January 9, 2015
CapitalPress.com
17
National FFA leaders visit Idaho schools
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
AMERICAN FALLS, Ida-
ho — FFA’s national offi cers
were received by an eager
crowd of younger members
Jan. 6 here — the third stop on
a week-long tour of eight Idaho
high schools organized to test
the leaders’ new workshops and
speeches.
A national FFA offi cer at-
tends each state’s convention,
and sometimes state FFA weeks,
and must be prepared with a
workshop and keynote address.
Never before, however, had all
six national offi cers visited the
Gem State.
The Idaho high school stu-
dents say the chance to play
guinea pig for FFA role models
is an opportunity of a lifetime.
The offi cers — college students
chosen through a rigorous inter-
view process who must take a
John O’Connell/Capital Press
FFA students at American Falls High School gather around Victoria
Maloch, national FFA secretary from Arkansas, while she presents
her workshop, Branding Your Life. The national offi cers were
scheduled to visit eight Idaho high schools from Jan. 5 to 9 to prac-
tice the speeches and workshops they’ll present to FFA chapters
throughout the country this year.
year off school to focus on FFA
duties — were scheduled to visit
FFA chapters in Rigby, Black-
foot, American Falls, Burley,
Kimberly, Jerome, Middleton
and Kuna, rotating workshop
and keynote address duties. FFA
members from other regional
schools were also invited at each
stop.
“It’s a really big deal,” said
Riely Geritz, American Falls
High School FFA chapter pres-
ident. “This is the fi rst time that
Idaho and American Falls High
School have had anything this
big, so we’re pretty excited.”
The FFA offi cers’ annual
statewide practice event, called
Experience State Week, had typ-
ically rotated between Tennes-
see and Arkansas. To increase
interest, FFA opted to accept
bids from other potential host
states.
Casey Zufelt, Idaho FFA ex-
ecutive director, added a leader-
ship conference and legislative
breakfast to Idaho’s proposed
itinerary to heighten its appeal.
She expects 150 FFA students
from throughout the state to at-
tend the mini-conference, which
was scheduled for Jan. 9-10 at
Boise’s Red Lion Hotel.
Zufelt hoped a breakfast
Jan. 9 at the Red Lion, would
give lawmakers who voted to
increase agricultural education
funding a chance to witness the
benefi ts. FFA will provide a free
bus to accommodate Northern
Idaho students, missed by the
tour of high schools. Zufelt said
the Takasugi Family Founda-
tion, representing the family of
the late Idaho lawmaker and
FFA supporter Patrick Takasugi,
donated $12,000 to cover the
majority of costs for the week.
“I wish I would have met a
national offi cer when I was a
freshman,” said Clancy John-
ston, Idaho FFA’s state secretary
who attends Boise State Univer-
sity. “It’s an incredible opportu-
nity to inspire FFA members and
to really put a spark on Idaho
FFA.”
The slate of offi cers includes:
Andy Paul, president, of Geor-
gia; Victoria Maloch, secretary,
of Arkansas; Ruth Ann Myers,
eastern region vice president,
of Kentucky; Kristen Schmidt,
central region vice president,
of Colorado; Stephen McBride,
southern region vice president,
of Tennessee; and Caleb Gustin,
western region vice president, of
New Mexico.
Some of the members, in-
cluding Paul, the FFA president,
are studying agricultural educa-
tion.
“The average American cit-
izen is around three genera-
tions removed from the farm,”
said Paul, who considers im-
proving agricultural literacy
to be the industry’s greatest
challenge.
Workshop activities and
discussions emphasized team-
work, personal character and
leadership.
Water allocations based on snowpack, reservoir levels
Idaho Ag Expo,
potato conference set
By TIM HEARDEN
Capital Press
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
POCATELLO, Idaho —
A seminar at the upcoming
47th Annual Idaho Potato
Conference will quiz partic-
ipants in a new curriculum
designed to teach the state’s
fifth-graders about the his-
tory and nutritional value of
potatoes.
The two-day conference
— hosted at Idaho State
University’s student union
from 8 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. Jan.
