note from Erin: you might remember receiving an action alert in the mail about this during the fall of 2001, asking you to support Senator Harkin's attempt to pay farmers to produce environmental benefits. Erin E. Jordahl Director, Iowa Chapter Sierra Club 3839 Merle Hay Road, Suite 280 Des Moines, IA 50310 515-277-8868 [log in to unmask] <A HREF="www.iowa.sierraclub.org">www.iowa.sierraclub.org</A> FY 03 OMNIBUS CUTS $4 BILLION FROM CONSERVATION TITLE OF FARM BILL TO OFFSET DISASTER PACKAGE Oppose Effort to Rob Mandatory Conservation Funds Funding for the Conservation Security Program, a key farm bill conservation program, is cut by $4 billion in the final deal on the agriculture disaster portion of the omnibus. The CSP would be reduced from a CBO score of $7.77 billion to $3.77 billion. Of that total, $3.1 billion would be used to offset the increased commodity program payments and other disaster aid, and an additional $900 million would be cut to pay for conservation technical assistance and other elements of the overall omnibus package. "It is outrageous to re-open the farm bill conservation title to solve the standoff over the disaster bill," said Ferd Hoefner, Washington Representative for the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. "We urge Congress to reject this proposal." The Congressional Budget Office has just recently rescored the CSP program at $7.77 billion over 10 years, up from its $2 billion 10-year score for CSP last year - presumably a reflection of how enthusiastic farmers and ranchers have been about the new program to help them solve natural resource and environmental problems. "Cutting mandatory farm bill conservation programs to pay for natural disasters sets a terrible precedent," continued Hoefner. "It is more than a little ironic that conservation programs, the only farm programs that actually help mitigate the impact of drought, floods and other natural disasters, would be cut to pay for disaster payments. This will only help ensure a continuing need for disaster payments in years to come." "Counting cuts from years down the road in a mandatory conservation program to offset today's disaster package - which actually compensates for disasters from years gone by - is truly breaking new ground in budget chicanery. More importantly, changing the farm bill in the flash of an eye as part of a thousand-plus page funding bill is unfair to the farmers and ranchers and conservationists who fought and negotiated for two long years to enact this new, innovative, forward-looking program." If the proposed cut and the overall bill do in fact get approved and signed into law, the CSP program would remain in place as a new conservation entitlement program. All interested farmers and ranchers with qualified and approved conservation plans would be able to participate. However, once total obligations reached $3.77 billion -- the artificial cap proposed by the new language in the omnibus bill -- enrollment of additional participants would be halted, unless Congress authorizes additional funding at that point. The Conservation Security Program is a comprehensive stewardship incentives program that provides financial and technical assistance to farmers and ranchers to reward them for creating public benefits such as clean water, clean air, wildlife habitat, carbon sequestration, rangeland improvement, and wetland restoration and enhancements. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - To get off the IOWA-TOPICS list, send any message to: [log in to unmask]