HERMISTON, Ore. — Two of the Northwest’s largest biomass and crop residue companies are joining forces.
Pacific Ag, of Hermiston, announced Thursday it has acquired Calagri after nearly two decades working side by side in the industry. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but Pacific Ag CEO Bill Levy said it will help provide better service for growers and a more reliable stream of products for different markets.
“I think it says great things about the future of Pacific Ag and our markets,” Levy said. “There’s a lot of great opportunities out there, and we felt we could meet those opportunities better together than we could separately.”
Pacific Ag is the nation’s largest harvester of crop residue and forage — such as corn stover and wheat straw — used to make things like animal feed or tree-free paper products. Composted wheat straw is also what’s predominately used to grow commercial mushrooms for grocery stores.
But perhaps one of the biggest future markets, Levy said, is plant material as a feedstock for biofuel and biochemicals.
“We believe that’s going to be a significant part of our future,” Levy said.
Based in Ellensburg, Washington, Calagri has collaborated and even shared equipment in the past with Pacific Ag, Levy said. Now, they’ll be able to continue that work seamlessly under a single operation.
Calagri’s co-owner, Kerry Calaway, is joining Pacific Ag’s leadership team and said it is an exciting time to be joining forces.
“New markets for forage and crop residue are growing across the region and the country, and farmers are increasingly looking for ways to sustainable generate additional income per acre,” Calaway said in a statement. “Together, we will create more opportunities for farmers while providing better service to our customers.”
Levy said Pacific Ag will retain Calagri’s employees, and as a result of the transaction the company will now harvest more than 300,000 tons of forage every year across Oregon, Washington and Idaho.
“This is a significant addition for us,” Levy said. “It’s exciting, truly, to be working with them and to be one company.”
Growers interested in learning more about generating income off crop residue can contact Pacific Ag at 1-844-RESIDUE.
KLAMATH FALLS, Ore. (AP) — Oregon wildlife officials have confirmed the first wolf killing in Jackson County since reintroduced wolves spread to southern Oregon.
The Herald and News reports that the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife says a wolf killed one goat and one sheep between June 9 and June 12 in the Grizzly Peak area outside Ashland. The agency also suspects a wolf injured a goat and killed another goat during that time, but vultures had eaten away at the animals’ carcass.
The department’s Mark Vargas says there will likely be more incidents between wolves and livestock as wolf populations continue to grow.
The wolf blamed for the recent livestock killings is originally from northeast Oregon and has also been tied to the attack that left a Klamath County cow injured in February.
NYSSA, Ore. — Onion thrips were found in commercial fields in the Treasure Valley region in late-April this year, much earlier than normal.
Thrips are a vector for the iris yellow spot virus, which can severely reduce onion yields. The virus was detected in onion plants the last week of May and researchers said they were likely infected in mid-May.
Onion growers in this area historically haven’t been concerned about thrips until about Memorial Day and the virus in past seasons has made its initial appearance in July or early August, said Oregon State University Cropping Systems Extension Agent Stuart Reitz.
The virus was detected the first week of June last year, which was an extremely early appearance, he said.
“They’re just coming earlier every year,” Reitz said, a development he contributed to the recent warmer than normal winters and early springs. “I think more of their populations survived over the winter so they were out spreading the virus around earlier than we’ve seen in past years.”
There are no good biological methods for controlling onion thrips in the Treasure Valley area of Southwestern Idaho and Eastern Oregon, which produces about 25 percent of the nation’s fresh bulb onion supply.
The only effective way to control them is by spraying.
With their earlier appearances, that means growers have to spray more to control them.
“If growers are having to spray another month of the season, that’s another huge cost for them,” Reitz said.
Thrips, and the virus they transmit to onion plants, will devastate an onion field if not controlled and not spraying is not an option, said Oregon farmer Bruce Corn.
“Sometimes you have to close your eyes to the cost because you won’t have a crop if the virus gets in early and you don’t spray for it,” he said. “As a grower, if you expect to have a crop, you have to be very vigilant and proactive on it.”
