Application pulled for Johnson County hog operation but plan may not be dead

IOWA CITY - A farmer proposing a hog confinement in eastern Johnson County pulled his application for a construction permit Thursday, but that does not necessarily mean the project will not happen.

Ray Slach had applied for a permit for a confinement animal feeding operation at 4315 Oasis Rd. to house 2,480 hogs.

The Johnson County Board of Supervisors held a public hearing on the application, but before the meeting started, Slach delivered a brief letter saying he was withdrawing his application.

The plan called for a structure 1,620 feet away from an existing one run by Slach with 2,400 hogs. Because of the number of combined hogs and their proximity to each other, to get a permit he would need to meet minimum standards in a scoring system established by the state known as a master matrix.

However, if he were to build the confinement at least 2,500 feet from the existing facility, he would not need a construction permit because the distance would be great enough and the number of animals small enough so as to not trigger the master matrix process, according to the county. There may still be some state rules he'd have to meet, according to the county.

Slach did not attend the hearing and did not tell the county what his intentions were. He declined to comment when reached by phone Thursday morning.

Some of the county supervisors bemoaned their lack of control over such a scenario.

'Local government has no power to block this, it has no power to site this, it has not power to (put in place) a moratorium,” supervisor Janelle Rettig said.

A crowd of at least a few dozen people attended the meeting, with some watching from an overflow area when the boardroom filled.

Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, a liberal organization active in political and environmental issues, brought attention to Slach's application. Many of the more than 15 people who addressed the supervisors identified themselves as CCI members and said they were worried about environmental effects, odor and the conditions of the animals.

Suzan Erem, who described herself as a beginning farmer in neighboring Cedar County and a CCI member, said confinement animal feeding operations and large corporate farming interests harm family farmers.

'There will be no place in this land for us,” she said.

Most of the speakers were opposed to Slach's plan, but there was some support for him.

Daniel Whitehall said he was a neighbor and friend of the Slach family.

'They are good people,” he said. 'They are respectful to the best of their abilities.”

Slach's application would have ultimately been decided based on the master matrix scoring, said Gene Tinker, animal feeding operations coordinator for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources.

The DNR only would have reviewed the proposal if the county did not give it a passing score, he said. County staff had preliminarily given it enough points to be approved.

Records from the DNR indicate the last facility built in Johnson County of the size Slach proposed was in 1993, when there was no master matrix process, Tinker said.

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