Jim Moss 8/23/07 pullout at bottom
By Wally Kennedy
wkennedy@joplinglobe.com
EAGLE ROCK, Mo. — Though an operating permit has been issued, the fight to stop a 65,600-chicken farm within a mile or so of Roaring River State Park will continue, opponents of the farm said Thursday.
“It’s amazing to think our government would let this happen,” said Jim Riedel, who lives near the concentrated animal feeding operation, or CAFO. “It’s disappointing, but we are still appealing the permit.”
The Missouri Department of Natural Resources has issued an operating permit to Rodney and Michelle Ozbun, of Eagle Rock, to operate a Class IC CAFO. An operating permit is required for a CAFO that confines more than 60,000 chicken pullets.
The operating permit was issued while a stay remains in effect on the construction permit that was issued earlier. That has angered opponents of the CAFO.
Mark Stephenson, a Joplin resident with a farm near the CAFO, said: “The DNR ignores what is best for the environment and ignores the will of the people. Even though a stay on the construction permit was issued, they allowed the operators (Ozbuns) to change the specs (building specifications) from the initial permit to avoid the stay order.
“The DNR thinks it’s above the law. They have danced all around the issue of this stay. They have completely ignored the stay. They (the operators) have been going at it seven days week.”
The permit, according to Stephenson, allowed for the construction of a composter for dead birds. He said the composter was not built. The CAFO, instead, will have an incinerator for dead birds. Stephenson said no public comment period was allowed for the change.
After learning that construction was still going on after the stay had been issued July 25 by the state Administrative Hearing Commission, Stephenson called the commission and informed the agency that the stay was not being enforced. The commission informed Stephenson that it could not give legal advice.
Stephenson said he called the DNR’s regional office in Springfield and told someone there that the stay was not being enforced.
“I was told by the DNR in Springfield that no stay was issued on the construction permit, and that it was a misprint in the newspaper,” he said. “The next time I talk to them, they tell me the four pullet houses were already completed when the stay was issued, so there was no construction to stay.”
DNR says requirements met
The DNR said the permit application complies with state law and meets all requirements needed to protect state waters. The permit calls for a no-discharge waste system. Waste generated by the CAFO will be taken elsewhere for land application.
Although the Administrative Hearing Commission issued a ruling July 25 to stay construction, the DNR says continuing construction work at the site “did not involve manure storage or treatment.”
Darrick Steen, who is overseeing the project for the DNR, said, “Our impression was that the CAFO was essentially complete when the stay was issued.”
The DNR in March issued a construction permit to Michelle Ozbun that authorized construction of four chicken-confinement buildings. The DNR said the construction of “other storage buildings for purposes of other utility work, plumbing or installation of other equipment not related to manure storage or treatment did not require authorization from a construction permit and therefore were not affected by the Administrative Hearing Commission’s stay order.”
Michelle Ozbun said the construction permit was only for the four confinement buildings.
“Everything else we have done, the propane tanks, the feeders and stuff like that, has nothing to do with the DNR,” she said. “The permit stuff was completed when we got the stay. We were done with the construction permit at that time.
“I had them (the contractor) do some work on a couple of sheds while they were here, but they don’t have anything to do with the farm.”
As for the Administrative Hearing Commission, she said: “They are not a court or a judge, or any of that. The people who are fighting us have made a big deal out of that. It’s nothing. What they do is give their recommendation to the DNR and to the Clean Water Commission. After that, it’s up to them.”
The stay was issued when the Administrative Hearing Commission received testimony that the Ozbuns still needed to obtain permission from an adjoining landowner to operate the CAFO.
Steen said the operating permit was issued after the DNR, not the hearing commission, determined that the Ozbuns had obtained the landowner’s signature to comply with the ruling of the commission. The commission has not lifted the stay, he said.
“We asked the Ozbuns to provide evidence to clear that up, which they did,” he said. “We feel comfortable that the deficiency has been adequately addressed. It’s the department’s role to make sure the operating permit is in compliance with the regulations before we issue a permit. Both permits are appealable.”
Steen said it is not necessary for the commission to lift a stay on a construction permit before an operating permit can be issued.
“The AHC did not state an operating permit could not be issued,” he said. “They did not prohibit that in their order.”
Steen said there is no state law that prohibits the issuance of an operating permit when a stay is in effect on a construction permit.
Before an operating permit can be issued, the operator must certify in writing that the CAFO was built according to the approved plans or permit. The Ozbuns obtained a professional engineer who certified that the CAFO was built according to the approved plan, Steen said.
One of three
The Ozbun CAFO, which will supply chickens for the George’s processing plant at Butterfield, 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.