Spraying for thrips costs between $20 and $100 an acre, depending on what chemical is used, according to Corn and Paul Skeen, president of the Malheur County Onion Growers Association.
Because there are a limited number of chemicals available to growers that effectively control thrips, rotating them is critical to avoid the insects building up resistance to them, Corn said.
That means growers have to also use the more expensive chemicals and Skeen estimates the average cost of spraying is about $50 an acre.
“If you’re spraying eight times, that’s a lot of money,” he said. But, he added, “You won’t have a crop if you don’t.”
To try to find a solution to the thrips problem, OSU researchers in Ontario last year started a field trial with some experimental onion varieties to see if they offer some resistance to thrips and the iris yellow spot virus.
Some of the varieties showed promise, Reitz said, but it will take several years to test them some more, then isolate the beneficial traits and breed them into commercially accepted varieties.
ENTERPRISE, Ore. — When making decisions about the future of the family farm worries about taxes and values loom large. Nonprofits and agencies throughout the Northwest, such as Wallowa Land Trust, work with landowners to find ways to reduce income taxes while planning a lasting legacy.
Julia Lakes, the trust’s conservation director, told attendees at a May workshop in Enterprise that conservation easements are one way they can help landowners keep property in the family during estate planning.
“The land trust uses its experience to ‘ballpark’ what you want the end result to be and helps lay out the path before a lot of money is expended,” Lakes said.
Attorney Nancy Duhnkrack kicked off the workshop with an overview of how easements work.
“Conservation easements allow landowners to voluntarily restrict how land is used in the future to protect the property’s values,” Duhnkrack said.
She said conservation easements are becoming increasingly popular, not just to keep working farmland intact, but because tax incentives, recently made permanent by Congress, make them economically advantageous.
“The landowner still owns the property and retains the right to sell it, lease it, pass it on,” Duhnkrack said. “It is the job of the land trust or public agency to monitor and make sure the restrictions in the easement continue to be in place.”
Wallowa County’s economy is dependent on natural resources, primarily through agriculture, timber harvest and tourism. Tourism alone brought in $28 million in 2015, according to a Dean Runyan and Associates study. The stunning scenery attracts short-time visitors and the development of vacation homes that can cause farmland fragmentation and put the rural flavor of the county at risk.
The fear of losing farmland to development prompted the trust’s formation in 2004. It’s signature bumper sticker, “Keep it Rural!”, simply states its mission.
Woody Wolfe, a sixth-generation Wallowa County farmer, was the first to use the trust to create a 197-acre easement on his farm. Wolfe said his first easement has two zones; one is working farmland and the other is a riparian zone where cattle once grazed.
“In the ag zone I gave up the right to build except for agricultural structures, but the riparian restrictions are much greater,” Wolfe said.
Duhnkrack said what rights a landowner gives up and what he retains are entirely up to him.
Wolfe said soon after he purchased a tract of land from a neighbor he started talking to James Monteith, one of the founding board members of the trust, about entering into an easement agreement to help pay off the loan.
“The highest and best use is not running cows or growing crops, it’s what somebody out of the area is willing to pay for breathing the air, having no traffic and looking at the mountains,” Wolfe said.
In 2011, Lakes said, the trust paid Wolfe 70 percent of the easement’s value with grant money and the family donated the remainder.
For the second easement on 257 acres, Wolfe is taking advantage of a USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service grant that pays 50 percent of the land’s value. Lakes said the NRCS allows the landowner to donate up to 25 percent and the other 25 percent is coming from private foundations and the Nez Perce Tribe.
Director Kathleen Ackley said the second easement is an attractive project for the trust because it is adjacent to the first — creating a larger protected swath of land.
“It’s about landscape-scale connectivity,” Lakes said. “Protecting big chunks keep agriculture viable.”
Wolfe said not everyone understands the benefit of conservation easements.
