NoNAIS.org

Government bureaucrats are overreaching their authority, attacking farmers without even having warrants or court orders to backup their actions. The latest attack, sent to me by many alert NoNAIS readers, comes at a Farm-to-Fork on-farm dinner at Quail Hollow Farm.

Farm-to-Fork Dinner Fiasco
By Laura Bledsoe | October 24, 2011

When an over-zealous regulator shows up at a farm dinner demanding that food be destroyed as hungry guests await, who do you call? Here’s Laura’s account written as a letter to her guests who had come to Quail Hollow Farm expecting a meal of foods harvested from local small family farms.
-Farm-To-Consumer, -FoodRenegade, -ShanonBrooks & -LewRockwell

Of interest, Nevada, where Quail Hollow Farm is located, is one of the more restrictive states. In the federal and many state regulations about meat slaughter and butchering it says:

Animals slaughtered and processed for animal owner may be slaughtered without inspection as long as the meat is consumed by the owner, members of the family, and non-paying guests.
-AMS.USDA.GOV, -APPPA.org

In Vermont we have:

Exempt - No inspection required:
Slaughter animals of your own raising for your own personal use, members of your household and non-paying guests
-Vermont Dept of Agriculture

The rules and regulations are so complex that there are things that can easily trip you up. Whether s it that way on purpose (government conspiracy) or by ineptitude (government stupidity) is often hard to tell. Many government officials are very helpful - get to know them ahead of time and work with them.

The problem comes when you get an over zealous, antagonistic government official hell-bent on sanctimoniously using their power. Using their power makes them feel like their existence is justified. They are afraid of losing their jobs if they don’t do something. Sometimes they have political motivations for higher office that they’re looking to promote by setting examples of how good they are at doing their job. Don’t let them climb the political ladder on your back.

Some lessons:

Do Seek all exemptions possible that keep the government and regulators out of your affairs. To do this you need to know the laws and regulations. They are accessible online. Read them. Understand them.

Do go slowly and think things out. Do not let the government rush you or panic you. You have rights. The bureaucrat is your civil servant. They should stay civil and serve you. They have limited authority.

Do document everything. Written, audio, video, photograph. Get officials names, ranks, agent numbers, department, phone number, email address, mailing address.

Do have witnesses. Many witnesses you trust.

Do ask for a warrant and under what authority the government is taking its actions.

Do not allow the government onto your property unnecessarily.

Do not allow the government further onto your property than absolutely necessary.

Do not allow events to become labeled as public events.

Do not allow your property to be labeled as a public building.

Do join the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund.

Lastly, do keep informed, follow what is happened, talk with others, comment on regulations in progress, contact your representatives regularly, work to fix bad regulations and laws. Work to improve the system.

There are some reasonable regulations, which fit with good sense, about how to harvest, prepare foods, cook, etc. Know them. Follow them. But don’t let government overreach its authority.

“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”
-Thomas Jefferson

From Mary Z…

Hello Walter.

You probably noticed that today’s Federal Register contained an APHIS notice extending the NAIS/”traceability” rule comment period by 30 days, until Dec. 9, 2011.

Apparently this is APHIS’s ineffectual attempt to “fix” the problems caused by their original publication of a bad link for comment submissions. I included in a story in The Milkweed last month your investigations about the bad link and your publicizing of a good link. Now that APHIS has “corrected” their original link, the link you had given for submissions now just goes to a general page listing some open comment periods (but not the one for this rule).

The various NAIS opposition groups are loudly claiming “victory” due to the comment-period extension, but that totally misses the point. The real point is the one you made from the start — APHIS’s messing around with the comment links completely impedes the public’s ability to have the legally required input on the rule. I just included a bit about this in an Oct Milkweed article and I suggested folks should submit comments such as the following:

USDA first gave an inoperable link for comments. Then, after some farmers found and publicized an alternate link, USDA apparently disabled the alternate link. Now USDA’s original link has been fixed. All this has resulted in much confusion and has prevented many members of the public from commenting. This violates the basic requirements of an adequate opportunity for public comment. At this point, the only way USDA can fix this defective rulemaking is to completely withdraw the proposed rule, re-publish it with the CORRECT link for online public comments, and allow at least a 120-day public comment period after the rule’s republication.

Having some comments such as the above in the record could prove valuable if, down the road, anyone needs to claim that USDA violated the requirements of the rulemaking process and the rule is therefore invalid.

If you think this approach has any merit, feel free to post some version of the above suggested comment on NoNAIS (subject, of course, to any corrections you may have to more accurately describe what happened with the links.)

Thanks

Mary

Walter here…

I suggest everyone go and leave comments at the new link as Mary has suggested. I also suggest that everyone send those comments to their state and federal representatives to protest this manipulation of public opinion. If we fail to speak up they will just steam roll over us. We told the USDA a resounding, yet polite no before. What part of “No” do they not understand?

Key Links:

eDocket APHIS–2009–0091 of USDA’s Federal Registry Notice of change to extend comment period.

New USDA Portal Link

New USDA Comment Link <-- USE TO SUBMIT COMMENTS

BEWARE that the comment form mandates some fields that are not marked as required. Just put a space or something else in all the fields to make the form work. Despite filling in all the required fields I had my comments rejected several times. Perhaps they don’t like what they’re hearing… (Just joking on that last bit. Sort of.) Persist - don’t let them block your voice with their ineptitude or otherwise.

