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72–378 2012

ADRIFT IN NEW REGULATORY BURDENS AND 

UNCERTAINTY: A REVIEW OF PROPOSED AND 

POTENTIAL REGULATIONS ON FAMILY FARMERS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

AGRICULTURE, ENERGY AND TRADE 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

UNITED STATES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

HEARING HELD 

NOVEMBER 17, 2011 

Small Business Committee Document Number 112–045 

Available via the GPO Website: www.fdsys.gov 


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(II) 

HOUSE COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS 

SAM GRAVES, Missouri, Chairman 

ROSCOE BARTLETT, Maryland 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

STEVE KING, Iowa 

MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado 

MICK MULVANEY, South Carolina 

SCOTT TIPTON, Colorado 

JEFF LANDRY, Louisiana 

JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington 

ALLEN WEST, Florida 

RENEE ELLMERS, North Carolina 

JOE WALSH, Illinois 

LOU BARLETTA, Pennsylvania 

RICHARD HANNA, New York 

ROBERT SCHILLING, Illinois 

NYDIA VELA ́ ZQUEZ, New York, Ranking Member 

KURT SCHRADER, Oregon 

MARK CRITZ, Pennsylvania 

JASON ALTMIRE, Pennsylvania 

YVETTE CLARKE, New York 

JUDY CHU, California 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

CEDRIC RICHMOND, Louisiana 

JANICE HAHN, California 

GARY PETERS, Michigan 

BILL OWENS, New York 

BILL KEATING, Massachusetts 

LORI SALLEY, Staff Director 

PAUL SASS, Deputy Staff Director 

BARRY PINELES, Chief Counsel 

MICHAEL DAY, Minority Staff Director 


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C O N T E N T S 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Page 

Tipton, Hon. Scott .................................................................................................... 1 

Critz, Hon. Mark ...................................................................................................... 3 

WITNESSES 

Philip Nelson, President, Illinois Farm Bureau, Bloomington, IL ...................... 5 

Leonard Felix, President, Olathe Spray Service, Inc., Olathe, CO ..................... 6 

Ray Vester, Vester Farms, Stuttgart, AR .............................................................. 8 

Carl T. Shaffer, President, Pennsylvania Farm Bureau, Mifflinville, PA .......... 10 

APPENDIX 

Prepared Statements: 

Philip Nelson, President, Illinois Farm Bureau, Bloomington, IL ............... 29 

Leonard Felix, President, Olathe Spray Service, Inc., Olathe, CO .............. 53 

Ray Vester, Vester Farms, Stuttgart, AR ....................................................... 48 

Carl T. Shaffer, President, Pennsylvania Farm Bureau, Mifflinville, PA ... 34 

Additional Materials for the Record: 

CropLife America Statement for the Record .................................................. 59 

EPA—Wetlands Oceans and Watersheds Letter ........................................... 61 

NCBA Foglesong Full Testimony .................................................................... 64 

NRECA Statement for the Record .................................................................. 130 

NSSGA Statement for the Record ................................................................... 134 

PM Letter to House SBC Committee on HR 1633 ......................................... 145 

United Fresh Produce Association Statement for the Record ...................... 150 


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(1) 

ADRIFT IN NEW REGULATORY BURDENS AND 

UNCERTAINTY: A REVIEW OF PROPOSED 

AND POTENTIAL REGULATIONS ON FAMILY 

FARMERS 

THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2011 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON SMALL BUSINESS, SUBCOMMITTEE ON

AGRICULTURE, ENERGY AND TRADE, 

Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in Room 

2360, Rayburn House Office Building. Hon. Scott Tipton (chairman 

of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Tipton, Bartlett, Barletta, Schilling, 

and Critz. 

Chairman TIPTON. Good morning, everyone. I would like thank 

you for joining us. The hearing will now come to order. 

I would like to thank all of our witnesses for being here today 

and we certainly look forward to your testimony. And I would like 

to thank everyone for taking time out of their busy schedules to 

join us today. I would like to give a special welcome to Mr. Leonard 

Felix, a constituent of mine and aerial applicator out of Olathe, 

Colorado. So Mr. Felix, I certainly welcome you to the Committee 

and I appreciate you taking the time to be here. 

Mr. FELIX. Thank you very much. 

Chairman TIPTON. Farmers and ranchers and small business 

owners today face a sea of onerous new regulations from the federal government. Although our nation’s agricultural community is 

expected to continue increasing food production to feed a growing 

world population, the current administration continues to contemplate and propose new regulations that would place increased 

burdens on American agriculture and make production more costly. 

With our economy struggling to rebound from the downturn, now 

is not the time to saddle farmers and ranchers with higher costs 

and more onerous regulations that are driving them out of business. 

Today we will examine two EPA regulations threatening family 

farms and small businesses, a duplicative pesticide permit requirement and potentially tougher air quality standards on farm dust. 