“There is a little bit of value to neighbors when you don’t change the land as much as you could have,” Wolfe said. “As a neighbor may not agree with using a conservation easement, but you might rest at ease when there is less likelihood there will be something across your fence line that detracts from your serenity.”
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A federal judge Wednesday rejected Ryan Bundy’s demand to be released from custody so he can appear before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
The son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy has been serving as his own lawyer since his January arrest during the armed occupation of an Oregon bird sanctuary. He’s also facing federal charges in Nevada for his role in an armed standoff with federal agents at this father’s ranch.
Bundy and lawyers for other defendants charged in both cases have said it’s improper to make them defend two cases at once in different states.
The Appeals Court plans to hear oral arguments Thursday in San Francisco, and Bundy wants to be there.
But U.S. District Judge Anna J. Brown denied his request for transfer or release, saying it’s not her call and it should have been brought up sooner.
“I’m not a magician,” she said.
Bundy was attempting to have a different federal judge, Robert Jones, hear the matter Wednesday afternoon, but nothing was on the docket as the courthouse neared closing time.
Jones, to ease the load on Brown, has been hearing requests for pretrial release from the more than 20 defendants charged in connection with the occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.
Brown’s denial came during a status hearing on the complex, high-profile case that began with a protest over the imprisonment of two Oregon ranchers convicted of setting fires. Much of the 2 ½-hour hearing was devoted to questions about pre-trial motions and discovery.
Twenty-six men and women were charged with conspiracy to impede officers of the United States after the 41-day standoff, and some of them were also charged with possessing a firearm in a federal facility.
Three men have pleaded guilty and a fourth, Jason Blomgren, was scheduled to so Thursday.
Trial for most the other 22 defendants is scheduled to start Sept. 7, though a few of the accused have waived their right to a speedy trial and likely won’t face a jury until 2017.
Marcus Mumford, the new attorney for occupation leader Ammon Bundy, suggested to Judge Brown during the hearing that his client might also waive his demand for a speedy trial.
Also Wednesday:
— Defendant Darryl Thorn of Marysville, Washington, arrived at court Wednesday with plans to accept a plea deal from prosecutors. Instead, he withdrew from the agreement and asked a judge for a new public defender. The judge, after a private meeting with the Thorn and the lawyer, confirmed an “irreparable breakdown” in the relationship and said Thorn would get new representation.
— Assistant U.S. Attorney Ethan Knight told the judge he expects prosecutors will take three or four weeks to present their case to the jury, meaning the trial will likely last well into October and perhaps November.
— Defendant Kenneth Medenbach, as he has repeatedly done, questioned Brown about whether she ever took an oath of office. She replied, “Mr. Medenbach, we’re not going to play these games.”
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Another Oregon standoff defendant has pleaded guilty to a federal conspiracy charge.
Geoffrey Stanek pleaded guilty Tuesday, accepting a plea deal in which prosecutors agreed to drop a charge of firearm possession in a federal facility. The government plans to recommend a sentence of six months of home detention.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Craig Gabriel said Stanek told authorities after his Feb. 11 arrest near Portland that he joined the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge after learning about it from Facebook.
The Oregonian/OregonLive reports that U.S. District Court Judge Anna Brown asked Stanek to describe what he did. Stanek replied: “I was there, your Honor.”
Stanek is the third of the 26 defendants charged with conspiracy to plead guilty. A fourth is scheduled to do so Thursday.
A dairy farmers cooperative is accusing an Idaho cheese facility of violating a contract to take delivery of organic milk from an Oregon producer.
Select Milk Producers, the cooperative, has filed a lawsuit against Sorrento Lactalis, a major global dairy company, for breaching an agreement to buy organic milk from Cold Springs Dairy of Hermiston, Ore.
The complaint alleges that Sorrento’s milk procurement manager at its facility in Nampa, Idaho, in August 2015 committed to purchase 150,000 pounds of organic milk for five years at a price of $40 per hundredweight. The amount was later revised to 48,000 pounds a week.
