DeGroot Out of Indiana
Fort Wayne’s Wane TV is reporting that Dutch Dairyman Johannes DeGroot has resolved his longstanding difficulties with IDEM by entering a consent decree:
Under an agreement reached with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM), Huntington County dairy owner Johannes DeGroot and DeGroot Dairy, LLC, operating in Indiana since 2001, is barred from operating livestock facilities in the State of Indiana. The Agreed Order, signed by DeGroot Dairy, LLC, and IDEM, resolves all compliance issues currently in litigation and allows for the dairy’s sale and operation in compliance with strict environmental regulations.
Link. The agreement has DeGroot selling off his Huntington County CAFO dairy to Vreba-Hoff - who has committed to IDEM that it will alter the dairy to bring it into compliance. It will be called Andrews Dairy, LLC.
MORE: The agreement should end up here - check this link for the full history . . . .
March 26th, 2008 11:01
Here’s the only problem with this…Vreba-Hoff is the company that originally funded the creation of the DeGroot CAFO. Look up any of the number of IDEM violations against DeGroot and see that Vreba-Hoff is also named along with DeGroot. It’s like the mafia boss taking over a business that was once run by one of his street soldiers.
March 26th, 2008 11:10
Remember this note from January 2007?
“On Jan. 4, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 announced it had issued an administrative order to comply with a state-issued discharge permit to Vreba-Hoff Dairy Development, Wauseon, Ohio, and De Jong Dairy LLC, Fremont, Ind. Vreba-Hoff has since provided documents to EPA demonstrating that it has transferred ownership of the dairy. EPA has sent a letter to Vreba-Hoff notifying the company that it is not responsible for complying with the EPA order. Dairy operator Simon De Jong has told EPA that he intends to comply with the order.”
Yeah, right.
March 26th, 2008 13:14
We did not want a dairy there at all, that close to Salamonie Reservoir. But to allow Vreba-Hoff to re-name it and immediately apply for an expansion to 2,500 cows is ridiculous! Vreba-Hoff has continual environmental violations at their dairies in several Midwestern states! The things that need to be corrected at this dairy have NOT been corrected yet, nor, after 4 years, do we believe IDEM can correct, monitor and enforce this! This dairy could not even handle 1.400 cows, so there is no way an expansion to 2,500 cows should be allowed! In April 2007 there were 3 serious spills by 3 CAFO dairies in 2 months – DeGroot Dairy, Union-Go Dairy, and Bekel Leasing LLC Dairy near LaFontaine, IN. All 3 of these dairies were established by Vreba-Hoff. It was the 3rd violation within 30 days for Union-Go Dairy, which has 1,650 cows and recently filed a permit application with IDEM to expand its operation to 2,804 cows. DeGroot Dairy has environmental violation complaints for the last 5 years, with their cow manure spilling into a creek that leads directly into Salamonie Reservoir! Salamonie was in terrible shape in 2004, due manure leaking into the Reservoir.
Please follow the link below about an Environmental Performance Partnership agreement between the District 5 EPA and Indiana Department of Agriculture— see page 91 on the proposed multi-state investigation of Vreba-Hoff.
“By: 6/30/04”
“Participate with EPA Region 5 in the Multi-State/Federal investigation of Vreba-Hoff Dairy Development animal feeding operations”
http://yosemite.epa.gov/r5/r5ard.nsf/216ee3876e2b57c786256641005b8d76/e2716d4460d7b476862570f500667744/$FILE/2003-2005%20EnPPA.pdf
Please also review this:
The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality has been in a legal tug of war with Vreba-Hoff for several years, filing a lawsuit in 2003 that resulted in a 2004 consent decree in which the company agreed to build an on-site waste treatment facility. This year, the department asked a judge to hold the company in contempt of court for violating the decree, asserting that Vreba-Hoff was still failing to correctly dispose of manure. Robert McCann, a spokesman for the department, said it has had problems with other dairies set up by Vreba-Hoff.
Reference: The Washington Post - Washington, D.C.
Author: Kari Lydersen - Washington Post Staff Writer
Date: Jul 29, 2007
Start Page: A.11
Section: A SECTION
http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/washingtonpost/access/1311684571.html?dids=1311684571:1311684571&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:FT&fmac=&date=Jul+29%2C+2007&author=Kari+Lydersen+-+Washington+Post+Staff+Writer&desc=Discord+on+Dairies+of+Dutch+Dreams%3B+Big+Farms+of+Immigrants+Recruited+to+Midwest+Draw+Opposition
Also - Ohio Dairy site water issues and AG Complaint: Vreba-Hoff is in trouble with a state regulator again - this time it’s the Ohio Attorney General’s Office over the construction and development of 20 dairy sites in the Buckeye State. In a 40-page complaint filed yesterday in Fulton County Common Pleas Court, Attorney General Marc Dann cited violations pertaining to storm water issues dating to 1999 at dairies in Fulton, Henry, Wood, Defiance, Paulding, Putnam, Van Wert, Williams, Hardin, Marion, and Madison counties. The complaint seeks up to $10,000 a day per violation. In some cases, dairies neglected to get state permits for discharging storm water. In others, they got them after the fact, when construction was either under way or finished - or else they violated the conditions of them.
Reference this link:
http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070721/NEWS06/707210403
These are a few examples of many environmental violations that show that Vreba-Hoff is NOT capable of running this dairy, much less expanding!
As concerned citizens, we are requesting that you help us in NOT ALLOWING IDEM to settle out of court and instead be prosecuted to the full extent of the law and not allow either DeGroot or Vreba-Hoff to operate CAFOs in Indiana again. Enough is enough! Please advise as to what will happen further.
Leslie and Bob Patterson
March 26th, 2008 16:44
[...] be sure to check the comments to my post yesterday in which a commenter points to several very odd aspects of IDEM’s decision to go [...]