Department of Agriculture annual review
of the Wisconsin Livestock Siting Law
May 13, 2009

Wednesday, May 13, 9:00, at DATCP Offices, 2811 Ag Drive, Madison WI is the Deptartment of Agriculture annual review of the Wisconsin Livestock Siting Law. Citizens from across the state will speak their concerns. If you can, please plan to attend. You may speak for a few minutes or attend to offer support. We want to show a large concern. Contact us for car pooling. Below are suggested changes needed in the law, which will be addressed in 2010.

We hope to see a large representation from Crawford County. Plan to arrive by 9:30 to speak and hear others. If you wish to speak, bring a written copy to give to the board as well.

Livestock Siting Law Changes:

  1. Add Local Control: Local governments and citizens know the health and environmental vulnerabilities of their area. They also know what economic strengths they already have and which would be harmed by CAFOs. Here in Crawford County we presented volumes of scientific literature to DATCP that spoke to serious potential pollution and health issues on the CAFO application here. Other groups around the state have done likewise. These scientific findings have been ignored, thus showing that the statement in the law that scientific evidence can be used to make stronger requirements of a CAFO have not been allowed. Return local control on CAFO siting.
  2. Add Quality of Life: Quality of life is not in the law. People deserve clean air and water, the right to cookouts and gardens, etc. Living next to a CAFO limits those possibilities.
  3. Add Enforcement of Laws: State Laws and DNR Rules are not being enforced. Budgets need to support monitoring and enforcement. In addition, fines do not match damages to wells and water ways. Greater fines would help support enforcement.
  4. Add Air Emission Standards: Independent, peer reviewed scientific literature points to serious respiratory illness from the emissions of CAFOs. Our state law does not address those concerns.
  5. Add rules to Prohibit Building without out Licenses and Permits: Right now, potential CAFO operators are building before they receive their permits. This shows that every CAFO will receive the licenses and permits, regardless of any health or environmental factors. The lawsuits that would be filed once a facility is built would keep any government agency from denying a permit.
  6. Add Greater Distance Requirements: Schools, homes, hospitals, scenic river ways, state parks, historic sites, trout streams, lakes, creeks, etc. are all vulnerable and valuable community resources. The distances now required from these community assets to build CAFOs do not protect either the health of people or the environment.
  7. Add Reimbursements to Local Communities: Right now local costs from CAFOs from polluted wells, road repairs, and decreased property values to name a few are born largely by the local communities. CAFOs should be paying those costs, not tax payers.


"While CAFOs clearly are profitable, they are only profitable because so much of the cost and damage is externalized onto the environment, neighbors and wildlife. The monitoring, supervision, clean-up, restitution, fines are not happening, thus the true cost of CAFOs never find the way onto the balance books." Talking point from the CAFO Conference.