Ohio Issue

 So-called non-profit lawyers…members of PETA…wild-eyed environmentalists beware. There’s an agricultural  grassroots effort taking hold and it’s called logical pushback.  Ohio voters recently approved a constitutional amendment to create a Livestock Care Standards Board. The ballot called Issue 2 was supported by 64% of the voters.

 Issue 2 was drafted and supported by an Ohio agricultural coalition in response to threats from the Humane Society of the United States to dictate how food animals are housed and handled through legislation and/or ballot measures. The 13-member board will provide a mechanism for determining and enforcing guidelines for the care and well-being of livestock and poultry. Board members will have the authority to ensure the quality, safety and availability of locally produced food in Ohio . What happened in Ohio is similar to grassroots efforts here in Idaho. For example, the Western Legacy Alliance’s Wally Butler describes responsible grassroots pushback: . “Western Legacy Alliance was kind of an outgrowth of a cooperative deal that the Idaho Farm Bureau and Idaho Cattle Association started out 2-3 years ago, mostly just to try to tell the rest of the story about what happens on our public land rather than the publicity that comes out of the environmental groups.”

 Environmental groups that are represented by lawyers who make a very comfortable living charging taxpayers $650/hr to stop farms from farming.