THANK YOU! CAFO Ordinance Stalls Under Mountain of Negative Comments
Buried under a mountain of negative comments on their proposed CAFO ordinance, the Polk County Environmental Services Committee took no action yesterday!
Initial numbers presented to the committee at the July 8, 2020 meeting indicate that there were an unprecedented 175 comments made on the ill-conceived proposal. While it is impossible to tell exactly what the final tally will be, it appears that only 14 commenters felt the proposal was too strong and more than 160 thought it was too weak.
Thank you to all of the people who took a break during the 4th of July Holiday to protect the health and property values of our beloved Polk County!
As would be expected during a pandemic the vast majority of you chose to send in your comments by email. While we don’t have final number, initial tallies indicate that there were close to 150 emails, 13 videos and 13 live comments. This far exceeds the more than 110 people who attended a January 2020 public hearing on basically the same proposal.
Concerns about the proposed ordinance included the lack of protection for un-zoned towns, 200 foot setbacks for an infinite number of hogs and no liability for future pollution. Many people called for Polk County to look seriously at the operations permit ordinance passed in Bayfield County years ago along with the improved versions passed this year by the Towns of Trade Lake and Eureka.
While it is not clear what the county’s next step will be, we are so blessed by all of you who stepped up!
We are also thankful to see our County Supervisors put the brakes on this deeply-flawed proposal.
Now is the time to design a CAFO ordinance that protects the health and property values of all Polk County families!