November 11, 2016
CapitalPress.com
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$18M fine against foodmakers a record
GMA and AG blast
each other
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
A Washington judge’s $18
million penalty against the
Grocery Manufacturers Asso-
ciation apparently far exceeds
any fine ever issued in the
U.S. for running afoul of cam-
paign disclosure laws.
The judgment, likely to be
appealed, is less than half the
amount sought by Attorney
General Bob Ferguson. But
it towers over the record $3.8
million settlement in a case in-
volving the Federal Elections
Commission or the $1 million
involving the California Fair
Political Practices Commis-
sion. No previous Washington
case had topped six figures.
California and Washington
are the states most likely to
impose large campaign fines
based on their laws and en-
forcement history, said David
Keating, president of the Cen-
ter for Competitive Politics, a
nonprofit in Washington, D.C.,
that opposes what it considers
overly burdensome disclosure
requirements.
“I don’t recall anything in
that range,” he said. “It seems
disproportionate.”
The ruling Nov. 2 by Thur-
ston County Superior Court
Judge Anne Hirsch was an-
other record-smashing figure
related to Initiative 522. The
2013 measure would have re-
quired labels on many prod-
ucts with genetically modified
ingredients, but was defeated
in a close vote.
Some $42.5 million was
spent to sway voters — $10
million more than any other
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
Thurston County Superior Court Judge Anne Hirsch, upper left,
listens as Washington Assistant Attorney General Garth Ahearn de-
livers closing arguments Aug. 30 in Olympia, Wash., in a non-jury
trial to determine the Grocery Manufacturers Association’s penalty
for not reporting the companies that contributed $11 million in 2013
to defeat a GMO-labeling initiative. Hirsch on Nov. 2 fined GMA
$18 million, reputed to be the largest penalty ever in the U.S. for
campaign finance violations.
campaign in state history.
GMA contributed $11 mil-
lion to the “no” campaign, a
fact timely disclosed. GMA
was found guilty of not nam-
ing about three dozen compa-
nies that supplied the money.
GMA contended that it re-
lied on legal advice and that it
believed it was acting within
the law, a claim Hirsch found
not credible.
Crucially, Hirsch conclud-
ed GMA schemed to shield
processed food companies
from criticism, threats and
boycotts.
The finding that GMA in-
tentionally broke the law tri-
pled the $6 million penalty that
Hirsch said was appropriate.
She stated the “sophistica-
tion and experience of GMA
executives” argued for a stiff
penalty. She noted that GMA
failed to timely file 60 reports
and that the case involved a
large amount of money. She
didn’t detail how she calculat-
ed the penalty.
Keating said he doubted the
fine, if upheld on appeal, will
have an effect outside Wash-
ington.
“It would probably further
bolster Washington’s reputa-
tion as a dangerous place to
speak,” he said.
Washington’s disclosure
law requires campaign contri-
butions and expenditures be
fully disclosed. “Secrecy is to
be avoided,” according to the
law.
During this election sea-
son, the PDC is currently re-
viewing more than 40 com-
plaints against candidates,
according to its website.
At a trial in August to de-
termine its penalty, GMA
presented testimony by a po-
litical scientist who said his
research suggests public dis-
closure laws are not helpful to
the public.
Hirsch said the testimony
was directly at odds with the
intent of Washington’s disclo-
sure law. “The court did not
find his testimony helpful,”
she wrote.
Shortly before the election
in 2013, GMA identified the
donor companies under the
threat of a fine.
GMA lashed out at Attor-
ney General Ferguson for tak-
ing the case to Superior Court
and seeking a fine far above
the maximum possible by the
Public Disclosure Commis-
sion.
GMA’s decision to report
itself rather than its members
as the contributor was “at
most an inadvertent technical
violation of the state’s vague
and complex disclosure law,”
the association said in a writ-
ten statement.
GMA’s case was “being
handled as a routine matter by
the Public Disclosure Com-
mission until Attorney Gen-
eral Ferguson seized control
shortly before the 2013 elec-
tion to further his personal po-
litical ambitions.”
Ferguson said in a state-
ment issued by his office that
he took GMA to court because
it “needed to be held account-
able for their arrogance and
willful disregard of Washing-
ton state campaign finance
laws.”
His office asked Hirsch to
fine GMA $43.8 million, three
times the amount GMA de-
posited into a fund in 2013 for
political activities nationwide.
Hirsch didn’t go that far.
But PDC Executive Direc-
tor Evelyn Fielding Lopez
praised the outcome on a
Facebook post. “PDC has the
most awesome attorneys!”
she posted.
