Environmental Coalition Sues EPA Over CAFO Rule

The EPA and its Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation or CAFO reporting rule is back in the headlines as earlier this week, a coalition of animal welfare and environmental organizations has filed a lawsuit against the EPA Agency challenging the Agency's withdrawal of a proposed rule about a year ago that would have allowed EPA to collect basic information, like locations and animal population sizes, of the nation's CAFOs. Field reporter Greg Martin has more Martin: "The EPA withdrew the proposed rule last July after comments from state agencies concerning the need for a federal law when the information in question was already being gathered by state and local agencies. The livestock industry was pleased with the proposed rule's withdrawal as according to the EPA the rule would have allowed EPA to place this personal information on the agency's website in an easily searchable database, where the ag industry feared extremists could access the information with the intent to do harm to cattle operations or the nation's food system. ?However, despite the EPA withdrawing the rule, earlier this year the agency passed the private information of livestock producers to three radical environmental groups through a Freedom of Information Act request in February and again in April. The release divulged names, addresses, geographic coordinates and in some cases telephone numbers and email addresses of over 80,000 producers in 29 states. Most listed are not regulated under the Clean Water Act, some having as few as 12 head of livestock." Thanks, Greg