21 and 8:30 a.m. to 10:45
a.m. Jan. 22 — includes 45
sessions highlighting the
latest in potato issues and
research. Seventy-two ven-
dors, including some of the
major farm chemical compa-
nies, will staff booths at an
accompanying trade show in
the student union. Further-
more, the 36th Ag Expo, fea-
turing 100 vendors and the
major manufacturers of po-
tato equipment, is scheduled
for ISU’s Holt Arena from 9
a.m. to 5 p.m. Jan. 20-21 and
from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Jan. 22.
Admission to conference
sessions is $25 at the door,
but the trade show and expo
are free.
During their conference
session “Are you Smart-
er than a Fifth-grader?” UI
Extension professor Rhea
Lanting, of Twin Falls, and
Martha Raidl, a UI nutrition
specialist based in Boise,
will quiz participants on the
middle-school spud curric-
ulum they designed, with
funding from UI and the Ida-
ho Potato Commission.
Lanting explained UI’s
College of Agricultural and
Life Sciences is helping to
convert their curriculum
into four interactive video
lessons, designed for iPads.
Lanting hopes to pilot the
potato curriculum in three
Idaho schools. She said IPC
will promote the program,
which she hopes will even-
tually be taught in 40-50
schools.
“Really the goal to me is
promoting Idaho products
and telling the health ben-
efits of potatoes,” Lanting
said.
Opening remarks at the
conference will be delivered
by John Foltz, dean of UI’s
College of Agricultural and
Life Sciences.
Key issues to be discussed
include the rise of kochia
weed resistant to glyphostate
herbicide in Western Idaho
and a late-season late blight
outbreak in Eastern Idaho.
Conference co-chairwoman
Pam Hutchinson said her
lecture will offer tips on
managing for the control,
prevention and delaying of
herbicide resistance, in re-
sponse to the kochia finding.
Co-chairman Phil Nolte will
provide an update on the late
blight outbreak, caused by
heavy August rainfall.
“Fortunately, it didn’t do
a whole lot of damage. It just
got everybody’s attention,”
Nolte said. “The big ques-
tion now is are we looking at
some kind of a pattern that
could repeat?”
Other sessions of note in-
clude antioxidants in baby
potatoes, new sources of
potato virus Y resistance for
potatoes, research on remote
sensing of potato fields, new
varieties of Russet Norko-
tahs, watering supplies and
growing conditions in the
future climate and an over-
view of the 2014 Farm Bill.
In addition to the op-
portunity to network with
customers, American Falls
farmer Jim Tiede is eager to
hear the latest research on
zebra chip disease, which
first arrived in the Pacific
Northwest in 2011.
Spectra Productions own-
er David Beale, who runs
the Ag Expo and conference
trade show, said the latest in-
novations in potato equipment
will all be on display under
one roof at the Expo. Beale
said the events have become
an international draw, and he
expects a couple of thousand
people to visit the Ag Expo.
SACRAMENTO — As
runoff from December’s
storms continues to trickle
into California’s reservoirs
while the snowpack remains
light, predicting how much
water will be available this
summer is tricky, offi cials say.
Anticipated reservoir lev-
els are key to determining
how much water the State Wa-
ter Project and federal Cen-
tral Valley Project ultimately
deliver to contractors, said
Dave Rizzardo, the state De-
partment of Water Resources’
chief of snow surveys.
Growers could be in for a
rude awakening if the Central
Valley gets more rain than
normal this winter but snow-
packs remain meager — an
incongruity that Rizzardo ac-
knowledges could be “a bit of
a public relations nightmare
for us.”
“We had a couple of won-
derful storms that shook the
trees really well with lots
of wind … but didn’t really
produce any snow,” Rizzar-
do said. “This is what the
perspective is when you’re
looking at reservoir operation.
It would seem simple enough
that no matter how the water’s
getting into the reservoir …
you can’t store any more than
X amount.
“The drier the scenario, the
more you can store … but the
wetter the scenario, the less
you can allow (to be stored)
because you need room to
catch all that runoff,” he said.
