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CapitalPress.com
August 24, 2018
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Opinion
Editorial Board
Editor & Publisher
Managing Editor
Joe Beach
Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com Online: www.capitalpress.com/opinion
O ur V iew
WOTUS ruling muddies regulatory waters
T
he controversial Waters of
the United States rule lives
again, at least in 26 states
— including Oregon, Washington
and California.
The Environmental Protection
Agency and the U.S. Army Corps
of Engineers wrote the rule in the
hopes of reconciling two separate
Supreme Court decisions in cases
involving the Clean Water Act.
The object was to better define
what constitutes “waters of the
United States,” which the act
gives the federal government
authority to regulate.
The 2015 rule extended
regulation to isolated bodies of
water that have a “significant
nexus” with navigable waters of
the United States. The rule left it
to the bureaucrats to determine
that nexus, and that rightly made
farmers and ranchers nervous.
The final regulation brought
little of the clarity it purported
to provide. (The Corps wrote a
scathing email to EPA insisting
the rule would not withstand a
court challenge.)
A number of states and
industry groups sued. That led
to competing rulings in various
district courts, including a stay
in 13 states ordered by a district
court in North Dakota.
The jurisdictional disputes
arising from those lawsuits
resulted in a nationwide stay of
the rule’s implementation by the
6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
in October 2015.
WOTUS was suspended last
year by the Trump administration,
the president making good on a
campaign promise. In February
the EPA and the Corps delayed
implementation until 2020 while
they work to replace the rule and
redefine “waters of the United
States.” These actions prompted
a host of new lawsuits in courts
across the country.
Earlier this year the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled that lawsuits
concerning the rule rightly must
originate with district courts.
The court’s order lifted the 6th
Circuit’s nationwide stay.
With the North Dakota district
court’s stay still in force, a court
in Georgia granted a preliminary
injunction blocking the rule’s
implementation of the rule in 11
states contesting WOTUS in that
court.
But in yet another case, U.S.
District Judge David Norton
on Thursday ruled the Trump
administration failed to comply
with rulemaking requirements
under the Administrative
Procedure Act in suspending rule.
In 24 states the implementation
of WOTUS is stayed, in 26 states
the rule is the law of the land. So
much for clarity.
It could be years before the
judgments on the various claims
and the eventual appeals work
their way to a decision on the
merits by the Supreme Court.
In the meantime, as American
Farm Bureau President Zippy
O ur V iew
Agriculture’s ‘youth movement’
F
inding enough workers for
the busy season is a challenge
for many farms, which try
everything from recruiting local
adults to hiring H-2A visa workers
from overseas.
A blueberry farm near Roseburg,
Ore., reminds us of the not-so-
distant past, when farmers relied
more on teenagers during the
busiest times of the year. Paul and
Sandy Norris, owners of Norris
Blueberry Farms, hire 180 high
school and college students each
summer to work in the fields and
the packing and shipping facility.
They’ve relied on their home-grown
“youth movement” for 20 years, and
see it as a win-win for themselves
and for their employees.
“The youth who work here
are absolutely amazing and
resourceful,” Paul Norris told
writer Craig Reed. “They stay with
the job until it is done. They learn
responsibility. We have orders and
we have to get them out. They have
to stay with the job until it is done.
The young adults know that and
they respond very well.”
They pay the students based
on their hard word. They start at
minimum wage, but can receive
more — retroactively — based
on how hard they work and their
attitude. The young workers quickly
come to understand how capitalism
operates — hard work and a good
attitude are handsomely rewarded.
It is a lesson many adults these
days would also do well to learn.
The Norrises chose to rely
on student workers when they
started their farm two decades
ago. Their first recruits were their
three daughters — Amy, Carrie
and Ellie — and their friends and
Craig Reed/For the Capital Press
From left, Sterling Colley, Anthony Buck and Easton Thompson wait at Norris Blueberry
Farms with electric pallet jacks to load a semi-truck trailer with blueberries. The farm has
been hiring local young people to work in the packing barn for the last 20 years.
acquaintances. From there they built
a tradition of hiring local students.
