Friday, July 22, 2022
CapitalPress.com 9
9th Circuit rejects arguments against
farming in Klamath wildlife refuges
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
A federal appeals court
has rejected claims that irri-
gation, pesticides and graz-
ing in several Klamath
Basin national wildlife ref-
uges are managed in viola-
tion of environmental laws.
The 9th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals has also
dismissed arguments by
farm representatives that
agriculture is too strictly
regulated in the Klamath
Basin National Wildlife Ref-
uge Complex.
Last year, a federal judge
threw out multiple lawsuits
filed in 2017 against a “com-
prehensive
conservation
plan” for five refuges within
the complex, which strad-
dles the Oregon-California
border.
A unanimous panel of
three 9th Circuit judges
has now upheld that deci-
sion, ruling that the Fish and
Wildlife Service’s plan com-
plies with all the laws gov-
erning the 200,000-acre ref-
uge complex.
“Given the extensive evi-
dence in the record support-
ing the choices made by the
Service, the panel saw noth-
ing that authorized us, as the
reviewing court, to make
different choices,” the 9th
Circuit said.
More than 20,000 acres
in two of the refuges are
leased for crop cultivation,
which environmental advo-
cates complained is priori-
tized over wildlife habitat.
The 9th Circuit has dis-
agreed with that argu-
ment, ruling that the Fish
and Wildlife Service’s plan
struck the appropriate bal-
ance between agriculture
and wildfowl management
as required by refuge man-
agement statutes.
Environmental
advo-
cates also claimed the fed-
eral government violated
Don Jenkins/Capital Press File
A Foster Farms processing plant.
Foster Farms has
‘no plans’ to reopen
Oregon chicken plant
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
CRESWELL,
Ore.
— Officials at Fos-
ter Farms say the poul-
try company has no
plans to reopen its shut-
tered chicken process-
ing plant here, despite
applying with state reg-
ulators to renew the
facility’s
wastewater
management permit.
The Oregon Depart-
ment of Environmental
Quality intends to reis-
sue the permit, which
was last issued in 2015.
It allows the plant to dis-
charge treated wastewa-
ter into an unnamed trib-
utary of Camas Swale
Creek in the Willamette
River watershed.
However,
Foster
Farms has not operated
the 35,000-square-foot
plant since 2006 and
has “no plans to do so in
the immediate future,”
according to a company
statement.
Jason
Gentemann,
Pacific Northwest Divi-
sion manager for Foster
Farms, said the permit
outlines what practices
and improvements to
infrastructure would be
needed to maintain envi-
ronmental compliance
if the plant ever does
reopen.
“Having an opera-
tion that, even though
it is old and shut down,
you’re probably going to
choose to at least keep it
permitted and make sure
on paper it’s compliant
and up to snuff,” Gen-
temann explained.
The permit renewal
also coincides with
three new proposed
chicken farms in the
Mid-Willamette
Val-
ley that would raise
millions of birds every
year for Foster Farms.
Opponents are fighting
the projects, arguing
they will endanger pub-
lic health and safety in
local communities.
Gentemann
said
there is no correlation
between those develop-
ments and the Creswell
permit.
“This is a completely
separate situation,” he
said. “It has no connec-
tion whatsoever to the
fact that we’re build-
ing new chicken barns
in the state of Oregon.
It just happened to be
coincidental timing.”
Creswell plant
At its peak, the Cre-
swell plant processed
roughly
7
million
broiler chickens per
year, producing 29.5
million pounds of meat.
Foster Farms bought
the site in 1987, and for
over a decade it was the
primary processor for
all of the company’s
chickens raised in Ore-
gon, Gentemann said.
Then in 1998, Fos-
ter Farms built a newer,
HOW TO
COMMENT
Comments for the
proposed water qual-
ity permit renewal at
Foster Farms’ Creswell
processing plant may
be submitted by mail,
fax or email to Trinh
Hansen, DEQ water
quality permit coordi-
nator, at 4026 Fairview
Industrial Drive SE,
Salem, OR 97302, or
trinh.hansen@deq.
oregon.gov.
The deadline for
comments is 5 p.m.
Thursday, Aug. 4.
larger chicken pro-
cessing plant in Kelso,
Wash. The Creswell
plant continued to oper-
ate at a reduced capac-
ity until 2006, when the
decision was made to
shut it down and send
everything to Kelso,
Gentemann said.
The DEQ water qual-
ity permit allows the
plant to discharge waste-
water between Nov. 1
and April 30. During
the summer, wastewater
would be used for sprin-
kler irrigation.
The permit regu-
lates several pollutants,
including E. coli, chlo-
rine, pH, oil, grease
and total suspended
solids left over from
processing.
Before operations at
the plant could resume,
Foster Farms would be
required to submit an
updated
engineering
report evaluating the
facility’s
wastewater
infrastructure.
“The study must
systematically evalu-
ate the entire waste-
water system and the
ability to operate as
designed and not create
nuisance conditions or
odor problems, while
consistently
meeting
the required waste dis-
charge limits,” the per-
mit states.
Foster Farms would
also have to develop a
wastewater
irrigation
plan, approved by DEQ.
A public comment
period for the Creswell
facility’s permit is now
underway, ending Aug.
4. DEQ says it will
schedule a public hear-
ing if it receives written
requests from at least
10 people, or from an
organization represent-
ing at least 10 people.
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the National Environmental
Policy Act by failing to con-
sider scaling back agricul-
tural leases on refuge lands.
However, the agency
properly explained that it
didn’t consider this option
because farming helps
waterfowl populations by
providing them with food,
the 9th Circuit said.