By December 2015, however, Sorrento notified the co-op that it wouldn’t honor the deal because the price was no longer competitive and the demand for organic cheese had dropped, according to the complaint.
Select Milk has been able to sell the organic milk from Cold Springs Dairy at a lower price since then, but the cooperative has sustained damages of more than $160,000 that continue to accrue, the complaint said.
Sorrento Lactalis filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit that denies Select Milk’s claims, “particularly the allegation that it entered into any final, binding contract or agreement.”
The cheesemaker claims that Select Milk hasn’t identified any “signed writing” that would comprise an enforceable contract under Idaho law.
Sorrento has asked a federal judge to either throw out the lawsuit or order the cooperative to produce such a document.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A change of plea hearing has been scheduled for a man arrested following the Ammon Bundy-led occupation of a national wildlife refuge in Oregon.
Jason Blomgren, 42, of Murphy, North Carolina, is set to appear in a federal courtroom in Portland on Thursday. He earlier pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiracy to impede officers of the United States and possession of a firearm in a federal facility.
Blomgren was granted pre-trial release in March after his attorney argued that he needed to go back to North Carolina to help care for a son who has autism. Blomgren joined the occupation about a week in after reading about it online.
Court records show a federal judge approved spending for Blomgren’s transportation from North Carolina ahead of Thursday’s hearing.
More than two dozen occupiers were arrested after the 41-day standoff that ended Feb. 11. Two of them — Corey Lequieu and Eric Lee Flores — have already accepted deals in which they pleaded guilty to conspiracy in exchange for the dismissal of the firearm charge.
Prosecutors have recommended a 2½-year prison sentence for Lequieu, who has a prior felony, and six months of home detention for Flores, a first-time offender.
Bundy and his remaining co-defendants are scheduled to appear in court Wednesday for a status hearing in their case.
The trial is scheduled to begin with jury selection on Sept. 7, but U.S. District Court Judge Anna J. Brown on Monday granted a motion for three men to be tried later. They are Sean Anderson of Riggins, Idaho; Jake Ryan of Plains, Montana; and Jon Ritzheimer of Peoria, Arizona. All waived their right to a speedy trial, likely pushing their cases into 2017.
Brown’s order says she will wait until August to set a trial date for them and any other defendant who seeks to waive his or her right to a speedy resolution.
The armed takeover and ensuing standoff at the southeast Oregon bird sanctuary began Jan. 2 and included the fatal shooting by police of rancher and occupation spokesman Robert “LaVoy” Finicum during a traffic stop.
Bundy and his followers wanted the federal government to relinquish control of Western lands and free two Oregon ranchers imprisoned for setting fires. Those demands were not met.
It’s been a “very strange season,” but Oregon’s berries are doing quite well so far, crop consultant Tom Peerbolt said.
Record rain over the winter and unseasonable heat waves interspersed with stretches of cool days have posed some puzzles for Oregon growers as they harvest crops that have a combined annual farmgate value of nearly $200 million. Berries, like many other crops, are about two weeks earlier than usual due to the weather swings. In some cases, different types of berries are coming ready hard on the heels of other types.
“The earliness of everything has thrown everybody off center a bit,” Peerbolt said. “It’s hard on logistics when everything comes at once. It’s hard for growers and processors to handle everything, but as long as it stays cool they can hold in the field longer.”
Peerbolt is co-owner with his wife, Anna, of Peerbolt Crop Management in Portland. The company consults on strawberries, raspberries, blackberries and blueberries, primarily in Oregon but some in Washington as well.
As strawberry harvest wraps up, harvest of Duke, Bluecrop and Draper blueberries is underway and growers are about 10 days into raspberry harvest, Peerbolt said.
He said the traditional start of harvest for Marion blackberries, still Oregon’s premier type 60 years after it was introduced, has always been the day after the Fourth of July holiday. This year, he expects harvest to begin two weeks earlier. Harvest of Black Diamond and Columbia Star blackberries, thornless cultivars that may gradually replace Marions, will begin sooner still.
