Grange Leader Calls for More, Not Less Farming

National Grange ^ | Nov. 12, 2001 | Richard Weiss

[Arthalion]

Yep. If we try to pass legislation to protect farmland around here, we end up getting it from three sides.

1. First you get the developers and construction industries whining about diminishing their livelyhoods. Too many people have become dependent on continued sprawl and curtailing it would hurt the economy.
2. Next you get it from the planners. If we build less houses, the value of the existing ones increases. This has the effect of pricing poorer people out of the home market and traps them in apartments.
3. Finally, you get it from the farmers themselves. Too many farmers in this region plan their retirements based on the developers going rates. They know they can make far more by selling their land to a developer than to another farmer, and so they do just that. When we try to pass these farmland protection bills they scream about us "infringing on their property rights" and destroying thier financial future.

So what's the solution? I dunno. I regard property rights to be among the most inviolate an American holds, but as I watch hectare after hectare of some of our nations best farmland disappear under endless rows of tract homes, I can't help but think we're shooting ourselves in the foot.

[Rudder]

Environmentalists have become witless participants in an enormous real estate scam.

That's for sure, and those trade figures you posted are testimony to the effects of that.

[Amerigomag]

Point well taken. The process here in Fresno goes as follows:

The city boundry sneaks up on the 20 acer farmer and he is then included in a "sphere of influence" or within the city limits themselves. This imposes additional restrictions and costs on his operation.

A developer then offers the struggling, small farmer a substantial, up front, cash offer, for an option to purchase his land at an inflated price at a future date. Typically about $2k per acre cash for an option to purchase in two to five years at triple the going rate for ag land.

When the option deadline nears the farmer realizes that he can get ten times the ag value but too late. He has to settle for the "reduced" rate. Continued farming is not an option when surrounded by homes, shopping centers, the neighborhood kids and a metered water supply.

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

Grange News Ping

[Carry_Okie]

They even use these regulations to make certain that only those developers who pay the political freight get to build. It's vertically-integrated corruption. The concensus process using technical advisory committees composed largely of bureaucrats removes any residue of transparency. I have documented the mechanics of the whole thing over thirty years in a recent book proposing a free-market alternative.

[Amerigomag]

Thanks. I've bookmarked your sight for tommorrow. Now it's time for bed. Work starts again at zero dark thirty tomorrow morning.

[tank_sherman]

Speaking of peanut butter, I saw some wrapped like sliced cheese. Latest thing in peanut butter I'm told.

The question is: Why? The easier to make sandwiches? God, this IS like the last days of the Roman Empire with the Huns coming over the hill. Are we really THAT lazy that we can't stick a knife in a jar and then smear it on bread? I despair for America ........

[brityank]

Morning BUMP for the East Coast. Our farmers need as much help as we can give them, and at least as much attention as the ongoing concerns of the WTC.

[Ben Ficklin]

Ther are realities that farming faces:

1. The political power of the environmental groups will not diminish.

2. The political power of the tribes will continue to rise. Often the tribes are aligned with the enviros but not always.

3. Genetic engineering will increase yields and likely develop plants that will grow in places that are not now farmable.

4. Water supplies will continue to shrink and prices will go up.

5. Non-point pollution regs are over the horizon.

6. Imported crops will continue to be a problem.

[Carry_Okie]

The problem is that valuable intangible goods that farms provide are not in the price of the food they sell. Urban poulations demand those goods for free, many of them by regulatory means. I have discovered a free-market pricing mechanism that may help restore the operation of those markets.

[Iowa Granny]

I've been reading about the Grange Convention in the Cedar Rapids Gazette.

[Osinski]

Bump for local family farms.

[farmfriend]

Richard will be happy to know some of his press releases are making into print.

[farmfriend]

Lisa Tharp is the Legislative Director. Laddie Marous is the Master. I don't remember his wife's name.

Ohio State Grange

[chambley1]

Concentration of payments for farms in the United States From 1996 through 2000, the top 10 percent of recipients in the United States were paid 67 percent of all USDA subsidies:

Chackout subsidy data base at www.ewg.org

[farmfriend]

Afternoon bump.

I mean a bump in the afternoon.

Make that.......Oh well, I give up.

[farmfriend]

bump for dinner

[farmfriend]

Grange Takes Stand on Environmental Regulations

[hedgetrimmer]

Bumping this terrific idea from the Grange.