Agri News, MN
05-16-06
Iowa lawmakers say session was good for agriculture
By Jean Caspers-Simmet
Agri News staff writer
DES MOINES -- Iowa House and Senate Agriculture Committee leaders said this legislative session was good for agriculture.
Senate Agriculture Committee co-chair David Johnson was glad to see a bill blocking the rule-making process that gives the director of the Department of
Natural Resources more discretion in rejecting livestock confinement permits passed.
"Do we give an appointed person more authority than the Legislature to adopt laws or regulations," Johnson said.
House Agriculture Committee chair Jack Drake said the director's discretion bill contains other provisions that will be good for the livestock industry.
The bill gives the DNR more authority over livestock confinement operations that don't have permits and are causing problems. All manure management permit holders will have to file reports electronically, something county officials said would make their job easier.
Eminent domain is one of the top five issues that came up when citizens contacted Drake before and during the session.
Legislators put new restrictions on the ability of governments to use their powers of eminent domain to condemn private property in order to make way for economic development projects.
"We don't want the government to be able to just step in and take things at will,"
Drake said.
Johnson said lawmakers extended more tax credits for small wind projects so that farmers, groups and municipalities can get involved in generating electricity from wind.
Landmark legislation committing $18 million for water quality projects in the state,
Johnson said.
House Agriculture Committee member Mark Kuhn is pleased legislators approved water standards to clean up Iowa's waters and made a new $18 million

commitment to improving waterways.
A bill creating a tax credit for landlords who rent or lease to beginning farmers passed for the second time. A year ago the governor vetoed the bill, but legislators are hopeful he will sign it this year.
The Easter Seals Rural Solutions Program was given a $130,000 appropriation that allows the program to continue helping disabled farmers farm, Johnson said.
Dolores Mertz, ranking Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, said a bill giving a tax credit to electric utilities that use soy-based transformer fluid is good for farmers and the environment. She was pleased about a bill that allows ag drainage well closure money to be used for alternative water quality practices.
Johnson's major disappointment was that legislators weren't able to earmark funds for upgrading the diagnostic lab at Iowa State University's College of
Veterinary Medicine.
"Iowa is number one in corn, hogs and ethanol, number five in cattle and is building its dairy herd,'' Johnson said. " The college sorely needs updated facilities."
"My disappointment is that there is never enough money for the agriculture budget,'' Mertz said. "One of my bugaboos is that we don't support ag in the state like we should.''