nutrient standards would affect permits to discharge wastewater in the lake's watershed and would be a more proactive approach to water quality management.
So far, the district has been able to work with entities discharging wastewater on voluntary incentives and has not had any major water quality issues that couldn't be addressed because of the lack of nutrient standards, Morgan said.
Metro on 11/13/2016
Arkanasonline
More algae seen on Buffalo River
The National Park Service has collected two samples of algae at the Buffalo National River that appear to indicate more types of algae in the river than previous sampling by another federal agency revealed. In September, after tourists reported algae on a 30-mile stretch of the river from U.S. 65 to Spring Creek, the U.S. Geological Survey sampled algae and found it to be mostly harmless. The algae found was from the genus Oedogonium. In October, Chuck Bitting, the natural resource program manager for the Buffalo National River, said he wanted to do more testing along that stretch. Bitting, whose wife was one of several people who spotted algae while canoeing, had wanted to return to the area to ensure that none of the algae is a type commonly called blue-green algae that can be harmful to humans and wildlife. Bitting said his team didn't find any blue-green algae but tested two samples that appeared to show algae from the genuses of Oedogonium, Spirogyra, and either Cladophora or Pithophora. Instead of sending the samples to the U.S. Geological Survey to be tested, Bitting and another researcher placed the samples under a microscope, took pictures and sent the magnified images to the agency, which determined what algae they were looking at, he said. Spirogyra, Cladophora and Pithophora are also known as green algae, which is not as harmful as blue-green algae but can depress oxygen levels for fish in the water at night, Bitting said. Green algae also produces oxygen during the day, but Bitting said he didn't know if the algae produces more oxygen than it consumes. At the least, he said, algae is an obstruction for fish. Bitting said the algae could be caused by many things, and he doesn't have enough information to pinpoint a specific cause. He said levels of algae-causing nitrates and phosphorous in the river have steadily increased since annual testing began in 1985. That could be because of human activity, including leaking septic systems or agriculture in the river's watershed. Bitting said he was disappointed that the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality didn't do its own testing and relied on the U.S. Geological Survey instead. The department previously received information from the U.S. Geological Survey regarding its September tests, and a spokesman said last week that the department had received no information from the National Park Service related to its October tests. "ADEQ has been working collaboratively with the [National Park Service] on water quality-related issues," read the department statement sent to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. "In fact, ADEQ has previously offered the use of continuous dissolved oxygen monitors to [the National Park Service] for evaluating the effects of algal blooms on aquatic life." The National Park Service has detected too-low oxygen levels in Big Creek before, but has never found too-low oxygen levels in the Buffalo River, Bitting said. Metro on 11/07/2016 Print Headline: More algae seen on Buffalo River
The National Park Service has collected two samples of algae at the Buffalo National River that appear to indicate more types of algae in the river than previous sampling by another federal agency revealed.
In September, after tourists reported algae on a 30-mile stretch of the river from U.S. 65 to Spring Creek, the U.S. Geological Survey sampled algae and found it to be mostly harmless. The algae found was from the genus Oedogonium.
In October, Chuck Bitting, the natural resource program manager for the Buffalo National River, said he wanted to do more testing along that stretch. Bitting, whose wife was one of several people who spotted algae while canoeing, had wanted to return to the area to ensure that none of the algae is a type commonly called blue-green algae that can be harmful to humans and wildlife.
Bitting said his team didn't find any blue-green algae but tested two samples that appeared to show algae from the genuses of Oedogonium, Spirogyra, and either Cladophora or Pithophora. Instead of sending the samples to the U.S. Geological Survey to be tested, Bitting and another researcher placed the samples under a microscope, took pictures and sent the magnified images to the agency, which determined what algae they were looking at, he said.
Spirogyra, Cladophora and Pithophora are also known as green algae, which is not as harmful as blue-green algae but can depress oxygen levels for fish in the water at night, Bitting said. Green algae also produces oxygen during the day, but Bitting said he didn't know if the algae produces more oxygen than it consumes. At the least, he said, algae is an obstruction for fish.
Bitting said the algae could be caused by many things, and he doesn't have enough information to pinpoint a specific cause.
He said levels of algae-causing nitrates and phosphorous in the river have steadily increased since annual testing began in 1985. That could be because of human activity, including leaking septic systems or agriculture in the river's watershed.
Bitting said he was disappointed that the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality didn't do its own testing and relied on the U.S. Geological Survey instead.