Quality is holding up, however.
“Boy there’s beautiful berries out there,” Peerbolt said. “The quality is very good.”
The harvest was early last year also, but the difference this year is “lots of moisture” through the winter and spring and cooler periods instead of an extended hot spell, he said.
“Very good quality and very good size – mainly in blueberries but in caneberries as well,” Peerbolt said. “On canes, it will not be a bumper crop, but it will be a good crop.”
Pest pressure, as it has for the past six years, comes primarily from Spotted Wing Drosophila, a tiny fly that saws into ripening berries and lays its eggs inside. The larvae feed on the berries, causing them to collapse in a gooey mess.
“Growers, unfortunately, have gotten very familiar with it” and spray to control it, Peerbolt said.
Oregon ranks first nationally in blackberry production, third in raspberries and strawberries and fourth in blueberries and cranberries.
Pendleton Grain Growers, the local farmers’ cooperative that dissolved earlier this year, has reached an agreement to sell the assets of its grain division to United Grain Corporation, based in Vancouver, Washington.
A deal has been in the works for months between the two companies, and includes all of PGG’s upcountry elevators, terminals and grain piles, along with all remaining inventory and contracts. Terms of the sale were not disclosed, but the agreement “includes the promise of future investment in the facilities,” according to a release issued Tuesday.
“The PGG Board of Directors has been seeking a buyer for the cooperative’s grain assets that would serve as a strong partner for our agricultural community,” said Tim Hawkins, board chairman. “We believe UGC is that partner and will provide the best possible outcome for members, our employees and the community.”
According to the release, UGC will be opening local offices and retaining a majority of PGG employees. A spokeswoman for PGG said their goal is to ensure facilities are up and running during next month’s harvest.
Founded in 1929, members of PGG voted to dissolve the co-op in May. That comes after years of financial struggles where the co-op had overstated its earnings by millions of dollars, and become entrenched in red ink.
The members of two Oregon farm cooperatives, Wilco and Hazelnut Growers of Oregon, have overwhelmingly voted to merge their operations.
The combination of Wilco, which focuses on farm supplies and fuel, with HGO, which processes and markets hazelnuts, is planned to be complete by Aug. 1.
A major result of the merger is the expected relocation of HGO’s facility in Cornelius to a new plant before the 2018 harvest that’s more centrally located in the Willamette Valley, the nation’s major hazelnut-growing region.
Construction of the HGO’s new processing plant will be made smoother due to the financial stability provided by Wilco, which generates about $220 million in annual revenues through its 17 farm stores, seven agronomy centers and bulk fuel sales service.
Together the two cooperatives will have about 900 employees, though some positions may be cut due to redundancies when a portion of HGO’s office functions are moved to Wilco’s headquarters in Mt. Angel.
Doug Hoffman, Wilco’s current CEO, would remain as chief of the merged cooperative while HGO’s CEO, Jeff Fox, will head its hazelnut division.
Farmers will earn equity and dividends in the combined cooperative based on their purchases of farm supplies as well as their hazelnut deliveries, though the pools will remain separate.
Among Wilco’s members, 79 percent voted for the merger while 99 percent of HGO’s membership’s supported it.
An Oregon farmer wants a jury to render a decision in the federal government’s lawsuit that accuses him of violating the Clean Water Act.
Earlier this year, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency filed a complaint against Bill Case of Albany, Ore., for unlawfully stabilizing a riverbank with large rocks beginning in 2009.
The EPA is seeking up to $37,500 per day in civil penalties as well as a court order requiring Case to restore the bank of the North Santiam River to its original condition.
Attorneys for Case have now filed an answer to the EPA’s allegations and requested a jury trial, which is considered unusual in Clean Water Act cases.
In his answer to EPA’s complaint, Case argues the agency’s lawsuit is barred because of his “reasonable reliance on representations by the United States Army Corps of Engineers” that the work didn’t require a Clean Water Act permit.
