By SUSAN BLOWER
Indiana Correspondent

KNIGHTSTOWN, Ind. — The Knightstown Locker has built its business on butchering and selling locally raised cattle and hogs since 1971. Dan Titus took over and expanded the business in 1988. He expected to hand his successful shop down to his two sons – until now.

Faced with a budget crisis in this recession, Gov. Mitch Daniels has asked the Indiana State Board of Animal Health (BOAH) to cut 50 percent from the Meat and Poultry Inspection Program. BOAH, in turn, has proposed drastically cutting the number of its meat and poultry inspectors.

Titus has been told that he can expect a state inspector to come to his shop only one day per week for three hours, down from 3-5 days per week.

Worse, the inspectors will come when it’s convenient for them. Inspectors must be present from the point of post-mortem to cooler. Only inspected meat can be sold legally.

“It makes me sick to my stomach,” Titus said. “In my personal opinion nothing is going to happen until a baby dies.”

Not only is he concerned for the safety of consumers, Titus estimates that this change will cut his business down to 15 percent of what it is now.

The Knightstown Locker does $200,000 to $300,000 per year in orders and walk-in customers. It employs seven people. He doesn’t know what direction he will go. His first inkling of this decision was provided in a letter to meat packers that he received on Jan. 7. Since then he has explored various options, none of which are good.

“I don’t know if it’s feasible to keep the business running,” Titus said.

Statewide impact
The decision to cut the state inspection program in half will “greatly impact not just my business but businesses across the state,” said Greg Fisher, president of Indiana Meat Packers Assoc. and manager of his family business, Fisher Packing, in Portland, Ind.
“It is extremely detrimental. Some businesses won’t come out of it,” Fisher said.

The farming sector will be affected, as well. In the last seven years, Fisher said 500,000 animals were slaughtered in meat lockers, freezer-beef programs and farmer’s markets. Without inspectors, those animals cannot be sold to the public.

“I don’t know if we can quantify the impact this is going to have,” Fisher said.

The Indiana Meat Packers Assoc. first learned of the budget cuts two weeks ago. Since then the organization has tried to pull together the Indiana Beef Cattle Assoc., the Indiana Pork Producers Assoc., Purdue University and others to protest.
Fisher said they are campaigning for this money to be re-appropriated to the inspection program.

“This is a growing industry, especially farmer’s markets. There’s a lot of need for the services we provide ... The tax revenues (the state loses from closing lockers) will more than outweigh the $900,000 they save (by cutting the program).”

With the added burden of unemployment assistance to the inspectors and employees of the closing businesses, the state will not get “very much bang for its buck,” Fisher said.

“We’re providing jobs and services in rural communities. Especially in a recession, I’m not sure what else we have in the budget that could claim that.”