16 CapitalPress.com
February 17, 2017
Idaho farm groups oppose ‘sanctuary city’ ban
By SEAN ELLIS
Capital Press
BOISE — Idaho farm
groups will oppose an immi-
gration-related bill that would
ban “sanctuary cities” because
they believe some of its provi-
sions could have a chilling ef-
fect on the state’s agricultural
workforce.
A so-called sanctuary city
is one that discourages coop-
eration with federal immigra-
tion agencies. There are cur-
rently none in Idaho.
House Bill 76 would pro-
hibit sanctuary cities in Idaho
and allow the state to withhold
funding if one was created.
But the bill also includes
a provision that requires law
enforcement officers, in the
case of someone who has been
arrested but is unable to prove
he is in the U.S. lawfully, to
hold that person for up to 48
hours until they can determine
whether there is a federal immi-
gration hold on him.
During a Food Producers
of Idaho meeting Feb. 1, some
members said that could send
a message to many in the ag-
ricultural industry’s workforce
that they are not welcome in the
state.
Idaho Dairymen’s Associ-
ation Executive Director Bob
Naerebout said the six-page
legislation appears to be a
mandate to law enforcement in
Idaho and his industry is con-
cerned about where it may lead.
“The agricultural work-
force is already scared and
nervous,” he said. “I think
it’s time to stand up and say,
‘These are people that are im-
portant to our industry.’”
FPI members voted unani-
mously to oppose the bill.
Idaho Grain Producers
Association Governmental
Affairs Director Rich Garber
said industry is still sorting
through the language of the
bill to understand what its full
implications could be.
“If this bill plays out the
way it appears it could, it
could be really devastating
to Idaho’s agricultural work-
Idaho potato industry makes
progress against diseases
force,” he said. “We’re very
concerned about (it).”
The bill’s sponsor, Rep.
Greg Chaney, R-Caldwell,
told Capital Press his bill is in
no way targeted at agriculture
and he was surprised the FPI
opposed it.
“I am very pro agriculture
and I understand what their
workforce needs are,” he said.
“I have a lot of respect for ag-
riculture. These aren’t ... the
people this legislation is tar-
geted at.”
He said his bill is targeted
at those who seek to obstruct
federal immigration law.
The part of the bill ag lead-
ers are concerned about only
relates to someone who al-
ready has a hold put on them
by U.S. Immigration and Cus-
toms Enforcement, Chaney
said.
He met with Naerebout
Feb. 3 to discuss the bill and
said that “we agree on more
than we disagree on. We will
keep talking.”
USDA and the U.S. De-
partment of Labor estimates
put the number of workers in
the nation’s agricultural work-
force here illegally as high as
70 percent, Naerebout said,
and audits that have occurred
across U.S. agriculture sug-
gest that 70 percent is proba-
bly accurate.
He said farmers and ag in-
dustry companies have to ac-
cept certain legal documenta-
tion provided by prospective
workers.
“I’m not going to question
whether that documentation is
legal,” he said. “That’s not our
job. We can’t do that.”
The ag industry’s concerns
about the legislation represent
just one piece of the overall
immigration issue, Naerebout
said.
“The issue is, we don’t
have a viable labor force,”
he said. “This is just a symp-
tom of ... what’s wrong in the
whole immigration equation
right now. This is a direct re-
sult of the failure of Congress
over the past decade to ad-
dress immigration reform.”
Drones’ popularity takes
off at Colusa Farm Show
By JOHN O’CONNELL
Capital Press
By TIM HEARDEN
Capital Press
IDAHO FALLS — The
head of Idaho’s potato seed
certification program says
growers appear to have made
progress in controlling bacteri-
al ring rot challenges, and their
potato virus Y infection rates
seem to have flattened.
Alan Westra, area manager
of the Idaho Crop Improve-
ment Association, based his
observations on early numbers
from ongoing seed certifica-
tion testing.
In 2014 — following a
ring rot flare-up — Idaho im-
plemented rules governing
the devastating pathogen, in-
cluding mandatory testing of
seed lots seeking certification
or recertification. The asso-
ciation has zero tolerance for
ring rot, rejecting any seed lots
in which the disease is found.
Officials also seek to trace the
origin of infections.
Westra said ring rot labo-
ratory testing and field inspec-
tions eliminated 1,700 acres
from the certification program
in 2015. He said results from
64 percent of 2016 seed lots
required to undergo testing are
Submitted Photo
Bacterial ring rot is among the diseases targeted by the Idaho Crop
Improvement Association.
in, and just 10 acres have been
eliminated.
“So far, it’s down consider-
ably from what it has been in
the last three years,” Westra
said. “Hopefully, it’s due to
the fact that we’ve been test-
ing, plus the industry at large
is doing a better job between
all of the other testing that’s
done outside of the program
and a greater attention to san-
itation.”
The program also calls
for swabbing of equipment to
gauge effectiveness of sanita-
tion. Westra said growers did
a good job of sanitizing seed
cutters — often implicated in
spreading ring rot — but the
bacteria was frequently found
in unexpected places, includ-
ing pilers and conveyors. Ring
rot also surfaced often on the
rubber belts that move spud
piles in potato trucks. He said
one commercial trailer that
was swabbed also tested pos-
itive for ring rot, indicating
growers shouldn’t assume
ring rot originates from seed
and that it is truly an “indus-
try-wide problem.”