Both of these issues are of serious concern to farmers across the 

nation, including my home state of Colorado where agriculture 

business generates $20 billion in economic activity each year and 

creates more than 100,000 jobs. 


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On October 31, 2011, a federal regulation took effect expanding 

permit requirements for pesticide applications. However, federal 

law already regulates the registration, labeling, and use of pesticides and provides environmental and public health protection. 

This expanded requirement is duplicative and another costly form 

of red tape that brings with it new added environmental protection. 

The EPA has estimated the expanded permit requirement will affect some 365,000 pesticide users at a total cost of $50 million per 

year, but the real cost to small business could be much greater. 

A second regulatory concern we will examine today that threatens rural economies is the potential for more stringent EPA regulations on farm dust. The EPA is currently in the process of revising 

the National Ambient Air Quality standards for particulate matter, 

including dust. While I am pleased that the EPA administrator announced that she does not intend to make current standards for 

coarse particulate matter more stringent, the revised rule has not 

yet been finalized. Uncertainty lingers. And there is still no agricultural exemption for farm dust in the EPA’s standards. In fact, 

producers in Arizona already fall within reach of current dust 

standards and have been forced to change their farming practices 

as a result. If the agency were to adopt more stringent standards, 

many more rural areas would be affected. 

As some of the witnesses here today will testify, dust is an unavoidable result of agricultural production and a fact of life in rural 

communities. Planning and harvesting crops and driving down dirt 

roads naturally stirs up dust. The only way to prevent this dust is 

to halt or reduce agricultural production and other activities in 

rural areas. This could be devastating to local economies and potentially cause food prices to rise. 

Unfortunately, the two federal regulatory concerns highlighted 

today are not the only ones that are creating uncertainty and worrying the agricultural community. They are part of a wave of onerous, overreaching proposed and potential regulations that the current administration is considering, leaving family farmers and 

ranchers adrift in new regulatory burdens. With nearly 1 in 10 

Americans unemployed and our country still struggling to crawl 

out of this economic downturn, it is imperative that we stop the advancement of these and other new job-killing government regulations. 

Two of my colleagues on the House Agricultural Committee have 

introduced legislation to bring regulatory relief and certainty back 

to the agricultural sector. Congressman Bob Gibbs of Ohio has introduced H.R. 872, the Reducing Regulatory Burdens Act, which 

would eliminate costly and duplicative permit requirements for 

pesticide applications near water. Congresswoman Kristy Noem of 

South Dakota has introduced H.R. 1633, the Farm Dust Regulation 

Prevention Act, which would give necessary certainty to small business owners in rural America that farm dust will not be included 

in EPA standards. Providing greater regulatory certainty and regulatory relief to our nation’s farmers, ranchers, and rural communities is absolutely critical. Creating an environment conducive for 

economic growth will enable farmers to grow crops and assist with 

getting our nation back on the path to future economic prosperity. 


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Again, I would like to thank our witnesses for participating, and 

I look forward to their testimonies. 

I now yield to my colleague, Ranking Member Critz, for his opening statement. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, gentlemen, for being here today. 

In Western Pennsylvania where my district is located, we take 

great pride in the outdoors. From the scenic Mon River to the Appalachian Mountains to hunting ruffed grouse in Laurel Ridge 

State Park, fresh air and clean water are an important part of 

what makes Pennsylvania a great place to live. Ensuring that all 

these natural resources remain free of pollutants and contaminants 

is a top priority. As we pursue these aims we must be mindful that 

environmental regulation can impose significant costs as well. Too 

often, however, it has been small firms that have been impacted 

the most by EPA’s rules. In fact, companies with less than 20 employees spend more than $4,000 annually, leaving many hard 

pressed to make investments in their own business. Balancing 

these costs with the benefits of such regulation is essential. The reality is that we need to protect the environment without undercutting our nation’s main job creators, small businesses. 

Today we will examine several regulations that have the potential to impose real costs on family farmers and smaller agricultural 

businesses. Perhaps most troubling for small businesses are new 

pesticide requirements under the Clean Water Act. Never before in 

the nearly 40 year history of this Act has the government required 

a permit for such use. Making this all the more problematic is that 

the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act already 

regulates pesticide. Such duplication will not safeguard the environment; it will, however, impose new recordkeeping and surveillance responsibilities on the more than 300,000 pesticide users. 

We will also look at the potential regulation of farm and agricultural dust. Such dust is a regular byproduct of farming and has 

been around as long as farmers have been working the land. There 

are limited signs demonstrating that this dust has any effect on 

health in rural areas. Even though the EPA administrator has recently stated that it will not regulate farm dust, there is still concern that it may do so in the future. This is not an unfounded concern. The truth is that opinions can change quickly in Washington, 

D.C. Given that, I believe it is correct to be out front on this issue. 

Finally, I am looking forward to examining an EPA issue that 

could seriously impact farmers in my home state of Pennsylvania. 

