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CapitalPress.com
Friday, January 8, 2021
Senator puts Washington meat inspections on table Spending,
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
The top-ranking Republican
on the Washington Senate agricul-
ture committee has reintroduced
the apparently popular but so far
unfunded idea of the state inspect-
ing meat and poultry.
State inspections would com-
plement USDA inspections, help-
ing small producers reach retail
markets and allowing meat to be
labeled “Washington inspected and
approved.”
“It would give consumers a bet-
ter idea of where the meat was
raised,” said Sen. Judy Warnick,
R-Moses Lake.
The USDA monopolizes inspec-
tions under the Federal Meat
Inspection Act. But with USDA
oversight, states can have their own
inspectors.
Senate Bill 5045, introduced
by Warnick, would direct the state
Department of Agriculture to nego-
tiate with the USDA to create
Reg Keddie/Dayton Natural Meats File
Washington state Sen. Judy Warnick, R-Moses Lake, has introduced a
bill creating a meat and poultry inspection program within the state
Department of Agriculture.
a state program.
The department already licenses
more than 100 custom-meat proces-
sors. But those businesses can only
process meat for the owners of the
animal.
State inspections would allow
small producers to sell meat without
first selling a share of the animal to
the consumer.
Some 27 states have meat inspec-
tion programs, with the USDA pay-
ing half the cost. Oregon lawmak-
ers last spring voted to have state
inspectors. The state Department of
Agriculture hopes to have a program
formed by mid-2024.
Washington lawmakers also con-
sidered creating a meat inspection
program last year. The state agricul-
ture projected that inspecting cus-
tom-meat operations would cost
$1.8 million a year.
The bill was scaled back, direct-
ing the agriculture department to help
producers market meat and to nego-
tiate an agreement with USDA. The
bill passed the Senate unanimously
and advanced through House com-
mittees without opposition.
The proposal stalled at the end,
though. The bill still cost $245,400
a year and didn’t make the budget.
Warnick said she hoped a bill
could be written to cost halfway
between $1.8 million and $245,400.
“We’re hoping to get it
done because it would open up
an opportunity for a number
of facilities,” she said.
Pacific Power rates drop 3.5% for irrigation customers
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
PORTLAND — Oregon regu-
lators have approved lower electric
rates for Pacific Power customers in
2021, thanks in part to cheaper fuel
and tax credits from wind and solar
energy, according to the utility.
That comes as welcome news for
irrigators already struggling finan-
cially with the coronavirus pan-
demic and water shortages due to
extreme drought.
Most of Pacific Power’s 615,000
Oregon customers will see a 5.2%
rate reduction, including an esti-
mated 3.5% reduction for agri-
cultural pumping. The utility has
7,984 irrigation customers state-
wide, about half of whom are in the
drought-stricken Klamath Basin.
Ben DuVal, power committee
chairman for the Klamath Water
Users Association, said the group is
pleased with the outcome following
months of deliberations.
“We appreciate Pacific Power’s
constructive approach to negotia-
tion and settlement,” DuVal said in a
statement. “We were able to resolve
irrigators’ most important issues
efficiently, and cost-effectively.”
Given the company’s initial pro-
posal, things could have turned out
much differently.
Pacific Power submitted its
request for a general rate revision to
the Oregon Public Utility Commis-
sion in February 2020, asking for a
6% increase. For irrigators, the rate
hike would have been 10%.
Rate increases were needed to
Energy Trust of Oregon
Pacific Power irrigation customers in Oregon will see a rate reduction.
help pay for more renewable energy
and transmission upgrades while
phasing out coal-fired power plants,
the company argued.
In 2016, Oregon lawmak-
ers passed the Clean Electricity
and Coal Transition Act, directing
the state’s two largest utilities —
Pacific Power and Portland Gen-
eral Electric — to stop using coal
by 2030 and double their renewable
energy mandate by 2040.
The KWUA and Oregon Farm
Bureau, among other organizations,
contested Pacific Power’s rate case.
“Electricity is one of the most
significant operating costs for agri-
cultural customers who are highly
dependent upon the use of pumping
and sprinkler equipment to deliver
water to their crops,” KWUA stated
in an Oct. 12 filing.
Increasing electricity costs
would exacerbate an already dire
situation for farmers and ranchers
reeling from drought, wildfires and
COVID-19, the filing stated.
The PUC determined that Pacific
Power cannot charge ratepayers for
incremental decommissioning costs
of its remaining coal plants — at
least for now.
“We must ensure that Pacifi-
Corp’s transition away from coal
resources is fair to Oregon cus-
tomers,” said Megan Decker, PUC
chairwoman. “We need to improve
Oregonians’ confidence in the cost
estimates through additional PUC
staff and stakeholder review before
we include PacifiCorp’s projected
costs in rates.”
The PUC also approved Pacific
Power’s annual Transition Adjust-
ment Mechanism, or TAM, that
incorporates fuel costs and tax cred-
its associated with multi-billion
dollar investments in renewable
energy.
Stefan Bird, president and CEO
of Pacific Power, said the revised
general rates and TAM combined
should lower customers’ electric
bills by an average of 5.2% in 2021.
“We kept our commitment to our
customers in 2017 to keep rates flat
for at least three years and we are
pleased to now deliver these price
reductions while simultaneously
making big strides in decarboniza-
tion and network resilience,” Bird
said.
