By Wally Kennedy

wkennedy@joplinglobe.com

EAGLE ROCK, Mo. — Opponents of the Ozbun Farms poultry CAFO near Roaring River State Park will seek a stay of the farm’s operating permit today.

Opponents of the CAFO owned by Rodney and Michelle Ozbun are seeking a stay of the operating permit, which was issued to the Ozbuns on Aug. 22 by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. The state’s environmental agency will be represented by a lawyer from the Missouri attorney general’s office.

The opponents, who will represent themselves, will testify before the Missouri Administrative Hearing Commission during a hearing that starts at 9 a.m. today in the Harry Truman Building in Jefferson City.

The Ozbuns, who plan an operation that will house up to 65,600 pullets for the George’s Processing plant near Cassville, have retained a lawyer, from the firm of Schreimann, Rackers, Francka & Blunt in Jefferson City, to represent them.

The Ozbuns will not be represented by Andrew Blunt, the older brother of Gov. Matt Blunt and a partner in the firm, but by Michael Schmid, an associate in the firm. Schmid on Tuesday said he does not comment on pending litigation.

Among those who are to testify are Mark Stephenson, a Joplin resident who has a family farm near the CAFO, and Beverly Sweeney and Jim and Sharon Riedel, who live near the CAFO in Barry County. They are members of the Friends of Roaring River, a group that formed in opposition to the CAFO.

The commission, in a decision issued last Thursday, decided to open a separate and new case on the operating permit for the CAFO after a motion was filed on Aug. 30 seeking a stay of the operating permit by Sweeney.

Stephenson on Tuesday said the opponents will attempt to show that the DNR circumvented the original permit by allowing changes to the permit application after the fact. The changes were made, he alleged, without giving the public an opportunity to comment on the changes.

Stephenson said the original permit called for the construction of a composter at the farm to dispose of up to 8,000 pounds of dead birds annually. That provision was changed to allow the construction of an incinerator to dispose of the dead birds.

In seeking a stay of the operating permit, Stephenson said opponents also will challenge the geology of the site, noting that there is a losing stream on the property that is an unnamed tributary to Roaring River.

In addition, Stephenson said the commission will be told that an engineer who inspected the site for the DNR initially certified that four poultry barns and a composter had been constructed on the Ozbun farm according to permit specifications. Stephenson said the composter was never built.

“We’re still dealing with the waiver issue,” he said. “We feel that the setback waivers required for this CAFO are invalid.’’

The commission issued a stay on the construction permit for the CAFO on July 25 after it received testimony that Ozbun still needed to obtain permission from an adjoining landowner to operate the CAFO. The operating permit was issued by the DNR when the agency determined that Ozbun had obtained the landowner’s signature to comply with the ruling of the commission.

Stephenson said the waiver obtained by Ozbun was not the only waiver in question.

The commission, a division of the executive branch of state government, is a neutral administrative tribunal that functions as a court-like entity to resolve conflicts that are usually between two parties. In this case, more than 30 parties are participating in the appeal of the construction permit.

A hearing on that appeal is set for Jan. 7.

The waste-management system for the Ozbun CAFO has been designed and permitted as a no-discharge operation, which means that wastes are contained and stored until proper land application can take place.

Land application of the wastes must be conducted using proper agronomic rates, proper application timing and proper setbacks from geologic features to minimize nutrient runoff and infiltration into groundwater, according to the DNR.



One of three

The Ozbun CAFO, which will supply chickens for the George’s Processing plant near Cassville, is one of three in Missouri that have been constructed or are proposed for construction near state parks or historic sites.

The others are at Arrow Rock State Historic Site in central Missouri and at Battle of Athens State Historic Site in the northeastern corner of the state.

The Missouri Parks Association and the Missouri Coalition for the Environment have encouraged their members to write to state legislators, the governor and the director of the Department of Natural Resources to seek stronger regulations of CAFOs.