Also, reducing farmed
acreage in the refuges would
not make more water avail-
able for wetlands, since it
would instead go to more
senior irrigators elsewhere,
the ruling said.
In developing the man-
agement plan, the Fish and
Wildlife Service was “con-
strained by a complex sys-
tem of water rights that is
largely beyond its control,”
the 9th Circuit said.
The government’s rules
for pesticide spraying also
came under fire from envi-
ronmental
advocates,
who claimed the govern-
ment should have evalu-
ated heightened chemical
restrictions.
The 9th Circuit has found
that argument “unavailing,”
since the Fish and Wildlife
Service reasonably decided
that further restricting pes-
ticide usage wasn’t feasible,
the 9th Circuit said.
“FWS
adequately
explained that some amount
of pesticide use was nec-
essary on the Refuges to
ensure sufficient crop pro-
duction, on which Refuge
waterfowl now depend,” the
ruling said.
Similarly, the govern-
ment didn’t have to evalu-
ate livestock curtailments in
one of the refuges, since it
considers grazing necessary
to control weed species and
promote sage grouse habitat,
the 9th Circuit said.
“Overall, FWS concluded
that the negative effects of
the limited, managed graz-
ing program on sage-grouse
were outweighed by the pos-
itive effects of the program,”
the ruling said.
While most objections
to the refuge management
plan centered on environ-
mental concerns, restrictions
on crop production were
also challenged by sev-
eral farms and agricultural
organizations.
These plaintiffs claimed
the management plan vio-
lated federal laws by increas-
ing the acreage devoted
to wetlands and unhar-
vested grain, among other
requirements.
The 9th Circuit disagreed
that farming is “automati-
cally consistent” with proper
waterfowl management and
thus limits on agriculture are
unauthorized.
Federal refuge manage-
ment statutes “unambigu-
ously prioritize” wildlife
over agriculture, which must
be consistent with waterfowl
objectives, the ruling said.
CoBank: Supply chains still fractured
By CAROL RYAN DUMAS
Capital Press
While easing of sup-
ply-chain bottlenecks and
overall improvements in
U.S. logistics have grabbed
headlines over the last quar-
ter, CoBank analysts are less
impressed with the progress
made to date.
“Supply-chain improve-
ments have been much more
modest than the headlines
suggest. And there is no
fast lane ahead,” said Dan
Kowalski, vice president
of CoBank’s Knowledge
Exchange.
“While
commodity
prices have declined mean-
ingfully and lineups at Cal-
ifornia ports have shortened,
supply chains are broadly
still mired in dysfunction,”
he said in the latest “CoBank
Quarterly” report.
Various metrics indicate
supply-chain performance
has improved, both domes-
tically and globally. But that
improvement is due to fewer
and faster export shipments
from China due to COVID
lockdowns there and slightly
lower transportation price
inflation, he said.
“The latest data show that
warehouse and inventory
costs are still rising at near-
peak levels, and transporta-
tion costs are still rising at a
much higher rate than before
the pandemic,” he said.
Agricultural
supply
chains reflect this marginal
and inconsistent improve-
ment as well. Grain rail car
availability was at a multi-
year low and prices were at
highs in Q2 and improved
only recently. But those
recent savings in rail rates
Succor Creek Cattle Ranch
Chilly Valley Lifestyle Estate
Klamath County, OR
27 Acres | $3,250,000
Holly Dillemuth/For the Capital Press
Standing grain is left for migrating birds in the Klamath Basin National Wildlife Ref-
uge Complex. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has rejected several lawsuits over
farming in the refuge complex.
Malheur County, OR
1,052 Acres | $5,900,000
Rio Vista Ranch
Okanogan County, WA
114 Acres | $3,350,000
www.HaydenOutdoors.com
have been partially offset by
a dramatic increase in fuel
surcharges, he said.
Grain export vessel rates
are also flirting with multi-
year highs. And despite
efforts to improve agri-
culture’s access to vessels
returning to Asia from Cal-
ifornia, the share of vessels
leaving port empty was still
70% in Q1, the latest avail-
able data, he said.
Truck rates have shown
the most consistent decline,
but are still far above
pre-pandemic levels. Truck
availability, however, is
markedly improved, he said.
“We do expect that as
consumer purchases of
goods continues to soften,
supply chains will slowly
recover,” he said.
If the oncoming recession
in Europe is a harbinger of
things to come in the U.S.,
the decline in demand for
goods will accelerate, fur-
ther enabling supply chains
to heal. But labor constraints
will continue to hamper the
recovery either way, mak-
ing the return to an efficient
supply chain agonizingly
slow, he said.
Despite financial mar-
kets’ all-consuming focus
on inflation, the U.S. econ-
omy continues to advance.
Labor markets are strong
and consumers are still
spending. Price inflation
is still raging but a sag in
commodity prices is rais-
ing hopes of smaller price
increases, he said.
For now, though, the
Federal Reserve is poised to
raise rates until it believes
inflation has been tamed.
The Fed is now singularly
focused on price stability,
and that is elevating the
risk to economic growth, he
said.
“The drop in commodity
prices and recent bond yield
inversions are sending up
red flags about slowing eco-
nomic activity and a poten-
tial oncoming recession,”
he said.
Monetary policy is not
a perfect science and the
“softish” landing that the
Fed desires will be a diffi-
cult needle to thread. Most
economists are now pro-
jecting a better-than-even
chance that the U.S. will be
in recession by mid-2023,
he said.
“We echo those projec-
tions, and while agriculture
and energy are likely to con-
tinue performing well due to
the Ukraine conflict, several
other sectors will slow in
coming months, just as the
Fed intends,” he said.
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