SIDNEY, Ohio — Picking up where former U.S. House Speaker John Boehner left off, U.S. Rep. of Ohio’s 8th Congressional District Warren Davidson hosted the 2017 Farm Forum at Edison State Community College in mid-March.

 

Hundreds of farmers from Shelby and neighboring counties attended this event. Taking part in the forum were U.S. Representative of Ohio’s 7th Congressional District Bob Gibbs, Executive VP Adam Sharp of the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation, and Presidential Agriculture Advisory Committee member Fred Yoder.

 

Each presented touched on a number of topics that applied directly or

indirectly to agriculture, including trade, infrastructure, regulations, tax reform,

healthcare and immigration. Most in the audience, though, were curious about Yoder and his association with U.S. President Donald Trump’s Presidential Agriculture Advisory

Committee.

 

Hundreds of volunteers from all states in the country dot this advisory committee and Yoder said he’s honored to be chosen.

 

“It’s heavily loaded with farmers,” Yoder said about the committee. “These

are people who are very strong in their beliefs. They are not a rubber stamp for

everything that Trump suggests but that they are there to advise him.

 

“(President) Trump believes strongly in market solutions and he also wants

to make sure we have the platform for innovation. He wants us to check which

policy has been working and what policy hasn’t been working.” Yoder also

discussed a desire for cabinet members to be supportive of renewable energy as

one-third of corn crops go to renewable fuels.

 

“I’m worried about the six to eight cabinet members who appeared to be not

supportive of renewable energy,” Yoder said.

 

Gibbs took the stand to discuss trade, exports and immigration, adding “we

have to export and move stuff overseas,” Gibbs said. “Trump is taking a tough line

on immigration and looking at bi-lateral trade agreements rather than multilateral

trade agreements.”

 

In regards to regulations, Gibbs said the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and

Consumer Protection Act is “penalizing our small community banks for what

happened in ‘08 and ‘09. Gibbs and Davidson both called for repealing and

replacing Dodd-Frank during the Farm Forum.

 

Gibbs also called for health care reform and tax reform.

 

“It’s falling apart. It’s imploding,” Gibbs said about health care, calling

the recently introduced (and defeated) American Health Care Act a “rescue

plan.”

 

During the question-and-answer period later on, Davidson explained this bill

was “not a full repeal” and is “not a full replace” but is a mixture of both in order

to get support from Democrats.

 

“I want to get a yes on it,” Davidson said, “as nothing really gets turned off

until January of 2020.”

 

Gibbs also shared his ideas about tax reform. “Tax reform needs to be done.

Rates are too high,” Gibbs said, adding that he wanted to “do away with the

death tax, add 100 percent expensing and add a territorial tax system.”

 

Gibbs told the audience that the 2014 Farm Bill will run out in September and

Congress has started the hearings.

 

“The Farm Bill is not a partisan bill,” Gibbs said. “It’s more of a struggle

between the Midwest and the South.

 

“Provisions about food stamps are also included in the Farm Bill to get “votes

from suburban representatives.”

 

Immigration form was a hot topic during the speeches from Sharp and Yoder.

Sharp stated that half of the state’s dairy labor is from outside the United States.

Yoder discussed improving the guest worker program for agriculture after

speaking with a local strawberry farmer who said his strawberries “lay to waste”

because he didn’t have enough people to farm them.

 

Sharp encouraged farmers to look into doing estate planning and called for an

increased support of use of technology in agriculture.

 

“We need to have a conversation on the acceptance of technology in agriculture,”

Sharp said.

 

Sharp also spoke about supporting youth programs that encourage

juveniles and young adults to take part in agriculture, whether they are from a

farming community or what Sharp called “non-traditional communities.”

 

“We have strong 4H and FFA clubs in Ohio….4H and FFA is in our DNA,” Sharp

said. “They should be supporting other paths to agriculture as well to encourage

youth to be part of the future of it.”

 

Infrastructure was also a concern expressed during the Farm Forum, along with the uncertainty of how improvements to infrastructures will be funded. Yoder said the he heard ideas of “public-private partnerships” as well as raising the fuel tax.

 

Davidson disagreed with the idea of raising taxes. He said that roughly 30 percent of the transportation budget is for “trails and beautification and trains.”

 

Davidson called for “using our highway money for highways.”