CAFO in Fayette County?
Kicks 96 is reporting this morning that a CAFO went before the Fayette County planning commission seeking a special exception earlier this week. The discussion was tabled, and reset for April 10th, so those of you near Old Town should probably figure out what is going on.
The Connersville News Examiner has more:
The request by Steele and Caldwell Farms, located on County Road 350-South and County Road 250-West, calls for a restricted commercial farm enterprise (confined feeding operation).
Resident Gary Smith requested members to table the issue as several people residing in the area have yet to study the information and respond. Smith cited road conditions, odor, revenue versus cost and use of property as concerns in the area for the proposed business.
He said only some of the neighbors were contacted about the operation. The board granted an extension until the April 10 meeting to present objections to the operation.
Kari Steele is to be one of the operators, and the article identifies her as a former consultant for IDEM in the confined feeding area:
She said the 4,000-pig operation would use about 4,000 gallons of water daily. The annual operation will require about 35 trips with semi-trailers using the road and will not present a traffic problem.
She said there are 59,000 farmers in Indiana of which 3,200 are pork farmers. Six million pigs are marketed annually. Pigs eat 12 percent of corn grown in Indiana and eight percent soy beans.
IDEM identifies (pdf) Ms. Steele as a contact person for Signature Farms in Greensburg, Indiana, which is connected to the Prema-Lean Pork Company, affiliated with Pyramid Partners. Prema-Lean was fined $5,687.50 by IDEM over a manure spill in Shelby County, Indiana. (see Order). Pyramid is run by Purdue grad John W. Corya of Greensburg, IN..
April 6th, 2006 14:20
I just came across your article about a pig CAFO possibly coming to Fayette County.
My husband and I are two of the 42 residents that live within a mile of this proposed pig factory and are going to fight it.
I wanted to inform you that the date has been changed for the meeting to present objections.
It is to be on Wednesday, April 19th. We received a letter from the APC stating this.
We believe it will be “lively” meeting.
These proceedings are usually taped to show on the local TV station, but at the last meeting when Ms. Steele gave her presentation
promoting the CAFO, the audio was lost in the taping, and imagine this, there is no recording of what she said. Would be nice if we had a news team that would be interested in
covering this in person. The meeting is at the City Hall at 500 N. Central, Connersville
at 7:00 on April 19th…..unless it is changed on us again.