This matter, called the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Day Load 

or TMDL requirement is part of a strategy to protect this watershed. However, it has severe and far-reaching consequences for 

local farmers, including those in my home state. This so-called pollution diet will put farmers out of business plain and simple. It will 

effectively remove hundreds of thousands of acres of productive 

farmland. In fact, the EPA itself projects that roughly 20 percent 

of cropland in the watershed, or about 600,000 acres, will have to 

be removed from production. Requiring states to enforce this on behalf of the EPA takes this too far. We are all for protecting this 

great watershed but not at the cost of putting farms out of business. We have been down this path many times before this year, 


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whether it is greenhouse gases, coal combustion waste, or the 

issues before us today. The truth is that EPA is no stranger to 

overlooking the concerns of small businesses. Instead of neglecting 

them, the EPA should be conducting meaningful outreach to small 

firms, especially when their regulation affects family farms and agricultural businesses. 

During today’s hearing we will be able to listen to the agricultural community and learn about their views on EPA’s regulations. 

Ensuring that the concerns of farmers and their rural businesses 

are heard is important. I hope that the EPA will take similar actions to increase its outreach in this area. Small farms which constitute more than 90 percent of all farms remain at the center of 

our country’s rural economy. With direct to consumer sales increasing, small farms are poised to grow, providing not just high quality 

food but also jobs. Given such promise, it is important that the federal government does not extinguish this potential by imposing unnecessary cost and duplicative regulatory burdens on them. 

I want to thank all of the witnesses in advance for traveling here 

today and I look forward to their testimony. 

With that I yield back the balance of my time. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, ranking member. 

If Committee members do have an opening statement prepared 

I would ask that they submit it for the record. And I would like 

to take a moment to be able to explain our timing lights for you. 

You will each have five minutes to deliver your testimony. The 

light will start out green. When you have one minute remaining it 

will turn yellow. Finally, it will turn red at the end of your five 

minutes. If you exceed that you will be ejected. I am kidding. If you 

would, try to keep it to that time limit and we will try to be lenient 

so that you can finish up. So. 

STATEMENTS OF PHILIP NELSON, PRESIDENT, ILLINOIS FARM 

BUREAU; LEONARD FELIX, PRESIDENT, OLATHE SPRAY 

SERVICE, INC., TESTIFYING ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL 

AGRICULTURAL AVIATION ASSOCIATION; RAY VESTER, 

VESTER FARMS, TESTIFYING ON BEHALF OF THE USA RICE 

FEDERATION; CARL T. SHAFFER, PRESIDENT, PENNSYLVANIA FARM BUREAU 

Chairman TIPTON. I would like to now yield to Congressman 

Schilling to introduce Mr. Nelson. 

Mr. SCHILLING. Thank you, Chairman. 

Members of the Committee, it is my pleasure to introduce Mr. 

Philip Nelson, who is here to testify on behalf of the Illinois Farm 

Bureau. Mr. Nelson has served as president of the Farm Bureau 

since December of 2003 and prior to that he served as a vice president from 1999 to 2003. More importantly, Mr. Nelson is a fourth 

generation grain and livestock farmer from Seneca, Illinois, who 

basically it is a family-run business which we like to hear in representing basically farmers from all over the United States. I appreciate you traveling all the way here during this very busy time 

in Illinois, especially with what is going on with harvest time and 

all that. So we look forward to hearing your testimony and welcome, sir. 


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STATEMENT OF PHILIP NELSON 

Mr. NELSON. Well, Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, I 

thank you for the opportunity to share our thoughts and concerns 

about the matters that have been outlined. 

I am Philip Nelson. I am a fourth generation farmer from Seneca, a real community about 75 miles south and west of Chicago. 

I farm with my wife Carmen, son Kendall, daughter Rachel, and 

we raise corn, soybeans, alfalfa, cattle, and hogs. I have been asked 

to testify about the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System Pesticide General Permit that went into effect the first of November and to say a few words about the potential of proposed dust 

regulations on ag. But before I do that I would like to point out 

that we should not even be here today testifying about the NPDES 

Pesticide General Permit because it should have never went into 

effect. 

As you know, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 872 back 

in March. I appreciate that several of you voted for that bill. And 

it is regrettable that this bill needlessly spent this past spring, 

summer, and all of the fall languishing in the Senate, caught in a 

stranglehold by a couple of senators upset primarily over the Senate Committee jurisdiction, not over the substance of the bill. I understand that more than 60 senators would vote today in favor of 

H.R. 872 if only given a chance. They should be given that chance. 

The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, Rodenticide Act [FIFRA] has 

covered pesticide labeling and application very effectively since 

1947. While the new permit process addresses pesticide applications in, over, and near waters of the United States, it duplicates 

FIFRA. EPA estimates that this new requirement, as was said before, would affect approximately 365,000 pesticide applicators nationwide that performed 5.6 million pesticide applications annually. 

It will cost $50 million and require over one million hours per year 

to implement this. 