Easement close for cherry orchard expansion
By DAN WHEAT
Capital Press
WENATCHEE,
Wash.
— After years of effort, it
appears the world’s largest
sweet cherry producers are
another step closer to gaining
more high-elevation orchards.
However, opponents of the
expansion say they question
the state’s authority to help
with the expansion.
The
Mathison
fami-
ly, which does business as
Wheeler Ridge LLC and
owns Stemilt Growers in
Wenatchee, Wash., is getting
an easement from the state
Department of Natural Re-
sources to install a water pipe-
line in a Chelan County road
right-of-way.
The right-of-way is in Sec-
tion 16 of the Stemilt Basin
south of Wenatchee. DNR
plans to sell the land to the
Washington Department of
Fish and Wildlife.
The Mathisons are paying
more than $9,000 for the ease-
ment, which enables them to
get water farther uphill to
Section 17, where they plan to
test the survivability of cherry
trees at 4,200 feet of eleva-
tion. If all goes well, they plan
to plant an orchard there.
Jerry Gutzwiler, president
of the Wenatchee Sportsmen’s
Association, said a lot of area
residents are disappointed be-
cause enabling more orchard
“flies in the face” of the whole
concept of the community
group, Stemilt Partnership, to
preserve and protect the area
for wildlife and recreation.
The association opposes more
development as detrimental to
habitat for the 6,000-head Co-
lockum elk herd.
The Mathisons have un-
successfully tried to buy or
lease Section 16 from the
DNR in the past for orchard
development.
The easement has been
“very secretive” and may not
be legal since Public Lands
Commissioner Peter Gold-
mark, head of the DNR, and
the director of WDFW signed
a sale and purchase agreement
for Sections 16 and 21 that did
not include any pipeline ease-
ment, Gutzwiler said.
Goldmark decided “to hold
WDFW hostage” to the ease-
ment and WDFW went along
with it because its funding to
purchase the land expires at
year’s end, Gutzwiler said.
“I can’t say I’d do anything
differently, but it will open up
major access through that sec-
tion (16) that was bought for
habitat, and road access de-
grades habitat,” he said.
DNR typically grants
easements as long as they
don’t impede land uses. The
DNR-WDFW agreement is
silent on easements, so DNR
has the authority to grant
it, said Bob Redling, DNR
spokesman.
WDFW wanted the ease-
ment granted before it got the
land “so it didn’t have to man-
age that process,” Redling
said.
The easement will be
signed soon because the land
is to be sold by the end of Jan-
uary, he said.
James Brown, regional di-
rector of WDFW in Ephrata,
said the Stemilt Partership
wants WDFW to buy Sections
16 and 21 to save them from
development.
It was Goldmark’s deci-
sion to grant the easement,
which he indicated last month
he would do, Brown said.
Federal funding, ear-
marked for critical habitat
under Section 6 of the En-
dangered Species Act, is
limited to the $1.8 million
appraisal of Sections 16 and
21, Brown said. WFDW is
also seeking $100,000 from
the state Recreation and Con-
servation Office to reach the
$1.9 million DNR wants, he
said.
Hopefully, that will be
forthcoming by the end of No-
vember from RCO money left
over when it helped Chelan
County buy Longview Fibre
land in the basin for preserva-
tion, he said.
EO Media file photo
Potatoes ride a conveyor belt into a cold storage facility outside
Hermiston, Ore.
Columbia Basin’s potato
farmers happy with harvest
Minimal impacts
from October rain
By GEORGE PLAVEN
EO Media Group
HERMISTON, Ore. —
Whether mashed, baked, scal-
loped or fried, there should be
no shortage of locally grown
potatoes to serve up at this
year’s Thanksgiving dinner.
As fall potato harvest
wraps up around the Colum-
bia Basin, farmers are expect-
ing above-average yield and
quality thanks to an excep-
tional growing season.
Bill Brewer, CEO of the
Oregon Potato Commission,
said early spring conditions
helped to jump-start the
crop’s growth, while summer
cooled off enough to avoid
stifling the plants. Most farms
finished harvesting ahead of
schedule, Brewer said, with
only minimal delays from Oc-
tober’s record rainfall.
“The weather was actual-
ly very cooperative,” Brewer
said. “It ended up working out
well.”
According to the National
Weather Service in Pendleton,
Ore., 1.9 inches of rain fell
last month at the Hermiston
Municipal Airport, making it
the wettest October on record.
Downtown Pendleton also
received 2.32 inches of rain,
making it the third-wettest
October there since 1900.
Soggy weather can make
for a difficult time harvesting
potatoes — especially spuds
bound for the storage shed. If
there’s too much mud, it could
block airflow to the plants and
cause them to rot before they
can be sold to supermarkets or
food processors.