“Most of that we assume is
snowpack … although it real-
ly hasn’t been snow but rain.”
In other words, if storms
fi ll reservoirs too quickly, wa-
ter has to be let out to leave
room for runoff from what
would normally be an abun-
dant snowpack. If that runoff
never materializes, reservoirs
could be left with too little
water to sustain their users’
needs through the summer.
Of course, reservoir opera-
tors could account for the light
snowpack and keep more of
the rainwater — particularly
if it trickles in, alleviating the
Tim Hearden/Capital Press
Boats are docked at Bridge Bay Resort on Shasta Lake in Northern California on a recent morning.
The lake was only at 42 percent of capacity as of midnight Jan. 4, according to the state Department
of Water Resources.
need for fl ood control, Rizzar-
do said.
But anticipating the water
that ultimately comes from
runoff can be diffi cult because
California has been known
to get some unexpected, cold
spring storms that dump snow
in the Sierras, he said.
“Normally it’s necessary
to top off the reservoirs in the
spring,” said Maury Roos,
the Department of Water Re-
sources’ chief hydrologist.
“As fl ood control require-
ments are eased, you want to
fi ll them up as close as you
can from spring snowmelt.”
The snow usually accounts
for about one-third of Cali-
fornia’s usable water supply,
Roos said.
Water offi cials and Nation-
al Weather Service forecasters
have said California needs at
least 150 percent of normal
precipitation — including 150
percent of normal snowpack
— to avoid a fourth straight
year of drought in 2015.
Achieving such an abundant
snowpack appears unlikely,
said Michelle Mead, a NWS
warning coordinator here.
The DWR and cooperat-
ing agencies conduct manu-
al snow surveys each month
from January to May, provid-
ing a basis for determining
allocation levels for state and
federal water contractors. The
meager snowpack was a key
reason the DWR initially es-
timated in December it would
deliver just 10 percent of re-
quested allocations to State
Water Project contractors.
As of Jan. 5, the Golden
State’s major reservoirs held
nearly 62 percent of their
average amounts of storage
for the date, according to the
DWR’s California Data Ex-
change Center.
Shasta Lake, the center-
piece of the federal Central
Valley Project, was at 42
percent of capacity and 66
percent of its normal level as
of Jan. 5 — an improvement
over the 24 percent of capaci-
ty it held in late October. And
Lake Oroville, the State Water
Project’s chief reservoir, was
at 39 percent of capacity and
held 62 percent of its normal
contents this week, up from
its level of 28 percent of ca-
pacity in late October.
Unfortunately, California
has seen a lull in precipitation
statewide since before Jan.
1, threatening to erase the
gains made in northern areas
in the fall against the three-
year drought. Northern Cal-
ifornia’s next chance of rain
appears to be next weekend,
Reservoir levels
Here are the percentages of
total capacity and average
for this time of year for major
California reservoirs, according
to the state Department of
Water Resources’ California
Data Exchange Center. Totals
are as of Jan. 5.
Trinity Lake: 34 percent of ca-
pacity; 50 percent of average
Shasta Lake: 42 percent;
66 percent
Lake Oroville: 39 percent;
62 percent
Folsom Lake: 45 percent;
91 percent
New Melones: 23 percent;
40 percent
Don Pedro: 39 percent;
59 percent
Exchequer: 7 percent;
16 percent
San Luis: 43 percent;
62 percent
Millerton Lake: 35 percent;
64 percent
Pine Flat: 13 percent;
31 percent
according to AccuWeather.
The federal Climate Pre-
diction Center’s three-month
outlook for Northern Califor-
nia continues to be warmer
and wetter than normal.
Funds sought to study rail interchange improvements FAA grants permits for
Crowther said. The changes Connell come from the north, ag, real estate drones
Connell interchange
would end a “pinch point,” and must go south roughly 35
Area in
detail
90
Site of
proposed
26
railroad
interchange
24
project
395
Othello
26
Connell
Co
l
b ia
u m
240
395
R
er
State legislators and city
administrators hope to obtain
federal funding to improve a
railroad interchange at Con-
nell, Wash., that would re-
solve a bottleneck in moving
agricultural commodities.