Case has previously told Capital Press that the Corps told him the bank stabilization project didn’t fall under Clean Water Act jurisdiction because the rocks weren’t placed in the river.
When asked about the jury trial request, Case said he’d have to consult with his attorney before commenting. Capital Press was unable to reach Case’s attorney as of press time, and the EPA’s attorney cannot comment on pending litigation.
Jury trials are rare in such cases, as Clean Water Act litigation is more commonly decided by federal judges on motions for summary judgment, said Bill Funk, an environmental law professor at Lewis & Clark Law School.
It’s likely that Case is counting on a jury to commiserate with his predicament of facing conflicting interpretations of the Clean Water Act by different agencies, Funk said.
“I assume the thinking is he will seem like a sympathetic defendant,” he said.
Under a legal precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court, defendants have the right for a jury to decide whether or not an activity violates the Clean Water Act. However, the amount of civil penalties and any injunctive relief must be decided by a federal judge.
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Voters in a rural Oregon town are receiving ballots in the mail for a recall election targeting a judge who opposed the armed takeover of a federal wildlife refuge earlier this year.
Harney County Judge Steve Grasty decided to fight the recall even though he is retiring this year.
The recall has stirred passions in Burns, which held the national spotlight for weeks during the standoff at Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.
Ammon Bundy and others occupied the refuge this winter to protest federal land policy and the imprisonment of Dwight and Steven Hammond, two ranchers sent to prison for starting fires.
The 41-day standoff ended Feb. 11 and included the fatal shooting by police of rancher and occupation spokesman Robert “LaVoy” Finicum.
The recall election is June 28. Though his title is judge, Grasty’s position is essentially chairman of the county commission.
He was outspoken in his opposition of the occupation and the ranchers holed up in the refuge. Their supporters blamed Grasty for not doing more to protect the Hammonds.
Some Burns residents are rallying around Grasty as the recall election draws near. About 100 people attended a rally for him last week and an ad running in the local newspaper this week will list the names of up to 150 supporters.
“I think he’s done a really good job for us,” said Jeanette Vinson, a nail technician who supports Grasty. “It’s ridiculous. Why go through all this? Why put the county through this?”
Kim Rollins, who initiated the recall and gathered enough signatures to get it on the ballot, declined to comment.
Grasty said he’ll be relieved when the election is behind him, no matter the outcome.
“I’ve always had good solid communication and relationships with folks and it’s very humbling to go to the grocery store, to go to the hardware store and every time someone expresses support,” said Grasty, who’s served in his position since 1999.
The occupiers wanted the federal government to relinquish public lands and free the Hammonds. Neither demand was met.
Two of 26 defendants indicted on a conspiracy charge after the standoff have accepted plea deals.
A September trial has been scheduled for the remaining 24 defendants, including Ammon and Ryan Bundy.
A Portland attorney and a Southern Oregon environmentalist are asking the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration to take industrial hemp off the federal government’s list of controlled substances.
The petition, filed June 13, is the latest move by people who believe industrial hemp could be a viable agricultural crop if the federal government didn’t classify it as an illegal drug. They have long contended hemp can be used to make food, medicine, clothing, lotions, construction material, oils and other products.
Some states, Oregon among them, allow licensed hemp cultivation but keep it tightly controlled. The petition notes that 30 other countries allow hemp cultivation, including Canada. The petition letter says state economies, the environment and national security “would greatly benefit from the re-commercialization of industrial hemp in domestic agriculture and manufacturing.”
Industrial hemp is a variety of cannabis, but lacks the THC level that makes pot smokers high.
The petition asks the DEA to declare a cannabis plant is industrial hemp, not marijuana, if its THC level does not exceed 1 percent. THC is the substance that gives users a buzz.
Industrial hemp is low in THC but has higher levels of Cannabidiol, or CBD, which some advocates say can be used to treat seizures.
West Virginia uses the 1 percent THC content level as its hemp definition, while other states, such as Oregon, say THC in hemp cannot exceed 0.3 percent.