As a result, the Norrises have
a ready-made corps of reliable
workers that return year after year.
They hire itinerant crews for the
picking, but all of the weighing,
sorting, packing and shipping are
done by their youthful crews.
The low unemployment rate —
3.9 percent nationally — has put
added pressure on many agricultural
employers. Workers who previously
did farm work are being drawn to
construction and other year-round
jobs, leaving many farms struggling
to find enough workers.
With the unemployment rate for
teenagers at 8.4 percent, farmers
such as the Norrises have tapped
into a ready labor market.
But there’s more to the job for the
students than a healthy paycheck.
There’s the life lesson that hard word
impresses on young people.
“You learn how to work hard
here, you get an idea of what it
takes to work in any company,”
said Kristen Beebe, 22, who is
in her fifth year at the farm and
leads a crew of 15 youth in moving
pallets. “You have to get along with
people, to be able to talk with both
superiors and people below you in
efficient ways.”
To their credit, other farms and
packing houses also hire young
workers. Grass seed growers and
other farmers hire students to drive
swathers and combines to harvest
their crops — and have for decades.
They know what the Norrises
know. Treated and trained well,
young workers will do a great job,
spread the word to their friends and
keep the ranks filled year after year.
Duval said, last week’s ruling
“creates enormous regulatory
uncertainty and risk for farmers,
ranchers and others” in the 26
states.
We worry the feds will use
the opportunity to expand their
authority in those states over
“waters,” and therefore adjacent
lands, not previously subject to
regulation under the Clean Water
Act. Such a designation could
have profound and expensive
consequences for landowners.
Farmers, ranchers and
regulators need clear,
unambiguous guidance on
the true extent and limit of
the government’s authority.
Unfortunately, it could be years
before they get it.
End the trade war, now
By TOM NASSIF
Western Growers
I
n a recent interview, I
reiterated my support for
President Trump’s stat-
ed objectives on recasting
American trade policy. The
international trade playing
field is fundamentally unfair
to the U.S., and many coun-
tries have for decades taken
advantage of us. It is imper-
ative that the administration
seek fairer trade agreements
for American companies —
and the millions of Ameri-
cans who go to work at these
companies every day.
As we now see so stark-
ly, the means to achieve
this end are causing serious
economic turmoil. America
is now quite clearly in the
midst of a trade war with
China, and we are edging
closer to more serious con-
flicts with other nations
implementing their own re-
taliatory tariffs. China and
other nations are targeting
American farmers, and if
this continues for a pro-
longed period of time, we
risk losing established and
emerging markets for Amer-
ican fruit, vegetable and
tree nut products. Farmers
in other countries can and
will fill the vacuum left by
our trade policies, for most
commodities. Once China
and other export markets
find replacement suppliers,
it will be extremely difficult
to dislodge them, even after
we reach new and presum-
ably fairer trade agreements.
President Trump and
his team are well aware of
these harsh realities. We
have made sure of that.
Our urgent plea has been
and will continue to be this:
We understand and support
the administration’s goal to
forge new and fairer trade
agreements, but those new
agreements will only bene-
fit American farmers if they
Of wolves, wildfires and grizzly bears
By ANN HATHAWAY
For the Capital Press
I
live close to Medford, Ore.,
and we are having smoke so
bad a person cannot go out-
side for anything. Today I think
it is hazardous. Bad stuff.
I am not a rancher or farmer
but I owned a hunting business
in northwestern Montana for
four years. No wolves then,
just grizzly. I don’t know what
“Einstein” proposed griz in the
northern Cascades but they
have to be one of those overly
college-educated morons.
Griz are a pain in the back-
side. They are very big and
very scary opportunists. One
whiff of something tasty and
they come in. They tear things
to hell and eat anything that
isn’t tied down.