I do not have to tell you that states like Illinois have very limited 

resources just like the federal government. Spending precious resources for this purpose represents neither good public policy nor 

a wise use of taxpayer dollars. Furthermore, it does not make our 

food any safer, our water any cleaner, or provide one iota of environmental benefit above and beyond what we already achieve on 

our farms. Frustrated? Yes. But what really keeps me lying awake 

at night is the potential of this for more regulatory creep. It is as 

if we go to bed one night with one set of regulations and wake up 

the next morning facing a new set. Every moment that we spend 

fighting and then working to comply with needless, duplicative regulations takes away from what we do best, producing food. 

In the case of the new NPDES Pesticide General Permit, we have 

good reason to believe that pesticide regulation could be expanded 

in the future and include other routine applications. If we look at 

history of similar rules that began innocuously and later expand 

exponentially, then past actions give us cause for concern about 

this new permit. 

The last issue I raise is one that perhaps is the most troubling 

and that is that lawsuits that may occur because of the Pesticide 

General Permit. In Illinois, farmers are already being sued for discharges at livestock facilities that are still being constructed where 


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on livestock is present. It does not take much imagination to see 

how this new permit opens the door to new legal challenges that 

are financially and emotionally draining. This permit does not improve food safety, does not add any additional environmental protection or benefit for society, and does nothing to improve my bottom-line. 

We feel the current regulation of pesticides by FIFRA has kept 

current and is effective to the point we do not need this entirely 

new permit program. H.R. 872 remains relevant and Congress 

needs to complete what 292 members of the House supported and 

likely a strong majority of the Senate would like to see approved. 

I would like to further comment on the proposed farm dust regulations. As I cut soybeans this fall, I wondered like most farmers 

how in the world would EPA even begin to regulate the dust flying 

off of my combine. How would the agency prevent dust from flying 

when I dump a load of corn or soybeans at the local grain elevator? 

Fortunately, administrator Lisa Jackson acknowledged the impracticality of regulating dust and announced there will be no dust regulations on agriculture at this time. But it is truly amazing that 

a campaign had to be waged to get EPA to finally act. By President 

Obama’s response on his bus tour last August to Illinois, and posed 

a question by a fellow Illinois farmer, the administrator’s words 

still do not instill tremendous confidence in farmers’ minds. 

That is why we support H.R. 1633. I look forward to answering 

your questions. Thank you. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, Mr. Nelson. 

Our next witness is Leonard Felix, constituent of mine from 

Olathe, Colorado. Mr. Felix grew up in Olathe on his family’s 

fourth generation farm and currently owns and operates Olathe 

Spray Company, a small aerial applicator business in Olathe, Colorado. And I would probably be remiss if I did not mention that you 

help grow some—because of your efforts—some of the best corn in 

the United States out of the Olathe area. 

Mr. Felix, it is great to have you here today and we look forward 

to your testimony. Please continue. 

STATEMENT OF LEONARD FELIX 

Mr. FELIX. Chairman Tipton and Committee members, I am 

president of Olathe Spray Service, Inc., Olathe, Colorado. For 43 

seasons I have been providing pest control services to farmers, 

ranchers, state and federal governments. I am testifying today on 

the impacts the EPA’s NPDES Pesticide General Permit on the 

early application of pesticides. 

I have a firsthand understanding of the burdens this permit will 

impose on my business, my clients, and other operators. My business is like 1,600 other small businesses in 46 states that make up 

the aerial application industry of the United States. My business 

employs 9 full-time persons, including myself and two sons, and 6 

to 10 seasonal workers. Like most aerial applicators, we represent 

a large and diverse group of clients. 

Uncompahgre Valley Water Users Association has been serving 

more than 175,000 acres of Colorado farmland since its construction in 1906. Water collected near the Continental Divide delivered 

down the Gunnison River and then through a six-mile tunnel into 


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the South Canal to the Uncompahgre River to the canals and to 

the rich farmland below. The farmers raise vegetables, forage and 

grain crops, orchards, grapes, berries, and other specialty crops, all 

depending totally on this supply of water. The herbicides we apply 

to the many canals and ditches control reed canary grass, orchard 

grass, and noxious weeds that would otherwise choke them. We 

also spray about 60,000 acres of cropland each year. We help control mosquitoes for the Grand Valley pest control district, Orchard 

City, and Cedaredge townships, and Gunnison County. We also 

treat private forest for control of insects that are destroying the forests across our west. 

We service about 500 customers yearly. Those clients call anytime asking for treatment as soon as possible. With the short season in Colorado we have to put in long days, and once harvest begins, night applications are often required to protect the harvest 

crews. This pace requires constant attention to the maintenance of 

our aircraft, frequent calibration of our equipment, and safety 

checks. We have become experts on pesticide label requirements 

and state laws. When done with a day’s flying it all starts over 

again after we complete the required recordkeeping. 