The department previously received information from the U.S. Geological Survey regarding its September tests, and a spokesman said last week that the department had received no information from the National Park Service related to its October tests.
"ADEQ has been working collaboratively with the [National Park Service] on water quality-related issues," read the department statement sent to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. "In fact, ADEQ has previously offered the use of continuous dissolved oxygen monitors to [the National Park Service] for evaluating the effects of algal blooms on aquatic life."
The National Park Service has detected too-low oxygen levels in Big Creek before, but has never found too-low oxygen levels in the Buffalo River, Bitting said.
Metro on 11/07/2016
Print Headline: More algae seen on Buffalo River
By Stephen Steed
Posted: November 6, 2016 at 1:28 a.m.
EVENING SHADE -- Tempers flared Tuesday night in Evening Shade, putting the Sharp County town of 432 at odds with the largely idyllic setting of the television sit-com of the same name, with its real-life residents debating the growth of the poultry industry in the area.
The expansion of operations in Batesville, Pocahontas and Corning by Ozark Mountain Poultry and Peco Foods calls for construction of some 1,000 poultry houses in about five counties within the watersheds of the Strawberry, Spring and Eleven-Point rivers.
Until the issue moves into the federal courts -- or to other towns -- Evening Shade is at the forefront of the debate.
To some, the expansion means jobs, even new careers.
Others see a threat to their streams and water wells, and point to the Illinois River and other Northwest Arkansas streams that have high levels of phosphorus and nitrates as examples of what they don't want to see happen in their area.
"I want to welcome all of you, from both sides of the issue," Curtis Middleton, the organizer of what he termed "a public service meeting," said early in the evening, when it wasn't yet apparent there were two factions in the crowd of about 100 lining the bleachers and taking up folding chairs courtside of Burt Reynolds Gymnasium/Linda Bloodworth Thomason and Harry Thomason Auditorium.
Middleton, an Evening Shade resident since 2005, is founder of the Arkansas Rights Koalition, a nonprofit started in July 2015 after Middleton discovered that neighbor Jerry Tracy was planning to build six poultry houses to grow about 182,000 birds per batch.
Middleton's group said in August that it intended to sue the federal Small Business Administration, the U.S. Farm Service Agency, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service -- alleging that they failed to conduct an adequate environmental study of the poultry operations' impact on wildlife, air quality, natural resources and on six specific threatened or endangered species of bats and mussels, and one plant.
Middleton, an environmental consultant, built a two-story plantation-style home deep into a picturesque valley, about 8 miles of gravel and dirt roads west of Evening Shade. Tracy has a small home atop a hill on about 120 acres a half-mile north of Middleton's place.
A nearby farmer who works for one of the two poultry companies said, "I feel like I'm caught right in between -- both ways -- in where I live and where I work." He asked not to be identified. Several other people in town shooed away a reporter -- in a friendly way -- a few hours before the start of the meeting. "I don't have many friends, and I don't want to lose the few I got," one said.
Community at odds
"We are not against the farmers or the poultry producers," Middleton told the crowd. "We are against the bad practices followed by state and federal agencies."
The crowd mostly sat silent through the addresses of the night's featured speakers: John Ikerd, a retired professor of agriculture economics at the University of Missouri; and Terry Spence, a consultant and farmer from northeast Missouri. Now aligned with various environmental and social-justice groups, both have long fought against industrial agriculture and large, concentrated animal farms.
"You have a powerful situation brewing here, with your clean air and clean water, while you still have it," said Spence, who became an activist when a meat processor put 80,000 head of cattle within three-quarters of a mile of his farm near the Missouri-Iowa border.
Farmers, especially young ones, will rue the day they signed their contracts, Spence said. Aside from initial indebtedness in which the average poultry house costs $300,000 to build, they will be financially responsible for upgrades deemed necessary by the poultry company and could be held liable for any environmental damage, he said.
Within an hour, the meeting devolved into shouting from the bleachers.
"It's only the lazy that are hungry," one man yelled, after Ikerd lamented the number of people who are "food-insecure."
"We were feeding people just fine before Obama and Hillary came along," another shouted.
Another tried to calm the crowd. "We have to co-exist, but it's not right for the state of Arkansas or the federal government to allow someone to put a chicken house within a hundred yards of my home," the man said.
"If I own that land, I can do whatever the hell I want with it," another responded.
A Cave City police officer asked a particularly agitated section of the crowd to calm down, to little effect.
