For those of you who missed this last week, this was the "press release".

Rural Iowans can again sue hog factories.

ICLU's six year quest to restore property rights ends
with Iowa Supreme Court ruling in today's Gacke decision.

Iowa's statutory protection for concentrated animal feeding operations
finally bit the dust today with a new ruling by the Iowa Supreme Court.

Invoking the rarely used "inalienable rights" clause of the Iowa
Constitution, the court restored the right of rural Iowans to go to court to
defend their property interests regarding neighboring hog confinements.
Rural Iowans can again sue hog factories.

Civil libertarians, family farm groups and environmentalists hailed the
decision, which lifted a near total ban on nuisance suits against animal
feeding operations that pollute or spoil adjoining properties.

"Justice smells sweet," said Ben Stone, executive director of the Iowa Civil
Liberties Union. "After years of struggle, rural Iowans have regained their
right to fight back in defense of their way of life. And you can bet they
will do just that," he added.

"This is a huge victory for family farmers and rural residents who have had
to put up with the stench and other problems with factory farms," said
Marilyn Anderson, a rural Story County board member with Iowa Citizens for
Community Improvement. "This ruling will help us hold them accountable" she
added.

"This ruling affirms what we've known all along - animal factories that
pollute our air and water, destroy rural quality of life, and threaten
public health deserve to be held accountable. And now, they will be," said
Tarah Heinzen, Sierra Club conservation organizer.

The ruling, which came in an Iowa Civil Liberties Union case, pitted Joseph
and Linda Gacke, Iowa farmers, against Pork Xtra, LLC., which built a hog
confinement facility on adjoining property. With their quality of life and
normal use of their property destroyed by airborne pollution, the Gackes'
sued in spite of an Iowa law that gave animal feeding operations immunity
for creating such a nuisance. The Gackes proved that the hog operation was a
serious nuisance and received a judgment compensating them for their past
suffering and the loss of the value in their homestead property.

Pork Xtra appealed the judgment which came only after the trial judge threw
out the Iowa Statute giving animal feeding operations immunity from nuisance
claims. Pork Xtra argued that an earlier Iowa Decision in Bormann v. Kossuth
County Board of Supervisors, should be overturned. Bormann only applied to a
small number of concentrated animal feeding operations that had been
established in formally designated "agricultural zones," but the statute in
Bormann was similar to the provision under challenge in the Gacke appeal.

In today's decision the Iowa Supreme Court not only declined to overturn its
prior decision in Bormann, but also found that additional grounds existed to
hold the entire immunity provision unconstitutional. The Court noted that
the Gacke's were property owners long before the nuisance was established
next door, and that they were being asked to bear the entire brunt of the
operation without possibility of compensation and without any benefit to
themselves.

The Court's opinion goes on to hold that the immunity statute violates
Article I, Section 1 of the Iowa Constitution which provides in part that
all persons "have certain inalienable rights-among which are those of
enjoying and defending life and liberty, acquiring, possessing and
protecting property, and pursuing and obtaining safety and happiness."

"It has been rare for the High Court of any state to invoke this clause",
says ICLU Legal Director Randall Wilson, who served on the case along with
the Gacke's local trial attorney Thomas Lipps of Algona, Iowa. "You can
count the Iowa decisions invoking this clause on the fingers of one hand,"
Wilson said.

As a result of the decision today it is no longer possible for agribusiness
lawyers to go to the federal courts for a different result, Wilson said.

Summary of opinion and link to full decision at:
http://www.judicial.state.ia.us/supreme/opinions/20040616/summary.asp?search
=02-0417#_1

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