The petitioners maintain that keeping the THC limit so low limits the number of cannabis varieties that can be bred and cultivated for traits that may be desirable in certain uses or products.
In an attempt to steer around controversy, the petitioners’ letter to the DEA says they take no position on the legalization or decriminalization of medical or recreational marijuana, or on whether CBD has medical uses.
The petition from Oregon residents is the second to hit the DEA in June. Earlier, the Kentucky Hemp Industries Council filed a petition to remove hemp plants from the Controlled Substances Act.
The chief petitioners are attorney Courtney Moran, of Portland, and Andy Kerr, a figure from Oregon’s spotted owl timber wars who now heads an Ashland conservation entity called the Larch Company. Others among the two dozen co-petitioners include the North American Industrial Hemp Council, Oregon state Rep. Floyd Prozanski of Eugene, and Anndrea Hermann, a Canadian cannabis and hemp technologies consultant who also teaches an industrial hemp course in the College of Forestry’s Wood Science Engineering Department at Oregon State University.
Farmers who won a lawsuit invalidating a ban of genetically engineered crops in Oregon’s Josephine County are now seeking $29,000 in attorney fees from the ordinance’s supporters.
A state judge struck down the county’s prohibition in May, holding that Oregon law pre-empts local governments from restricting biotech seeds.
Voters in Josephine County approved the ordinance in 2014, which was challenged last year by Robert and Shelley Ann White, who wanted to grow genetically modified sugar beets.
While the county government took a neutral position in the litigation, supporters of the ordinance — Oregonians for Safe Farms and Families, a nonprofit, and Siskiyou Seeds, an organic farm — intervened in the case to defend the ban on genetically modified organisms.
The intervenors claimed that the Whites lacked standing to file the lawsuit because they were “hobby farmers” who didn’t have a financial stake in growing GMOs.
Supporters of the ordinance also argued that Oregon’s pre-emption law was unconstitutional because lawmakers created a “regulatory void” by disallowing local rules for GMO crops without imposing their own regulatory scheme.
Josephine County Circuit Judge Pat Wolke rejected those arguments and overturned the GMO prohibition, finding that the conflict between state law and the local ordinance “could not be more clear.”
The plaintiffs’ attorneys are now seeking $29,200 from the intervenors, but not the county, because several of their legal claims “had no objectively reasonable basis.”
For example, the intervenors cited no legal precedents from Oregon to support their argument that the pre-emption statute was unconstitutional and instead pointed to a ruling from Ohio, the petition said.
Though the amount represents less than 20 percent of the plaintiffs’ legal costs, they’re seeking the award in part to deter similar arguments in a future case, according to the petition for attorney fees.
“An award of fees in this case will discourage those similarly situated to abandon meritless claims and to concentrate on those issues which they might impact in a responsible way,” the petition said.
Mary Middleton, executive director of OSFF, said it “would very negatively impact us to pay attorney fees for the other side,” but her attorneys don’t think such an order would have legal precedent.
The group is still deciding whether to appeal Wolke’s ruling but doesn’t think it will impede others from seeking GMO-free zones.
“The movement is growing across the country,” she said.
As for the petition for attorney fees, Middleton said it’s likely an attempt by biotech developers to thwart such efforts.
“I can only speculate, but the way it looks on the surface is they’re trying to scare counties and scare people who object to their agenda,” she said.
SISTERS, Ore. (AP) — Officials on Sunday lifted all evacuation notices for residents in about 900 homes near wildfire burning in central Oregon.
The Oregon Department of Forestry says the fire has scorched nearly 2,100 acres, or about 3 square miles, and was about 72 percent contained as of Sunday morning. No structures have been lost.
Residents throughout Oregon are being told to prepare for the fire season by being ready to go in case of an evacuation. Fire officials urge residents to get ready by assembling emergency supplies, planning escape route and taking other measures.
The cost of fighting that fire has hit about $2.3 million.
More than 600 personnel and five helicopters have assigned to the fire, which was ignited by lightning Tuesday.
