Agriculture leaders, EPA spar over regulations

WASHINGTON - The war of words between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Iowa's agricultural interests is heating up - and not even face-to-face meetings seem to be easing tensions.

This week, Sen. Chuck Grassley, D-Iowa, joined several other members of the Senate Agriculture Committee in a closed-door meeting with EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy on Capitol Hill. The committee's Republican members had requested the meeting in a May 23 letter to the agency because of several dust-ups between the EPA and agriculture leaders.

Not only did the meeting not go well - Grassley released a statement after the meeting blasting the EPA for an 'unhelpful approach and general negative attitude toward agriculture” - but he still was seething about it Wednesday afternoon.

'My impression is that nothing is going to change,” he said. 'Two or three of the members said it's better to withdraw this and start over again, that we've got to write it so it's clear and people understand it. I think starting over would be the right thing to do, but I don't think she's inclined to do it.”

Grassley said the Agriculture Committee members requested the meeting be closed, as did McCarthy, to allow for a 'frank discussion.”

At heart are several issues, the most recent of which is an attempt to 'clarify” the 1972 Clean Water Act after U.S. Supreme Court decisions in 2001 and 2006 made it unclear which waterways are subject to federal regulation because of downstream connections and which are not. Agency officials say there is no attempt to expand the agency's authority, and it actually scales back the amount of waterways the agency regulates to the amount of the 1980s. And, EPA officials say, any clarification would keep current exemptions and exclusions for agriculture.

Farming interests aren't buying it, accusing the government of a 'land grab” that could control waters with only a minute effect on downstream waters, such as ponds, drainage ditches and culverts.

In recent days, the American Farm Bureau has amped up its rhetoric as well, saying it is in the midst of a 'public relations campaign” and that it wants to take the discussion to a 'wider audience.”

'AFBF and several state Farm Bureaus have met with the EPA repeatedly, and each time agency officials have declined to grapple with the serious, real-world implications of the rule,” AFBF President Bob Stallman said in a July 17 statement. 'EPA is now engaged in an intensive public relations campaign, and we believe its statements are directly contrary to the reality of the proposed rule.”

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, did not sign the May 23 letter - it was limited to Republicans on the Agriculture Committee - and called the controversy 'much ado about nothing.” He said that farming practices have changed drastically over the past few generations, and that some level of regulation is necessary.

'Ag interests are just kind of whipping things up,” Harkin said.

The EPA has extended the period in which it is accepting public comments on the new Clean Water Act proposal, with a final decision possible in October.

But other grievances still remain. In their May letter to the EPA, Republican senators cited pesticide regulations, methane emissions, a controversial leak of private information about farmers by the EPA, 'and other regulatory issues that may be on the horizon and could threaten the continued productivity and economic viability of American agriculture.”

There also is an EPA proposal to lower the amount of ethanol in the federal Renewable Fuel Standard, which has Iowa's ethanol industry on guard.

Top state and federal representatives have united to oppose that, given that Iowa leads the nation in ethanol production.

On Wednesday, Grassley said he is not hopeful.

'I appreciate the Administrator coming to the Hill to talk with us, but the meeting did little to alleviate my concerns that the agency isn't listening to the people its rules will directly impact.”