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| Bluegrass lawmakers vote fees for ‘Kentucky Proud’ |
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By TIM THORNBERRY
Kentucky Correspondent FRANKFORT, Ky. — As the 2008 General Assembly winds down, agriculture fared pretty well through a session filled with anxiety over budget cuts and divisions over bringing forth a vote to allow casino gambling.
The Kentucky Department of Agriculture (KDA) helped push through House Bill 626, which establishes “Kentucky Proud” in state law and authorizes the agriculture commissioner to collect fees to fund the farm marketing program. Kentucky Proud has been a huge marketing success used to get state-made products out to the general public and has been a leading initiative of Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner Richie Farmer.
“This bill will assure producers, as well as consumers, that Kentucky Proud will always be the brand for fresh, nutritious, great-tasting food products made right here in the Commonwealth,” Farmer said. “Kentucky Proud has been very successful in much of the state, and this legislation provides the stability to take the Kentucky Proud movement to a higher level.”
The bill, sponsored by Democrat representatives Mike Denham (Maysville); Tom McKee (Cynthiana) and Ruth Ann Palumbo (Lexington), also allows Kentucky Proud funds to be carried over from one fiscal year to the next and establishes a 12-member council to advise the KDA on administering the program. The program, which started with a few dozen members, has grown to include more than 1,000 since 2004, with an estimated $80 million in retail sales in 2007.
KDA also applauded the passage of Senate Bill 203, concerning amusement ride safety. The department is required by state law to inspect every amusement ride or attraction that operates in the state at least once a year and investigate serious ride accidents. The legislation requires ride owners to inspect rides before opening to the public each day and prohibits anyone under 18 from operating a ride.
It also requires ride owners to notify the KDA within 12 hours of an accident that results in death, injury requiring medical treatment other than first aid or damage to a ride that renders it unsafe, and permits the department to issue subpoenas in a ride accident investigation and establish civil penalties of up to $10,000, up from the current maximum of $1,000.
This legislation followed a tragic incident last year that severed both feet of a girl riding the Superman Tower of Power ride at Six Flags’ Kentucky Kingdom Amusement Park in Louisville.
Other ag-related legislation that made its way through the state House and Senate included HB 495 and HB 484, both supported by the Community Farm Alliance (CFA), a grassroots membership organization with 2,000 members in 75 Kentucky counties, which advocates helping local farmers through the idea of a local farm economy.
HB 495 addressed the issue of keeping the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) from becoming a mandate on the state level without first being a federal directive. In the event NAIS becomes mandatory on the federal level, this legislation will ensure that state policy will be no more stringent than the federal mandate, while preventing the state from penalizing a farmer or withholding goods, services, licenses, permits, grants or other benefits based on non-participation in any phase of the NAIS.
State Rep. Rick Rand (D-Bedford), the primary sponsor of HB 495, said his involvement started more than a year ago when the ag development board on the state level said farmers could not cost share in model programs at the county level if they did not register their premises.
“I did not think that was fair and it was unreasonable, so I worked with the ag development board and they backed off of that issue,” he said. “It looks to me like the wheels are kind of off the wagon as far as the national program is concerned, and I didn’t feel like it was in Kentucky farmers’ best interest to be the state out there pushing this.”
CFA member Frank McAninch said the NAIS would create a lot of extra out-of-pocket expenses for farmers.
“This was a real victory for Kentucky farmers and it decreases the threat of more expenses and liability for them. One thing this legislation did was maintain a degree of independence and protected the small farmers’ liberty. Those are two things we don’t want to lose,” he said.
The original intent of HB 484 was to require state-funded universities to purchase local agricultural products when possible. The bill partnered with HB 669 from the 2006 session, which required state parks to purchase local ag products. Late in the session, the language of the bill was changed from a mandate to an “encouragement” for those universities to purchase locally.
Betty Bailey, a CFA board member, retired schoolteacher and fourth-generation family farmer from Bath County, said the bill was a perfect partner to HB 669 and “creates another building block toward creating a sustainable future for our Kentucky farmers and providing a local food economy for all Kentuckians.”
McAninch said, regarding the passage of HB 484, “Legislation is a compromise and if you can get any through the House and the Senate and it does most of what you want, it’s a victory. Now what we have is a piece of legislation that we can go back to and try and improve.”
These bills now head to the desk of Gov. Steve Beshear for his signature.
This farm news was published in the April 9, 2008 issue of the Farm World, serving Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee. |
| 4/9/2008 |
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