Protecting Responsible Livestock Producers

One of the major pieces of legislation we passed this session out of Ag Committee was a bill protecting responsible livestock producers.  This bill is important to many livestock producers.  Some have been sued multiple times for nuisance suits.  While there are a few bad actors out there this bill does not protect them. Unfortunately, many of the good farmers have been targeted by these suits.  This bill protects the farmers who follow best practices for livestock production.

SF 447 was debated in the House this week and passed.  The bill is now on its’ way to be signed by the Governor. SF 447 adds a new subsection to Chapter 657.11A that to promotes responsible animal feeding operations encouraging them to adopt existing prudent and generally utilized management practices, and deems livestock nuisances as permanent and specifies court awarded damages to:

(a) actual economic compensatory damages for loss of market value of property,

(b) objective and documented medical compensation where the livestock operation was the proximate cause of a health infirmity and the cost to treat such health conditions; and

(c) for compensatory special damages for intangible injuries such as annoyance, loss of comfortable use and enjoyment of real property that is no more than 150% of the sum of compensation for lost market value and health considerations.

News from District 96

This week we passed a lot of non-controversial bills through the House.

This week I was joined by Bruce Neimann and Randy Francois of the Farm Bureau.  They both shared their thoughts on issues important to the Agricultural Industry.