Now we have a new obligation, satisfying the NPDES permit requirements by the EPA and states. In 2009 when the Sixth Circuit 

Court of Appeals revoked the EPA’s 2006 rule exempting pesticide 

applications to, over, and near waters of the U.S., it overturned the 

congressional intent and required EPA to develop NPDES permits 

requiring hundreds of thousands of pesticide users to be in compliance. 

The EPA’s general permit was implemented October 31st of this 

year in six states but it also required similar permits in Colorado 

and 43 other states. Colorado’s Department of Public Health and 

Environment administers the Colorado permit on private property. 

However, EPA administers a pesticide general permit on federal 

and tribal lands. So we will require compliance of both since we do 

work on all of the above. 

These permits will be a huge challenge. Soon there will be enforcement penalties for paperwork and performance violations and 

activists will be able to challenge operators under the Clean Water 

Act citizen suit provision. The cost of defending against citizen suit 

can put us out of business. It is all redundant and unnecessary because FIFRA requires the EPA to ensure pesticide safety before it 

is allowed to be registered for use. 

When working as a for-hire contractor for public and private decision-making clients, EPA has spared applicators part of the planning and reporting burdens required of the government agencies 

and other large entities. However, EPA considers application participating in the planning of the pest control to be decision makers. 

These applicators will have additional responsibility of planning 

and reporting their extensive requirements for documenting maintenance, calibration equipment, assessing weather conditions, minimizing spray drift and offsite movement, and site monitoring. 

Completing these activities are part and parcel to the safety and 

professionalism of our business. Failure to properly update these 

records could result in penalties up to $37,500 per incident per day 

and potential citizen suits. Such records do not add anything to enVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:18 Jan 26, 2012 Jkt 072378 PO 00000 Frm 00011 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A378.XXX A378

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vironmental protections provided by the label of the registered 

products. They just add cost, time-consuming burdens, and open 

the door for those suits. 

So while my sons and I are operating properly applying pesticides products for our clients, we must now also worry about taking notes for permanent records later that evening. Long days and 

risks are part of being the pilots, but the burdens risk of the 

NPDES are something we just do not need or want. 

Do the general permits improve the environment? Not at all. Agriculture does not need the added burden. States do not need the 

added expense. And even EPA and the majority of Congress have 

voiced their opposition to the permits. There is a solution to this 

nonsense, enact House H.R. 872. I am informed there are 65 or 

more senators willing to support this legislation if it is brought before the Senate, and we can only hope there is one additional vote, 

that of the Senate majority leader. 

I thank you, and I will entertain any questions you all have. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. Next on our panel we have Ray 

Vester, a third generation rice farmer from Stuttgart, Arkansas. 

Mr. Vester is testifying on behalf of the USA Rice Federation 

where he currently serves as chairman of their Environmental Regulatory Subcommittee. Thank you for being here today, Mr. Vester, 

and we look forward to your testimony. 

STATEMENT OF RAY VESTER 

Mr. VESTER. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, other members of the 

Subcommittee, I appreciate the opportunity to be here today to 

speak to regulatory issues facing the rice industry and other agricultural industry people. 

The USA Rice Federation—I am Ray Vester from Stuttgart, Arkansas, the rice—president of the USA Rice Federation Environmental Regulatory Subcommittee. The USA Rice Federation is a 

national organization representing rice producers, millers, and 

merchants, and others involved in the rice industry. They are an 

advocate for the production on milling and sales of rice here in the 

United States and also the sale of rice around the world. 

The rice industry is an industry which is unique to the United 

States. There are 10 states that produce rice. The six leading states 

are Arkansas, California, Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, and Missouri. Four other states produce rice and that is Florida, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Illinois. There are about three million acres 

of rice raised each year in the United States and an average of 

about 9,000 farms that produce that rice. It is a $34 billion industry here in the United States, creating 128,000 jobs in that industry, many of which are rural jobs in small communities around the 

nation. There are 20 billion pounds of rice produced each year, half 

of which is exported, but the other half is consumed here in the 

United States. Pests that affect the rice crop are insects, disease, 

and of course, weeds and grasses, and rice is a crop that is grown 

in the water. It is an aquatic crop. 

I am here today to speak on behalf of the rice industry concerning the NPDES permits which we are looking now at since November 1 has arrived. The first thing that is obvious when you 

read the permit is that there is education needed in the Office of 


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Water in the Department—in U.S. EPA. One of the first things you 

read is that the use of pesticides should be done at the lowest 

amount of pesticides possible delivered in a precise way to actively 

control the pest. That is what farmers do each and every day because that is the reason of economy savings. Then the next language that comes up states that the pesticides are only to be applied as a last resort measure when pest conditions can no longer 

be tolerated. If that approach is followed, then the first approach 

cannot be reached. If you wait until the last to control the weeds, 

then you use more pesticides. If you use the pesticides early you 

use smaller amounts. It would be like taking your child to the 

emergency room or to the doctor with a sore throat and the doctor 

tells you, well, he has strep throat and you say, well, you know, 

he is not sick enough to have antibiotics yet. I will take him home. 

