For immediate release: January
30, 2006
For more information, contact:
Rosie Partridge: 712-673-2754
Iowa CCI: 515-282-0484
Des Moines
– Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement (CCI) members disagree
with a move last week by the federal Environmental Appeals Board
(EAB) to approve an initial set of the Environmental Protection
Agency’s (EPA) ‘safe harbor’ agreement for factory
farms.
“The EAB’s decision is nothing
more than the Bush administration policing themselves,” said
Iowa CCI member Rosie Partridge from Wall Lake. “We know that
this deal will give factory farms safe harbor – or free rein
– to pollute our air and jeopardize our health for at least
four years with very little penalty.”
Iowa CCI members contend that the safe harbor
deal would allow factory farms across the country to continue polluting
the air without threat of prosecution by EPA, in exchange for a
commitment from a handful of concentrated animal feeding operations
(CAFOs) to study the problem for a number of years.
The EAB’s decision comes after a hearing
held on December 13th in Washington D.C. Iowa CCI, along with other
citizen and environmental groups, presented legal arguments and
filed a brief urging the EAB to refuse to ratify the agreement.
Iowa CCI, along with three other organizations,
– the Environmental Integrity Project, Sierra Club and the
Association of Irritated Residents-- filed a lawsuit in May challenging
the deal struck between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) and the factory farm industry. The group plans to continue
moving forward with their lawsuit.
Iowa CCI members have met with the EPA five
times over the past two years, including a bus tour of Iowa hog
factories, urging them to end the deal. Iowa Citizens for Community
Improvement is a 30 year old organization with thousands of members
across the state from all walks of life who talk, act and get things
done on critical issues affecting all Iowans. For more information,
visit www.iowacci.org.
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