Offi cials want to recon-
fi gure the Connell Rail Inter-
change to accommodate more
traffi c from the Burlington
Northern Santa Fe Railway
and the Columbia Basin Rail-
road.
The Columbia Basin Rail-
road line intersects at the in-
terchange with BNSF’s Lake-
side Subdivision line, which
links Spokane and Pasco,
Wash.
The interchange was built
roughly 100 years ago.
“The confi guration is out-
Moses Lake
er
Capital Press
28
Richland
iv
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Wash.
Pasco
ak
e
serves $2 billion in
ag goods
Sn
Kennewick
221
12
N
82
h.
Was e.
Or
Alan Kenaga/Capital Press
dated and ineffi cient, and it
needs to be upgraded,” said
Jed Crowther, Connell city
administrator.
As currently proposed,
the interchange would be
moved south to an industri-
al zone, away from vehicle
and pedestrian crossings,
he said, increasing effi ciency
and allowing timely delivery
of products moving through
the region. About $2 billion
in agricultural products are
shipped by rail through the re-
gion, he said.
Rail lines from the inter-
change serve Moses Lake,
Wheeler, Schrag, Warden,
Bruce, Othello and Connell.
Crowther said the Columbia
Basin Railroad hauls more
than 10,000 rail cars annually
carrying agricultural commod-
ities and industrial freight.
“As (Burlington North-
ern) increases its capacity, it
doesn’t do any good to have
a bottleneck,” said Rep. Matt
Manweller,
R-Ellensburg.
“Connell will be a bottleneck
if we don’t fi x it.”
The current confi guration
of the interchange allows lon-
ger trains to enter Connell
only from the south, said Pat
Boss, public affairs consultant
for Columbia Basin Railroad.
Most of the trains entering
miles to Pasco to turn around
and return to Connell.
“If we can confi gure it
correctly, the trains that are
coming from Spokane could
directly access the Connell
interchange and not have to
go all the way down to Pasco
and turn around again,” Boss
said.
Stakeholders formed the
Connell Rail Interchange Co-
alition in December. Connell
city council members on Jan.
5 directed staff to prepare a
state Community Economic
Revitalization Board plan-
ning grant application to
determine the cost of the im-
provements.
The coalition also wants
to work with other communi-
ties whose interchanges have
similar issues to apply for
federal grant money, Man-
weller said.
“We’ve got a 21st-century
economy running on 1920s
train lines,” Manweller said.
“Something’s gotta give here.”
By JOAN LOWY
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The
Federal Aviation Administra-
tion on Tuesday issued permits
to use drones to monitor crops
and photograph properties for
sale, marking the fi rst time
permission has been granted to
companies involved in agricul-
ture and real estate.
The exemptions to the
current ban on commercial
drone fl ights were granted to
Advanced Aviation Solutions
in Star, Idaho, for “crop scout-
ing,” and to Douglas Trudeau
of Tierra Antigua Realty in
Tucson, Arizona.
Advanced
Aviation
Solutions plans to use its
1.5-pound, fi xed-wing eBee
drone to make photographic
measurements of farm fi elds,
determine the health of crops
and look for pests. The aim is
to save farmers time walking
through fi elds. The drone also
can carry sensors that pick up
information invisible to the
naked eye, which can help
determine which fi elds need
watering.
Trudeau’s exemption au-
thorizes him to fl y a Phantom
2 Vision+ quadcopter to “en-
hance academic community
awareness and augment real
estate listing videos,” the FAA
said.
Real estate companies have
been eager to gain permission
to use drones to photograph
and make videos of pricey
properties.
The permits require that
drone operations include both
a ground “pilot” and an ob-
server, that the pilot have at
least an FAA private pilot cer-
tifi cate and a current medical
certifi cate, and that the drone
remains within line of sight of
the operator at all times.
Before these approvals, the
FAA had granted 12 exemp-
tions to 11 companies involved
in the oil and gas, fi lmmaking,
landfi ll and other industries.