And you come back at the end of the week and his throat is so sore 

he cannot speak. He is running a fever. You say, well, I still think 

he is strong enough to survive. And a week later you find him in 

the hospital with an IV with antibiotics hoping you save his life. 

That is the approach the NPDES permit takes when it comes to 

the application of pesticides on rice or any other crop. 

Rice is grown in an aquatic situation. In fields with established 

borders, levy borders, to keep either water in or out. Water is kept 

in during the growing season, released during the harvest season, 

and dried. It is not waters of the U.S. There are waters pumped 

into the field there. The permits required for any time you apply 

a pesticide in the waters of the U.S. rice we feel is not planted or 

grown in waters of the U.S. It is planted and grown in a flooded 

situation. 

The permits are supposedly to permit—to prevent pesticides 

being released into the waters of the U.S. when, in fact, a permit 

allows you to release pesticides into the waters of the U.S. We are 

already covered by FIFRA, which as the speakers have already said 

that covers all those situations. It is established. Farmers follow 

those rules and regulations. Aerial applicators follow those rules 

and regulations. And with the passage of NPDES permits we have 

double regulation. We are doing the same thing over and over 

again, costing family farms more and more money to accomplish 

what is needed. The rice industry is very much against the passage 

of this. 

On the dust issue, it is hard to farm without dust. It is a natural 

reaction. If you do not have dust, the ground is too wet to work. 

If you have dust, the ground is ready to be prepared for planting. 

We are challenged and given the responsibility to raise crops to 

feed this nation. And with dust regulations that supposedly could 

be imposed we face a very difficult situation. We stand very much 

opposed to the dusty regulations that may affect rice farmers and 

farming in general in the United States. 

I would be happy to answer any questions that you might have. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, Mr. Vester. Now I would like to 

yield to Mr. Critz to introduce the final witness. 

Mr. CRITZ. Well, Carl, we are going to actually tag team on you 

today because I did not know until just recently that another member of the Committee, Mr. Barletta, you are actually his conVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:18 Jan 26, 2012 Jkt 072378 PO 00000 Frm 00013 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A378.XXX A378

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stituent. So I am going to give you a very short introduction and 

then yield to Mr. Barletta to give more of a personal introduction. 

But I would like to introduce Carl Shaffer. He is the president 

of the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau. The Pennsylvania Farm Bureau 

is the largest farm organization with a volunteer membership of 

more than 50,000 farm and rural families representing farms of 

every size and commodity across Pennsylvania. Mr. Shaffer was 

just recently re-elected to a third term on the American Farm Bureau Federal Board of Directors and appointed to a second term as 

a member of their executive committee. And something I just 

learned that I am going to say, Lou, I am not going to let you say 

it, is that among recognitions for leadership and achievements in 

agriculture, Mr. Shaffer was named as a master farmer in 1996, 

which is one of the highest honors awarded to farmers in the Commonwealth. Congratulations. 

And I would like to yield to my colleague from Pennsylvania, Mr. 

Barletta. 

Mr. BARLETTA. Thank you, Mr. Critz. And I would like to thank 

my constituent, Pennsylvania Farm Bureau president, Carl 

Shaffer, for traveling to Washington for this hearing today. 

Mr. Shaffer owns a farm in Mifflinville, which is in Columbia 

County, a county that was badly flooded just very recently. Mr. 

Shaffer has worked hard representing all of the farm bureaus 

across the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I look forward to continuing to work with the Farm Bureau on important legislature in 

the future, and I appreciate Mr. Shaffer taking time out of his busy 

schedule to share his testimony with us here today. 

And I yield back my time and thank you, Mr. Critz. 

Chairman TIPTON. Mr. Shaffer, if you would like to continue, 

please. 

STATEMENT OF CARL T. SHAFFER 

Mr. SHAFFER. Thank you, Chairman Tipton, and Ranking Member Critz. Thank you very much. 

I really appreciate the opportunity to be before you today. As was 

stated, my name is Carl Shaffer. I am pleased to offer this testimony on behalf of the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau and the American Farm Bureau Federation. I own and operate a farm in Columbia County, Pennsylvania, where I raise green beans for processing, 

corn, and wheat. 

As a small businessman, I struggle to keep up with all the laws 

and regulations that control how a person operates their business. 

Of all the federal regulatory agencies, the one that takes the most 

time and costs me the most in productivity, is the EPA. In just the 

last three years, the EPA has set in motion a number of new regulations that will change the face of agriculture. 

My written testimony highlights five issues. I will discuss two in 

the short time I have today. One, EPA’s burdensome and we believe unlawful, micro management of the Chesapeake Bay Total 

Maximum Daily Loads and number two, EPA’s proposed rulemaking expanding the scope of the waters regulated under the 

Clean Water Act. 