DuVal, with the KWUA, said
irrigators should see a 3.5% reduc-
tion with the new base rate and
annual adjustments.
“Customers are getting eco-
nomic benefit from smart invest-
ments that Pacific Power has made
in meeting its renewable energy
requirements in the state of Ore-
gon,” he said.
But Decker, the PUC chair-
woman, cautioned that rates
may increase in 2022 after fur-
ther evaluation of Pacific Pow-
er’s ongoing costs as it drops coal
generation.
Critic of farm employers wins Washington state grant
By DON JENKINS
Capital Press
The farmworker advo-
cacy group Community to
Community Development,
a politically active organi-
zation that accuses agricul-
ture of exploitative labor
practices, has received a
$50,000 grant from the Inslee
administration.
The Bellingham, Wash.-
based organization is one
of 358 nonprofits to share
in $11.85 million from the
Washington Equity Relief
Fund for Nonprofits.
Gov. Jay Inslee directed
the state Department of
Commerce to give federal
CARES Act funds to non-
profit groups led by minori-
ties and that serve minorities.
Nearly 1,000 organizations
applied.
Commerce
announced
the recipients Dec. 30 but did
not disclose spending plans
by the organizations. The
grants ranged from $25,000
to $75,000.
Community to Commu-
nity has been at the forefront
of farm labor issues, argu-
ing there is no shortage of
U.S. farmworkers and calling
for an end to foreign guest-
worker programs, as well as
capitalism.
The group has sup-
ported boycotts and strikes,
and endorsed legislation to
increase state oversight of
farm labor conditions.
“As a farmworker com-
munity leader, I hold the state
accountable for the deaths of
farmworkers that have hap-
pened and will continue to
happen,” the group’s head,
Rosalinda Guillen, told a
Senate committee in 2019.
The Commerce Depart-
ment declined Monday to
provide details on Commu-
nity to Community’s applica-
tion. A spokeswoman said in
an email that “there is noth-
ing in the application requir-
ing them to say how they
will use the money.”
“The only requirements
are an attestation that the
organization has been
impacted by COVID and, of
course, they cannot use the
money for any illegal pur-
poses,” the spokeswoman
said.
Community to Commu-
nity’s application was spon-
sored by the Institute for
Washington’s Future, a non-
profit whose board chair-
woman is Guillen.
Efforts to obtain comment
from Community to Com-
munity or the Institute for
Washington’s Future were
unsuccessful.
Organizations can’t use
equity grants for lobbying,
according to the commerce
department.
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S214623-1
S224745-1
relief
package
to benefit
cattle
producers
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
Several provisions in the
government spending and
COVID-19 relief package
signed by President Donald
Trump will benefit cattle pro-
ducers and the industry.
The bill includes $1.4 tril-
lion in government spending
and $900 bil-
lion for pan-
demic relief.
T h e
relief por-
tion of the
bill includes
$11 billion
Danielle
for USDA to
Beck
prevent, pre-
pare for and
respond to COVID by pro-
viding support to agricultural
producers. It includes addi-
tional funding for cattle pro-
ducers, said Danielle Beck,
senior executive director of
government affairs for the
National Cattlemen’s Beef
Association.
Cattle producers received
payments from earlier pan-
demic relief approved by
Congress through the Coro-
navirus Aid, Relief and Eco-
nomic Security Act. The first
was for losses from Jan. 15
through April 15. The second
was an inventory payment,
which NCBA said fell short
of covering all losses.
The third payment is for
losses incurred from April 16
through May 14, Beck said
in the latest “Beltway Beef”
podcast.
“It’s really intended to
provide assistance to those
producers who were really
left out in the cold after that
April 15 cutoff date,” she
said.
The additional payment
will be based on what pro-
ducers previously received,
she said.
“So this is some targeted
relief that we’ve really been
asking for way back when the
CARES Act was enacted,”
she said.
Another big win for cattle
producers and NCBA was the
inclusion of provisions pro-
posed in the Requiring Assis-
tance to Meat Processors for
Upgrading Plants, known as
the RAMP-UP Act.
The COVID relief por-
tion of the bill provides $60
million for USDA grants to
meat and poultry processors
to upgrade their facilities to
become part of the federal
inspection system to be able
to sell across state lines, she
said.
“That’s, I think, tre-
mendous when it comes to
increasing competition in the
packing sector,” she said.
It would allow more mar-
ket access, allow custom
products to make their way
into new markets and, hope-
fully, provide more hook
space, she said.
“These grants getting out
the door sooner rather than
later are going to help us out
quickly and make changes,
much-needed
changes,
sooner,” she said.
USDA is also required to
work with states to improve
the existing Cooperative
Interstate Shipping program.
It is also required to conduct
a report on the availability of
financing for new and exist-
ing meat and poultry pro-
cessing capacity, she said.
The bill also includes $284
billion in a second round of
Paycheck Protection Pro-
gram loans that simplifies the
forgiveness process for loans
under $150,000, she said.
“More
importantly,
the bill specifies that for-
given PPP loans will not be
included in taxable income,”
she said.
In addition, the bill clari-
fies deductions are allowed
for expenses paid with the
proceeds from a PPP loan,
she said.
The relief portion of the
package also ensures live-
stock producers are paid for
their animals by requiring
dealer trusts.