From: Defenders of Wildlife Rural Updates! March 14, 2003 URGENT ACTION: PROTECT FUNDS FOR THE CSP Senate Budget Committee this week passed an amendment by Senator Grassley (R-IA), instructing the Department of Agriculture to enact a strict payment limit law at $300,000 max per farm, saving $1.4 billion annually. Under Grassley's proposal this money would be transferred to the new Conservation Security Program widely heralded as an innovative new working lands farm conservation program. The amendment closes loopholes: payments made as generic certificates are brought under the limits, and large farms could not exceed these limits by dividing into several corporations. There is certain to be an attack on the Grassley amendment when the Senate Budget Committee resolution goes to the floor next week. Please take a moment TODAY to call your senators and ask them to support the Grassley provision that enacts solid payment limitations and uses the savings to restore funding to the Conservation Security Program. The Capital Switchboard number is 202-224-3121. Calls are especially needed from the following states: California, Colorado, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Minnesota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Washington and Wyoming. Please call Senator Grassley to thank him for introducing this amendment. 202-224-3121 ENVIROS SUE OVER CAFO RULE The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club, and the Waterkeepers' Alliance filed suit last week challenging the EPA's rule on confined animal feeding operations. The groups contend that the rule, finalized by the EPA last December, violates the Clean Water Act by allowing large-scale farms to pollute waterways with animal waste. Under the rule, which has dramatically weakened since its original drafting during the Clinton administration, large animal factories would be allowed to continue to dump millions of gallons of liquefied manure into open lagoons, and then spray the liquid over fields. The rule exempts from the Clean Water Act the polluted runoff that typically results from these practices by calling it "agricultural stormwater." The new rule also allows CAFOs to write their own nutrient management plans without public input or agency oversight, and fails to mandate monitoring of waste seepage into groundwater supplies. Not everyone thinks the new rule is too weak, however -- the American Farm Bureau Federation and the National Chicken Council have filed suits "questioning the EPA's authority to require pollution permits." For more information, visit: http://ens-news.com/ens/mar2003/2003-03-10-10.asp - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - To view the Sierra Club List Terms & Conditions, see: http://www.sierraclub.org/lists/terms.asp