The first issue is occurring right in my backyard. The EPA’s 

TMDL for the Chesapeake Bay. All the land I farm is in the Bay 


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watershed, and most of the land is within the site of the Susquehanna River. Unfortunately, the EPA does not believe that economic considerations should be taken into account when implicating a TMDL. The overarching problem is that EPA’s Bay model 

is fundamentally wrong. The EPA knows that the model has significant problems and failed to correct it before they finalized the 

Chesapeake Bay TMDL in December 2010. 

A news article recently reported on the lack of scientific credibility and quoted an EPA official dismissing the concerns of local 

and state government saying ‘‘use common sense and let us get on 

with it.’’ Another EPA official was quoted as saying ‘‘none of this 

stuff should impede the planning for what everyone knows is needed to be done.’’ Well, common sense would tell us that money does 

not grow on trees. Hard-earned and private capital must be applied 

in a manner to achieve actual and proven water quality improvements. Common sense would be for EPA to leave the implementation of a TMDL to the states where Congress intended. 

A second issue is draft guidance on the Clean Water Act jurisdiction. The draft guidance would greatly expand EPA’s regulatory 

footprint from the value of the land to restrictions on land use. 

Farms and small business entities will expand negative economic 

consequences. The EPA is changing the rules of the game and has 

indicated they do not need to comply with the Regulatory and 

Flexibility Act and the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement 

Fairness Act. There is no question that asserting Clean Water Act 

jurisdiction will limit the activities that farmers, ranchers, and 

land owners will carry out on their land. The EPA already tries to 

require permits for changing from one type of farming to another. 

The guidance will effectively remove the term navigable from the 

definition of waters of the U.S. 

The term and the definition of waters of the United States permeates all sections and programs under the Clean Water Act, including oil spill prevention and control measures, water quality certifications, the just issued pesticide permits, and soon to be issued 

post-construction storm water regulations. 

The economic implications of continued and purposeful federal 

regulatory overreach will be staggering. These costs will impact the 

whole economy and this committee should not be surprised when 

our productivity contracts and jobs are lost to foreign competition. 

I want to thank you for convening this hearing, and I will be glad 

to respond to any questions you might have. Thank you. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, Mr. Shaffer. I appreciate that. It 

is always kind of interesting when you get the unintended consequences, which come from regulation. We all want clean air. We 

all want clean water. And some of the impacts. 

We will start out with questioning. I would like to begin actually 

with Mr. Felix from my home area. 

Aerial application and pesticides play a major role in protecting 

our farmlands, forests, and other invasive species in enhancing the 

production of food and fiber. Mr. Felix, how will the expanded 

NPDES permit requirement impact your ability to be able to serve 

farmers, local governments, and others that rely on timely economic applications of pesticides? 


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Mr. FELIX. Well, I think currently those kind of applications represent about 40 percent of our business. With the risks that go 

along with the citizen suit efforts that can be done I am really considering not doing those applications anymore. So as far as the 

right-of-way worked on the canals, they would not be done timely 

anymore. I would lose that revenue and also would not need as 

many employees to get that work done. And the water users would 

have to be adding to their arsenal of some way of controlling that 

problem because it is not going to work for us. 

As far as the mosquito and the aquatic applications that we have 

done for adult mosquito control and for junk fish in the DOW 

waters around there, again, probably would not be able to make 

those applications anymore. So how they would accomplish, that I 

do not know, but it is going to put such a strain on my business 

I do not think I would be able to accomplish those anymore. 

Chairman TIPTON. So simply from proposed regulatory requirements you are considering just not doing it anymore? Just simply 

cannot afford to do it. Is there going to be collateral damage to the 

community at that point, the farm and ranch community? 

Mr. FELIX. Yes, I think so, especially on the irrigation projects 

and the communities that we would cease to do mosquito applications for. 

Chairman TIPTON. How will these new regulations—do you see 

them impacting or having some good impacts in regard to environmental or public health in terms of expanding protections? 

Mr. FELIX. Congressman, we have been doing this work for years 

and years and the EPA has regulated those products that we use 

to the point that we are using safer and more appropriate products 

all the time. And we see no adverse environmental effects from 

what we are doing so it is not going to change anything. It is just 

going to make compliance more difficult and more risky for us to 

be involved in business. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. Next question perhaps we can 

have Mr. Nelson and Mr. Shaffer from our two Farm Bureaus 

maybe address this issue. EPA administrator Lisa Jackson has proposed retaining the current standard for coarse particulate matter. 

However, there is no agricultural exemption for farm dust. This uncertainty still lingers throughout the farming community. Mr. 

Shaffer and Mr. Nelson, in previous years when the EPA has revised air quality standards for the Clean Air Act, has the agency’s 

final rule always reflected what the EPA initially proposed concerning farm dust? Mr. Shaffer. 