My opinion about griz in
the northern Cascades is no, no
and nope. No way! You want to
Guest
comment
Ann Hathaway
go have a hamburger? Remem-
ber, griz eat meat and ham-
burgers translate into cows. Be
they large or small cows, the
griz will try to eat one. That
means the owner of that cow or
calf loses that animal but also
— and no one seems to think
of this — they lose all the fu-
ture production of that cow or
calf. That amounts to a lot of
money and livelihood and I
don’t want to see that happen.
Griz eat a lot of baby deer and
baby elk, too.
As for smoke, I have been
cooped up in my house for al-
most four weeks and I am not
happy with the situation that
has finally, I hope, made people
stop and think. (Thinking seems
to be a lost commodity a lot of
the time.) Gee, if you let the for-
est get nice and thick and don’t
take care to keep it cleaned up,
gosh, it might burn up.
Well, duh! I feel sorry for
all the parties involved because
common sense just doesn’t
seem to be in vogue. The
BLM and Forest Service try
to put out a plan to clean up as
much as possible and bam, the
enviro-nuts file a lawsuit. Ev-
erything stops, the forest gets
thicker than hairs on a dog, the
brush fills in the empty places
and bingo, a forest fire going
someplace to happen. And it
never seems to get settled one
way or the other, for a long
time. It is a sad situation and
the judges who do not dismiss
the frivolous lawsuits are just
as guilty as the rest. Shame on
them.
Now, I move to wolves!
They are great big dogs. Em-
phasis on dogs. Big dogs!
Would someone please tell me
why a woman is out researching
in the wilds (without a gun, God
forbid she should have one) and
goes up a tree because she is
scared as the devil. Since when
is a wolf more important than a
person? Why wasn’t she carry-
ing a gun? More environmental
claptrap? More regulation?
We have been demoralized
in the name of environmental-
ism and it is crippling our econ-
omy, our society and our en-
vironment. And it has stopped
critical thinking. There was a
reason why wolves were killed
out here in a lot of the western
U.S. They raised holy particular
hell with the livestock and they
got shot. So some enviro-nut
decided to reintroduce big Ca-
nadian wolves back into the
Northwest. Pardon my sarcasm,
but it was a “brilliant” decision.
Dumb as a box of rocks!
Wolves belong in the big-time
wilderness, not in farming and
ranching areas. And don’t tell
me they are in big-time wil-
derness. They are a large, dan-
gerous nuisance and were I a
rancher, I would shoot every
one.
I don’t blame the ranch-
ers; they have been vilified
on a continuing basis and it is
damned unfair. Their pasture
practices and procedures have
improved mightily and the
ranchers should be respected.
They raise a product important
to our economy.
I read a saying that I think
is more than appropriate, “Thin
It, Log It, Graze It Or Watch It
Burn.”
Do you suppose the envi-
ro-nuts who seem to be over-ed-
ucated morons will get the mes-
sage? Sadly, I don’t think so.
Ann Hathaway is a retired
outfitter.
Guest
comment
Tom Nassif
haven’t permanently lost
their relationships with for-
eign buyers.
In other words, we ur-
gently need the administra-
tion to drive this process to
conclusion quickly.
In the short term, realiz-
ing we will never be made
whole, we need effective
and immediate mitigation of
the economic damage being
inflicted on our producers.
President Trump promised
to not let American farm-
ers “be the casualties if this
trade dispute escalates.”
Late last month, Secre-
tary of Agriculture Sonny
Perdue announced a $12
billion trade mitigation
plan. Of the three programs
envisioned as part of this re-
lief package, only the Food
Purchase and Distribution
Program has the potential
to deliver some mitigation
to the fresh produce in-
dustry. Even so, questions
remain about how much
of the roughly $2.5 billion
allocated for this program
will go to purchase surplus
fruits, vegetables and tree
nuts, and how close to regu-
lar market values producers
will receive for these agri-
cultural goods. There is also
the hope that we can receive
direct payments as other
commodities will.
We’ll keep working
with the administration
on this as we press for the
more critical need: a rapid
and successful conclusion
to our trade conflicts and
the restoration of com-
merce between American
farmers and buyers across
the globe.
Tom Nassif is presi-
dent and CEO of Western
Growers.
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