The certification program
also plants tubers from Ida-
ho seed lots in Hawaii to test
for PVY, which is spread by
aphids. Of the 2015 seed, half
of the lots had no confirmed
PVY. Westra said 67 percent of
acres were eligible for recerti-
fication through the program
for having less than 2 percent
PVY.
COLUSA, Calif. — When
it comes to their popularity in
agriculture, drones are taking
off.
Unmanned craft that look
like miniature helicopters can
take images from the air and
gather information that helps
farms with such things as pre-
cision irrigation and chemical
treatments, experts say.
“We’re still finding ways
to apply them,” said Dennis
Ryan, principal engineer for
the Redding, Calif.-based Ver-
tical Sciences Inc., which was
displaying a DJI S100 Plus
rotary octacopter at its booth
at the Colusa Farm Show on
Feb. 7-9.
The 2-year-old compa-
ny uses the camera drone
to do mapping and imagery
for growers, and Ryan and
his business partner, Jim Bi-
anchin, see plenty of room for
growth in the industry.
“I think it’s huge,” Ryan
said of the potential for drones
in agriculture. “We don’t even
know what they’re capable of
at this point.”
Tim Hearden/Capital Press
Dennis Ryan, right, of Redding, Calif.-based Vertical Sciences
Inc. discusses the use of a drone for taking aerial pictures with
passers-by Feb. 7 at the Colusa Farm Show. Ryan says drones will
make a big impact on agriculture in coming years.
This was Vertical Scienc-
es’ second year at the Colusa
show, and Ryan said interest
among growers has picked up
significantly.
Nearby, Scott Gregory of
Oroville, Calif.-based Ag One
Solutions gave a presentation
on all the uses of aerial imag-
ery from drones.
“You can see a lot from the
air that you can’t see from the
ground necessarily,” Gregory
said, adding that software in-
terprets lots of data from still
photos.
Images in infrared and oth-
er light spectrums can help a
farmer determine if nitrogen
is distributed evenly in soil,
if irrigation system leaks are
causing plant stress in tomato
fields and if dodder — a par-
asitic plant — is sucking the
nutrients out of alfalfa, Greg-
ory explained.
Software applied to a
high-resolution photo that
spots every tomato plant in a
field can provide a plant pop-
ulation count and estimate
plant loss, he said.
“This can be pretty useful
for a grower when you’re try-
ing to estimate your yield,” he
said.
With GPS technology, an
iPad and information from an
aerial photo, a grower can go
out and find trouble spots in a
field or orchard and treat them
without having to traverse the
entire farm.
“This is the epitome of
precision agriculture, in my
opinion,” Gregory said.
Western businesses using
drones for agriculture are
poised for significant ex-
pansion this season after the
Federal Aviation Adminis-
tration last summer eliminat-
ed a requirement that drone
operators also be licensed
pilots.
The new rules allow those
without a pilot’s license to
take a 16-hour course and
pass a test to get a remote pi-
lot’s certificate.
Even before the rule
change, about 2,100 compa-
nies and individuals had fed-
eral permission to fly drones
for farming, according to the
drone industry’s Association
for Unmanned Vehicle Sys-
tems International.
Bill would clarify solid
waste disposal rules for ag
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
7-2/#14
Western lawmakers have
proposed an amendment to
the federal Solid Waste Dis-
posal Act to help farmers
understand which manure
management rules they’re
supposed to follow.
HR 848, the Farm Regu-
latory Certainty Act, would
reaffirm and clarify Con-
gress’ intention regarding
manure management un-
der the Resources Conser-
vation and Recovery Act
of 1976, also known as
the Solid Waste Disposal
Act.
The new legislation would
also prevent farmers who are
already engaged in legal ac-
tion or making a “diligent
attempt” to work with state
or federal governments to
address manure management
issues from being targeted by
citizen lawsuits, according to
the lawmakers.
Manure runoff has been a
concern in Skagit, Whatcom
and Yakima counties in Wash-
ington state.
In early 2015, a federal
judge in Washington applied
solid waste disposal rules in
the RCRA to dairy farms in
the Yakima Valley. The Envi-
ronmental Protection Agency
and Congress “clearly” never
intended RCRA for that pur-
pose, Washington Rep. Dan
Newhouse told the Capital
Press.
“They were not to target
farmers, dairies, livestock
producers,” Newhouse said of
the rule. “(Farmers) ended up
having to comply with a rule
they had no idea they were
subject to.”
The new legislation will
provide farmers with clarity
so they know which rules ap-
ply to them and can get better
environmental results, New-
house said.
“We’re not talking about
letting anybody off the hook
when it comes to being re-
sponsible for the environ-
ment,” Newhouse said. “We
just want to make sure it’s
clear which rules they need to
follow.”
Newhouse and fellow
Washington Rep. Cathy Mc-
Morris Rodgers, both Repub-
licans, and Rep. Jim Costa,
D-Calif., introduced the bill.
It has 27 additional spon-
sors, including Rep. Collin
Peterson, D-Minn., former
chairman of the House Agri-
culture Committee, Rep. Kurt
Schrader, D-Ore., and Rep.
Devin Nunes, R-Calif.