Poweshiek CARES meeting: August 20, 2013

Joyce Otto, President of Poweshiek CARES, welcomed the members. She reminded us, as a community, of our commitment to the restoration of environmental stewardship. She urged us to reflect on both the significance and beauty of the mission statements of governmental departments (the Board of Health, the Department of Natural Resources, etc.) and the failure of those departments to live up to those mission statements when they conflict with the interests of large agribusinesses.

Donna Winburn announced that Practical Farmers of Iowa will hold a field day from 2 to 5 p.m. on Thursday, August 22, at Heritage Farm. The topic is “record keeping.”

Marilyn Barnes announced that, because of legal action and the activities of Poweshiek CARES, Prestage Farms has agreed not to expand or build any confinements within three miles of her home for the next twenty years, once renewable. In addition, it has stopped all of the proposed expansions and additions to confinements in Chester Township. This announcement was delayed until the legal paperwork was filed and formalized, but the agreement was reached in May 2013.

Tim Kapucian, our state senator, and Dave Maxwell, our state representative, attended a meeting in June with pork producers, at which Prestage Farms indicated that they would not build any more confinements in Poweshiek County. This, however, was just a statement, not a promise or a binding legal agreement.

Val Vetter announced that we have finally received the approval and acknowledgement of our paperwork for being a 501(c)4 corporation on August 4. The total cost of incorporation was $1967, leaving a balance of $2862.

We heard reports from each of the five regular committees.

Partnering committee: Sandy Moffett explained the purpose of the committee and the goal of contacting representatives in each county in Iowa. Emma Andelson gave pretty good reports on six counties, and we're starting to work with those first. We're also interested in partnering with regional and national environmental organizations and with local organizations. Donna reported that Linn County is forming a “Farmers and Neighbors” group. Sandy noted that county auditors are often useful initial contacts. Next meeting: September 3, 7 p.m., Board Room.

Outreach and education committee: Laforest Sherman directed our attention to tonight's agenda to suggest the range of proposed activities. He described the panel discussion that we're trying to put together for fall: presentations by local farmers about their practices, goals, and values. We want to do public presentations about CAFOs, and have collected a lot of supporting research and evidence on their effects on public health. Next meeting: September 9, 7 p.m., First Baptist Church.

Legislative action committee: Marilyn reported that the committee would welcome more members. Their current priority is to find one or more “champions” in the legislature for our goals. She urged us to “make friends and influencing people,” taking a less strident and more respectful attitude towards legislators. We need to prepare for meetings with legislators by producing short, effective, persuasive materials for them. She distributed a handout listing the members of the Agriculture Committee and several other handouts that she thought might be of interest. Next meeting: September 3, time and place to be announced. (Earlier in the meeting, Marilyn had also observed that the legislative action committee cannot propose a plan of action until the group as a whole sets legislative objectives, and urged us to draw up a list of our legislative objectives as soon as possible.)

Response and mobilization committee: Jeremy Chen reported that the committee had discussed making appearances at local homecoming parades (like a float in the Grinnell Homecoming parade, which begins at 5:30 p.m. on October 3). The goal is to stage events that will involve a lot of people and a lot of participants. They considered a number of ways to design floats with high visual impact. One proposal is to decorate Jim Yungclas's haywagon with appropriate signs and posters for CARES, and to have seventy-five people in gas masks walking alongside and behind the float (“coming soon to a location near you!”), with signs identifying the various air pollutants generated by hog factories. Next meeting: September 3, time and place to be announced.

Community impact committee: Sue Kolbe reported on their July 18 meeting with Kathy Kamp, who can make customized maps and has already done a CAFO diagram. She has volunteered to build maps from data (e.g., animal confinments, number of animal units, number of citations, number of employees, etc.) On August 1, they went to a meeting of the Board of Supervisors on the topic of the English River watershed. That topic was postponed, but the supervisors do want to know more about the structure of the water flows.

Since then, the committee has been working on setting up a meeting in Iowa Cit