Fortunately, the early start
allowed most growers to
avoid that issue, Brewer said.
The Columbia Basin is also
home to sandy, well-drained
soils that dry out quicker,
meaning farmers don’t have
to wait long after it rains to get
back out into the fields.
“I really don’t think it was
an issue,” Brewer said. “Most
people were done by the time
the moisture really started
coming.”
Greg Harris, farm manager
for Threemile Canyon Farms
near Boardman, said they fin-
ished harvesting storage pota-
toes by Oct. 10, which was a
few days ahead of schedule.
The farm grows 7,000 acres
of spuds — including several
varieties of russets — which
are sold to processors such as
french fry giant Lamb Weston.
“Because most of the rain
came during the second half
of October, most people had
the bulk of storage done,”
Harris said. “Otherwise, it
definitely would have been a
problem for us.”
Along
with
storage,
Threemile Canyon delivers
potatoes directly from the
field to customers through
early November. That’s where
having sandy, absorbent soils
comes as a benefit, Harris
said. In particular, processing
plants around the Tri-Cities
leaned heavily on the farm
during the late October rains.
“They were almost dou-
bling our output out of here
for three or four days to get
potatoes to those plants,” he
said.
The early season growing
conditions have made for an
excellent crop, Harris said.
He estimates production to
be about 2 tons per acre more
than usual.
“We’re happy with how
it turned out,” he said. “Cer-
tainly, it was one of our better
crops.”
Statewide, Oregon farmers
grew nearly 1.22 million tons
of potatoes in 2015, worth
$176.45 million. Brewer said
the region from Hermiston to
Boardman averages 30-plus
tons per acre, mostly for pro-
cessing into products such as
fries, potato chips and potato
flakes.
Basin Gold, a cooperative
of Oregon and Washington
growers, also specializes in
producing and marketing
fresh market potatoes, such
as the ones on supermarket
shelves.
Bud-Rich Potato, of Herm-
iston, is part of that co-op.
Most farms should be pro-
ducing at or above average
throughout the area, Brewer
said.
USDA: Midsize farms hold their own
Numbers drop
slightly, but shifts
larger in other
categories
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
The number of mid-
size growers in the U.S. has
dropped slightly but the cat-
egory hasn’t experienced as
much change as other farm
sizes, according to USDA.
Farms in the midsize cate-
gory, with roughly $350,000
to $1 million in annual rev-
enue, declined in number by
5 percent between 1992 and
2012, according to a recent
USDA study.
To compare, large farms
with more than $1 million in
revenue more than doubled
in number, while small com-
mercial farms — those with
revenues between $10,000
and $350,000 — declined in
number by 22 percent.
Midsize farms also had
smaller net exit rates from the
industry than large or small
commercial farms between
2007 and 2012, the study found.
“They do stick around,”
said Chris Burns, an econo-
mist for USDA’s Economic
Research Service who co-
wrote the report, “The Chang-
ing Organization and Well-be-
ing of Midsize U.S. Farms,
1992-2014.”
Burns said he decided to
study the characteristics of
midsize farmers to see what
traits caused them to succeed
and grow.
For example, increasing
farm income over time was
strongly correlated with a
willingness to lease more
acreage, he said.
Younger farmers intent on
growing their operations were
likely renting more acreage
while those approaching re-
tirement were downsizing,
Burns said.
“Midsize farms will prob-
ably include both of those
groups,” he said.
Beginning farmers in the
midsize category were more
likely to exit the industry than
those who have operated for
more than 10 years, he said.
“If you have experience
farming, you’re more likely to
succeed,” Burns said, adding
that such factors are signif-
icant as the overall farming
population ages.
Over time, the number of
farms in the midsize category
may shift due to variations in
income, either because they
grow to large farms or shrink
to small commercial opera-
tions, he said.
“They can bounce around
just because of changes in
prices and yield,” Burns
said.
However, larger opera-
tions can often better afford
labor-saving technologies and
reduce their costs, he said. “I
think we’ll probably see more
production on large farms.”
While Burns’ report fo-
cused on midsize farms, the
data also showed a dramatic
shift among smaller farms:
Those with low sales — under
$10,000 — increased in num-
ber by 400,000, or 61 percent,
between 1992 and 2012.
Meanwhile, small com-
mercial operations with in-
comes between $10,000 and
$350,000 fell in number by
245,000, or 22 percent.
It’s unclear whether small
commercial farms are simply
earning less revenue or if an-
other reason is responsible for
this shift, Burns said.
“It definitely makes me
curious as to what’s driving
that,” he said.
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