April 10, 2015
CapitalPress.com
11
Washington
Ecology urged to change Fertilizer removed
from train bill
drought well regulations Farm lobbyists happy
By DON JENKINS
Agency says
conditions must
get worse before
groundwater tapped
Capital Press
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
OLYMPIA — A Central
Washington lawmaker April 1
said the Department of Ecology
should immediately let farmers
pump from emergency wells,
a step the agency says it won’t
consider unless the drought gets
worse.
Yakima County Rep. Da-
vid Taylor said growers in his
agriculture-rich district report
already needing wells that were
used with state approval in earli-
er droughts.
“That’s what I’m hearing
from folks,” Taylor said after the
initial meeting of the legislative
drought committee.
The committee has little
direct control over the DOE’s
drought response, but it pro-
vides a forum for lawmakers to
ask questions.
DOE drought relief coordi-
nator Jeff Marti said the state
once had a “more lax posture
toward drilling of emergen-
cy wells, and a lot of people
came to depend on them during
drought.”
But the agency now views
emergency wells as a desper-
ate measure. Groundwater and
surface waters are connected,
and drawing from emergency
wells will eventually impact
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
Rep. David Taylor, R-Moxee, questions Washington Department of Ecology drought relief coordinator
Jeff Marti at a legislative meeting April 1 in Olympia. Taylor challenged the agency’s policy of withhold
for now permission to use emergency wells.
streams, Marti said.
To prevent other water users
from being shortchanged, ev-
ery extra gallon drawn from the
ground will have to be matched
by an another gallon put into
streams, he said.
“We want the impact to be
essentially water-budget neutral,
and, frankly, that’s the only poli-
cy that’s going to keep us out of
the courts,” Marti said.
DOE has asked lawmakers
for $4 million to buy water in the
Yakima Basin for that purpose.
But the agency won’t spend the
money unless the drought deep-
ens.
DOE can’t say exactly
how much worse the drought
must be, though Marti said
conditions will have to be
“much more severe than what
we’re looking at currently.”
The U.S. Bureau of Recla-
mation forecasts junior water
right holders in the Yakima
Basin will receive 73 percent
of their normal summer water
supply.
DOE held two workshops
this week in the Yakima Basin
to explain how farmers can sell
their water rights.
Drought committee chair-
man Sen. Jim Honeyford,
R-Sunnyside,
questioned
whether water will be available
to lease to let landowners use
their emergency wells.
“They have drilled those
wells at considerable expense,
and in a water short year, how
do you find water?” Honeyford
asked. “It’s a Catch-22. It’s a dry
year. You don’t have any water
to offset, and they can’t use the
wells they have.”
Marti agreed farmers could
have trouble finding water rights
to mitigate drawing from emer-
gency wells. “You’re right. The
water is more scarce and expen-
sive,” he said.
In response to a question
from Taylor, Marti said DOE
does not consider crop value
when fielding requests to use
emergency wells.
“Our position is that re-
gardless of crop type, unless
the (groundwater) use is offset
through mitigation, we’re not
going to be approving those
types of wells,” Marti said.
Taylor said he will continue
to press DOE on its policy on
emergency wells. “It’s not ad-
dressing the need,” he said.
OLYMPIA — House Dem-
ocrats have stricken anhydrous
ammonia, a widely used nitro-
gen fertilizer, from a bill moti-
vated by the influx of rail tank-
ers hauling Bakken crude oil to
West Coast refineries.
“I’m glad the House Envi-
ronment Committee heard our
concerns and amended the bill
to minimize the impact on ag-
riculture,” Washington Farm
Bureau associate director of
governmental relations Scott
Dilley said.
Lawmakers have been
working on legislation to help
fire departments and commu-
nities respond to potentially
explosive derailments.
Senate Bill 5057’s provi-
sions include mandating larger
crews for trains carrying hazard-
ous materials. Railroad unions
say additional crew members
would be in position to decouple
burning rail cars, while railroad
companies say larger crews are
unnecessary and may conflict
with federal rules.
A Senate floor amendment
extended the staffing require-
ment to trains hauling anhy-
drous ammonia.
The amendment, which
passed over the opposition of
Senate Republican leaders,
pulled agricultural groups into
what had been a debate about
regulating oil tankers.
Farm lobbyists, concerned
the bill would increase the cost
of transporting fertilizer, argued
anhydrous ammonia didn’t be-
long in the bill.
The chemical, though haz-
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
Rail cars roll past a crossing
guard on the BNSF Railway
mainline in southwest Washing-
ton. A bill focused on tankers
hauling crude oil was amended
in the state Senate to cover
anhydrous ammonia, a nitro-
gen-based fertilizer. A House
committee has now removed
fertilizer cars from the bill.
ardous, isn’t explosive. Accord-
ing to the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, leaking
anhydrous ammonia rapidly
expands into a heavier-than-air
cloud that causes breathing dif-
ficulties and burns.