"Some time back, things got tough," one woman shouted. "I didn't want a chicken house next-door to me, but we almost became chicken farmers. You got to make a living."
She also said she thought that the naming of the proposed Tracy farm by Middleton and another supporter, Paul Hinson, in a possible lawsuit against the three federal agencies pits "two families against one" and was engulfing the rest of the community.
"We're not here to be against the farmer," Hinson said. "But we are here to be good stewards of our community and of our land."
Not long before the amplifier was turned off and the meeting came to a fairly subdued end, Ikerd, in a breaking voice, said, "I don't know one instance where this kind of controversy hasn't ripped a community apart, and I can see it happening here right now."
Job prospects
Evening Shade has long relied on and made some money from Evening Shade, the television series. The show ran from September 1990 to May 1994. Burt Reynolds starred and the Thomasons, both native Arkansans, produced the series.
During that time, the Evening Shade School Foundation sold enough Evening Shade Cookbooks to build the Reynolds/Thomason facility, dedicated in 1993. Now owned by the Cave City School District, which is where Evening Shade kids have gone to school since a consolidation several years ago, the facility is leased for dances, concerts, holiday events and meetings.
"This area -- Sharp County -- is so poor, and it desperately needs jobs," Cave City Superintendent Steven Green said. He was unable to attend Tuesday's meeting because his school was hosting a donkey basketball game. "Maybe these poultry houses will create a few," he said. "But I know there has to be a balance. Our good water is one of our best resources."
Peco Foods Inc., based in Alabama, and Ozark Mountain Poultry, based in Rogers, have announced expansion plans for northeast Arkansas. Peco said it would spend $165 million on its processing plant in Pocahontas and feed mill in Corning (Clay County), creating 1,000 jobs. Both companies also have plants in Batesville, about 30 miles south of Evening Shade.
Peco said it would need a network of nearly 600 growers, primarily of broilers, to service its growth. Ozark Mountain Poultry has said it will need about 400 growers as it expands in Batesville and in Magness (Independence County) with a $25 million feed mill. Both companies are eligible for various tax breaks and incentives from the state.
Unemployment in several counties in the area neared or surpassed double digits in 2014, when some of the expansion plans were first announced. Unemployment rates were 12.2 percent in Clay County, 9.3 percent in Randolph County, 9.4 percent in Sharp County, 8.3 percent in Independence County. The state average was 7.4 percent in March 2014.
The statewide unemployment rate in September was 4 percent. The average in those counties is a tick above, at 4.1 percent.
By the numbers
If 1,000 poultry houses sounds like a lot, "it's not even close" to the numbers in Washington and Benton counties, the state's top two poultry producers, said Marvin Childers, president of the Poultry Federation of Arkansas, Missouri and Oklahoma.
Those two counties accounted for 822 of the state's 5,895 poultry-related farms, according to the 2012 Census of Agriculture. About 300 of the farms were in the broiler business. If each farm had five poultry houses, the two counties would have a combined 1,500 broiler houses.
"That's the point," said Middleton. "We're looking at many, many times the number of poultry houses we have now. Multiply the effects of a thousand of them in a short period of time. But, again, we're not against the farmer. We just want the government to do what it's supposed to do."
Sharp County had 32 broiler houses; Independence County, 28; Randolph County, 28, according to the 2012 Agriculture Census.
Tracy, the Evening Shade farmer, was among those who shouted from the stands at the meeting. After the meeting, he was a little sheepish, admitting that he and friends "got a little emotional."
Still, he said, he took the night's meeting personally.
He teaches diesel mechanics at Arkansas State University at Newport. "I just want to stay home, run a business and watch my kids grow up. Now, what's wrong with that?" Tracy, 46, said.
His contract for six houses, if built, is with Ozark Mountain Poultry. He said he was confident that the poultry industry in general and Ozark Mountain, in particular, have improved on their technologies enough that environmental problems like those seen in Northwest Arkansas won't occur a couple of hundred miles to the east.
Angie Haley, 42, said she hopes that's the case.
"We're really proud of our water," Haley, a member of the Evening Shade City Council and the town's librarian, said a few hours before the meeting.
The water is fresh and pure, from a deep and bountiful spring just east of town, she said. While water is piped in to the 300 or so customers of the Evening Shade Water Department, it's also available right from the spigot near its spring.
"We don't want to lose that," she said.
SundayMonday Business on 11/06/2016