My new comment to the USDA in October 2011:

First of all I do not appreciate the games that the USdA is playing with breaking links and preventing people from being able to comment on proposed policy changes. That is underhanded despotic tactics. Please clean up your act. No need for this sort of behavior. If it is IT (Information Technologist) incompetence then fire the people responsible and hire better workers. If this is an actual attempt at a conspiracy within the government perhaps in the coots with Big Ag then whip yourself - You’re really not doing a good job of it either way. I really expect better.

At this point, the only way USDA can fix this defective rule-making is to completely withdraw the proposed rule, re-publish it with the CORRECT link for online public comments, and allow at least a 120-day public comment period after the rule’s republication. All comments from ALL previous comment periods including previous comments about NAIS should be included in this comment period.

—So on to my comments about the topic—

In short: No NAIS! It’s that simple. We have no need of mandatory livestock traceability at the state or federal level. If anyone wants traceability let them do it voluntarily and pay for it themselves. I already have total traceability - I know where all of my livestock are at all times and my customers know too. Your studies show that traceability will steal $5 to $50 per head from my family, from my children’s mouths with increased costs that are not at all necessary.

I previously submitted comments (Comment Tracking Number: 80ee4937 on Document ID: APHIS-2009-0091-0001) at the other Federal Registry entry in August of 2011. Please add this to those comments and include both comments in the final comments on this topic.

I will be submitting both comments along with a complaint to my congressional representatives and my local state legislation to oppose your renewed attempts at forcing NAIS on us and to oppose your underhanded tactics for blocking public response.
-Comment Tracking Number: 80f4f098 Document ID: APHIS-2009-0091-0001: Traceability for Livestock Moving Interstate

My previous comment to the USDA in August:

I am opposed to NAIS, Animal ID, Animal Traceability or what ever you wish to change the name to. It all comes down to the same thing.

The USDA, had previously promised in the winter of 2010 to drop NAIS. Now the USDA is going back on their word - a shameful two-faced liar.

During this tight economic times the USDA is not able to get funding from Congress for the massively over budget NAIS they had so now they are trying to foist the costs and responsibilities for NAIS off on the states who also do not have the funds to enact or enforce such a program. This program should be called “No Cow Left Behind” because it is going to burden states with high costs without giving real benefits just as the disastrous “No Child Left Behind” has done.

Traceability is a violation of our Constitutional rights and freedoms. It is not necessary for the prevention of disease spread nor is it necessary for the notification of livestock owners. Traditional forms of media and the new media such as the internet are more than sufficient.

It is simply for the benefit of Big Ag & Exporters who want traceability so they can claim the marketing value that small producers have and so they can enter into foreign markets. If they want traceability they should create their own voluntary private system rather than a government subsidized system.

It will hurt consumers by raising food prices and limiting diversity in the market as the Big Ag producers destroy the small producers. The USDA needs to stop subsidizing Big Ag with tax payer money.

The worst of it is that the USDA is going down the path of Hell to repeat the terrible errors of the British government who killed almost 7 million healthy animals in a panicked reaction they later admitted was an error and that they had caused the diseases.

Any form of mandatory Premise ID, Animal Traceability & Animal ID is a bad idea. It should not be promulgated by unelected bureaucrats, stripping away our rights to farm and homesteading.

Feel free to borrow but customize it with your concerns.

In scary legal news a Wisconsin judge had gone completely loopy declaring that citizens have no right to produce or eat the foods of their own choice.

In response to a request from the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, the judge issued a clarification of his decision last week regarding his assessment of the constitutionality of food rights. The judge expanded on his original statement that such constitutional issues are “wholly without merit.”

He explained that the FTCLDF arguments were “extremely underdeveloped.” As an example, he said the plaintiffs’ use of the Roe v Wade abortion rights case as a precedent does “not explain why a woman’s right to have an abortion translates to a right to consume unpasteurized milk…This court is unwilling to declare that there is a fundamental right to consume the food of one’s choice without first being presented with significantly more developed arguments on both sides of the issue.” Gee, I thought they both had to do with the right to decide what to do with your own body.

As if to show how pissed he was at being questioned, he said his decision translates further that “no, Plaintiffs to not have a fundamental right to own and use a dairy cow or a dairy herd;

“no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to consume the milk from their own cow;”

And in a kind of exclamation point, he added this to his list of no-nos: “no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to produce and consume the foods of their choice…”

You have to wonder if maybe even the regulators are getting a tad uncomfortable with the rulings coming from the nation’s judiciary on food rights. Many of these individuals, biased as they are against raw milk, dabble in farming to some extent, or grew up on farms. This judge has gone way beyond what many of them have come to assume–that everyone has the right to own a cow and consume its milk Even in places that ban raw milk sales, there’s nearly always a provision in state law that anyone who owns a cow has the right to consume its milk.

It seems Judge Fiedler is saying it’s not a “fundamental right,” but rather a right granted us by the state.
-The Complete Patient

The original judgement can be seen here. To quote from the main points:

1) no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to own and use a dairy cow or a dairy herd;

2) no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to consume the milk from their own cow;

3) no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to board their cow at the farm of a farmer;

4) no, the Zinniker Plaintiffs’ private contract does not fall outside the scope of the State’s police power;

5) no, Plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to produce and consume foods of their choice;