The House Environment
Committee dropped anhydrous
ammonia from the bill when it
amended and then passed SB
5057 on March 30. The full
House has yet to vote on bill. If
it passes, the Senate will have to
agree to the changes.
The bill could apply to farm
chemicals that are flammable.
“Over the next couple of
weeks, I expect more discus-
sion will take place on the com-
peting ideas from the House
and Senate on how to address
the bill’s central topic — trans-
portation of crude oil,” Dilley
said. “We’ll continue to work
to ensure that any resulting leg-
islation doesn’t increase costs
for farmers. The House com-
mittee’s actions were certainly
a step in the right direction.”
Don Jenkins/Capital Press
A grain elevator at the Port of Kalama on the Columbia River in Washington is one of CHS Inc.’s global as-
sets. Whatcom Farmers Cooperative in northwest Washington will merge with CHS in hopes of expanding.
Wash. co-op, CHS merge
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
A northwest Washington
farmers cooperative that has
ambitions to grow has agreed
to merge with global agribusi-
ness giant CHS Inc.
Whatcom Farmers Coop-
erative, which has 205 voting
producers, will join a compa-
ny that reported a net income
of $1.1 billion on revenue of
$42.7 billion for the fiscal year
ending Aug. 31.
The Lynden-based WFC
anticipates CHS’ resources,
expertise and financial ser-
vices will help it overcome
barriers and expand outside its
corner of the state.
WFC has seven retail
outlets in Whatcom County,
distributes propane and petro-
leum fuels, and sells agrono-
my products and services di-
rect to farmers.
“We’re stuck up in the cor-
ner (of the state). Our ability
to grow is pretty limited right
now,” said WFC board presi-
dent Jeff Bedlington, a Lyn-
den grower.
WFC and CHS announced
the merger in a press release
April 6 Terms of the merger
were not disclosed. WFC’s
producers have approved the
merger, which must get final
approval from the CHS board
of directors before becoming
effective in July.
Minnesota-based CHS has
some 1,100 member cooper-
atives and 84,500 individual
members. The company an-
nounced in February it was
paying out $581 million in
cash dividends to its members.
Some 2,540 members
shared $8.4 million in Wash-
ington, while 1,701 members
divided $4.7 million in Idaho
and 427 members divvied up
$3.3 million in Oregon.
WFC was founded in 1941.
Cooperative officials said they
spent more than a year study-
ing whether to merge with
CHS. “The decision wasn’t
made quickly,” said WFC
General Manager Don Eucker,
who will retain his position.
Eucker said that with CHS’
help, the Whatcom coopera-
tive may be able to expand its
agronomy business into Cana-
da and farther south in Wash-
ington.
WFC will maintain its re-
tail outlets and will continue
to have control over its assets,
he said.
“From an outside stand-
point, the transition is going to
be very seamless,” Eucker said.
The merger will expand
CHS’ presence in the West,
company spokeswoman Lisa
Graham-Peterson said. “We
continue to look for expansion
in that area of Washington to
serve farmers,” she said.
CHS was formed in 1998
by the merger of Cenex Inc.
and Harvest States Coop-
eratives. The company’s
wide-ranging agriculture and
energy enterprises include oil
and ethanol refineries, grain
terminals, convenience stores,
and food processing and fertil-
izer plants. CHS shares owner-
ship with Cargill Inc. of grain
elevators at the Portland, Taco-
ma and Kalama, Wash., ports.
Apple Blossom Festival honors Brunner
WENATCHEE, Wash.
— Jay Brunner, director of
the Washington State Uni-
versity Tree Fruit Research
and Extension Center in
Wenatchee, has been named
Apple Citizen of the Year
by the Washington State
Apple Blossom Festival.
Brunner has been an en-
tomologist at the center for
36 years and is retiring in
September.
Among other accom-
plishments, Brunner was
instrumental in helping the
tree fruit industry shift into
integrated pest manage-
ment, specifically phero-
mone mating disruption as
a biological means of com-
bating codling moth, a ma-
jor apple and pear pest.
Brunner will be honored
at the festival’s All Service
Club Luncheon on April 29
and will ride in the Stemilt
Growers Grand Parade on
May 2.
— Dan Wheat
Dan Wheat/Capital Press
Jay Brunner holds the Washing-
ton State Horticultural Associa-
tion’s Silver Apple Award given to
him in 2005. He is being honored
this year by the Washington State
Apple Blossom Festival.
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