Maine Small Farmer Battle Going On (Lincoln, Oxford: credit, house, buy)

[BrokenTap]

There is a pretty good battle going on in the State of Maine right now. The USDA-NRCS has had a pilot program in place for the last year and surprisingly this change is working out well. Instead of having an administrator for every county, they group a couple of counties into a ZONE instead.

What does this mean for Mainers?

Just lower taxes. This does not upset the people on the ground talking to the farmers at all. This is just an administrative deal. Rather than have 4 administrators doing paperwork, they have 1 doing it. And instead of having the conservation planners doing paperwork, 1 administrator does it so that they can help farmers instead.

So far it has worked well. Maine has two important things going on.

1. We have the most start-up farms in the nation
2. We have the youngest farmer age in the nation

In short, agriculture in Maine is making a powerful comeback, so it really upsets me when a new state administrator comes in from out of state and wants to destroy the new Zone System. It is only one upper management person that dislikes the system, but unfortunately he holds the axe that could cut the zone system from Maine.

A few of us have really worked hard to make sure smaller farmers are getting some of the Farm Bill money that our legislators thought we were getting. In years past only the big farmers in Waldo county got any money, but this year it was shared between both big and small, and over half the people applied were given the money they requested...and the second round of funding is about to happen so that figure will only increase.

Think of it this way. Instead of 3 or 4 expensive projects being done for big farmers, we are doing 17 little projects...but for the small farmer, these little projects make a huge impact on their farming operations so how "little" is that really? It's time the small farmer got a bit of thepie!

I have been on the phone all day talking to both state and federal legislators letting them know that pulling the plug on the Zone System is far to premature. It is only a year old and stats show it is making a difference. If it saves taxpayers money, and we are increasing farms and getting younger people involved...why oh why would you want to abolish that system???

If anyone truly wants to help small farmers in Waldo, Knox, Lincoln, Oxford and Androscoggin Counties, they can simply asky the same question I have.

Why abolish something that is working?

John Piotti is the House Majority Leader and is a powerful voice in Maine Agriculure. He also represents Waldo County which is affected by this zone. Being the house majority leader though, he can take calls from anyone in Maine. A 2 minute call would help small, local farmers I assure you...

207 287 1430

Thanks

[tankratt]

Hey Broken Tap good for you hang in there and keep on farmin

[msina]

A 2 minute call would help small, local farmers I assure you...
done.

[cebdark]

So noted.

[BrokenTap]

I have a hard time with this whole thing guys. It just screams of someone abusing power. Perhaps in a private business this sort of decision to keep or axe the Zone System would be just fine, but this is the Federal Government and a system that funnels down money to the people legislators intended the money get to. There should be some public comment on this and that just isn't happening.

There is a token inquiry in some of the local ag committees, but overall its pretty hush-hush because the decision has already been made by most accounts. At the very least legislators of these districts should have been clued in to the decision that is being made on the zones, but that is not happening either.

The real issue here is this: farming is more than a job and vital to the communities in which these farms reside. Even if you don't farm, and buy your food from Hannaford, without fields the woods would grow in and many of the views we see today would be gone. Forest and field, that is just Maine and good portion of that is done by small farmers. For years Waldo County has not given much Fed or State money to small farmers and that was a mistake. Its been changed via the new Zone System and now a single person who has not been in this state for 30 days wants to change that with one fell swoop?

Not on my shift pal.

This isn't a big farm versus small farm issue. It is simple a "small farm contibutes to Maine too" issue.

[cebdark]

Originally Posted by BrokenTap

I have a hard time with this whole thing guys. It just screams of someone abusing power. Perhaps in a private business this sort of decision to keep or axe the Zone System would be just fine, but this is the Federal Government and a system that funnels down money to the people legislators intended the money get to. There should be some public comment on this and that just isn't happening. Perhaps it's just me, but I seem to hear more and more about the lack of public comment on issues these days.

There is a token inquiry in some of the local ag committees, but overall its pretty hush-hush because the decision has already been made by most accounts. At the very least legislators of these districts should have been clued in to the decision that is being made on the zones, but that is not happening either.

I found the "hush-hush' factor to me most difficult to swallow also when it came to school consolidation.

Have you heard any actual reason for the decision being made? How is it justified?

[BrokenTap]

I got a call yesterday morning from the USDA office and the person in charge of the State of Maine and I talked at length about this situation. They said I was confused and that the intention had never been to abolish the Zone System but to get information on it and make sure it works.

Was I confused and got this situation mixed up, or did the call from the Legislatures change their attitude?

I have gotten things mixed up before so I am not infallible, but I think in this case it was people once again getting involved that made a difference. This issue has been going on for months, and despite me sending many emails out on how the Zone System was working so well, I was told "no information had come forward on whether it was working or not." It is pretty hard to prove a negative, but I got copies of the emails I sent out so they do exist and information from a producer was sent forward.

It makes me wonder?

Either way I got to tell the powers that be at the USDA here in Maine that too many people had invested too much in small farms and are getting good results to go back now. Perhaps it is too much to credit the Zone System to all of those positive things, but when something is working, why rock the boat, especially if the program is only a year old and the boat hasn't got much farther out then past the dock?

Since I think people getting involved made a huge difference rather then me "being confused", I will thank all the people on City Data Forum-Maine who called or simply sent-up good karma or whatever. I was assured the Zone System will stay in place. As I said in another post, it only takes a few to get attention and I truly think that is what happened in this case. Thanks again.

[cebdark]

Thanks for the update BrokenTap.