Mr. SHAFFER. You know, I think it is very easy to look at recent 

history regarding the EPA. An environmental organization will file 

a lawsuit against them. And instead of defending themselves in a 

court they will settle, and thus promulgate a new regulation. We 

have seen this time and time again. And I think that is the danger 

of this, that is the way a new regulation is being developed, unfortunately. My feeling is it is the obligation of Congress to develop 

regulations where it can be brought out in the open, debated, and 

come with some common sense reasonable regulation, but instead 

it is almost like the EPA is encouraging somebody to sue them so 

they can settle and just develop a new regulation upon agriculture. 

Chairman TIPTON. Mr. Nelson. 


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Mr. NELSON. A couple of concerns that I have, and Carl alluded 

to one of them, I think the intent in Congress when you look at 

the Clean Air Act is one thing and I think what EPA is proposing 

is another. And I guess I am very concerned where we have farmers in certain parts of this country right now that cannot even comply with the particulate matter that they are proposing. 

As I said in my testimony, when we harvested this fall and you 

see a natural cause happen when you are harvesting a crop that 

is ripened, you know, farmers have no control over that. And I 

think what irritates farmers the most is getting back to a comment 

that was made earlier, there just needs to be some common sense 

put into this equation as we talk about this. But in response to 

your question, I think I am very concerned that, you know, EPA 

keeps proposing these and keeps handcuffing farmers across this 

country, not just in Illinois, with their proposed rules. 

Chairman TIPTON. I believe that is an important issue, Mr. Nelson. I appreciate you bringing that up because we are seeing some 

activist groups now encouraging expansion of the particulate matter out into the western states to where when the wind blows—I 

know in my part of the country and I know Mr. Felix can speak 

to this as well, we have half of Arizona airborne over us every 

spring just in terms of the dust coming in. So that certainly does 

be able to create some challenges for us. I appreciate you bringing 

that up. 

Small business owners raise concerns that the EPA and its rulemaking in terms of clarifying waters in the U.S. is not adhering to 

mandatory requirements of the Regulatory Flexibility Act and the 

Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act as well. The 

Farm Bureau Federation and other groups wrote to the EPA to express their concerns on this matter and we would like to be able 

to submit that in today’s hearing record as well. 

Given the significant and potentially devastating effect of this 

rule on small businesses, it is critical that the EPA ensure small 

businesses have a fair and meaningful opportunity to participate in 

the federal rulemaking that the agency completes all of the necessary costs benefits analysis. What are some of the costs you see 

coming out of some of these rulings—potential rulings for EPA dust 

control? 

Mr. NELSON. The first thing that comes to my mind is how are 

you going to comply? In harvesting, I think you are very limited 

in what you can do to try to meet that requirement. I look to my 

colleagues in California that might have a lot of fresh produce, that 

they drive down a dirt road. They are out of compliance under the 

proposed rules that they are pushing forward. So I think the compliance issue is one thing that rises to the top of every 

businessperson involved in agriculture in trying to comply with it. 

Chairman TIPTON. Mr. Shaffer, do you have any comments? 

Mr. SHAFFER. I would just echo that. But just for instance in 

Pennsylvania, we have a large amount of dairy farmers for instance and they depend on making hay for cattle feed. Well, you 

cannot bale hay and put it away wet, or you are going to have 

spontaneous combustion. So just by the definition of it you have to 

let hay dry. Thus, when you go to bale it you are creating dust. So 

honestly, you know, as I said in my testimony, it is laughable when 


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they say use common sense. Well, this is common sense and to try 

to regulate particulate matter over dust and things like that, that 

is not common sense. 

Chairman TIPTON. Yeah. The uncertainty is certainly a question. 

Mr. Felix, could you maybe address, has it been your experience 

in terms of applying pesticides that you will wake up one morning 

and you have new labeling that you may not have been made 

aware of that can put you out of compliance? 

Mr. FELIX. Certainly. This happens quite frequently. As a product comes down the pipeline to us and the label changes come, we 

are not notified of it. The only responsibility we have is reading 

that label as we get it. And we have lost uses in the middle of the 

season. For instance, I was applying a product to spinach and there 

was a complaint made to the Department of Agriculture and they 

came in to do the investigation. I went out and got a label off the 

new products and spinach was not on the label, but the material 

we carried over for the winter it was. And so these kinds of things 

are going on all the time on a daily basis and that is why in my 

testimony I mention we become experts on the label and the proper 

use of the products in compliance with that label and that was one 

lesson almost learned the hard way. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. Just a couple more questions and 

then we can get our other members involved here as well. 

Mr. Vester, due to the uncertainty of the process to obtain a general permit have you started to consider changes that you will need 

to make in order to comply with new permitting requirements? 

Mr. VESTER. Well, once again we are dealing with U.S. EPA. 

Most of our farmers have no clue this is there. They receive no notification from anybody. If they read the National Register every 

morning they might discover that there has been a new rule. We 

have spent a great deal of time on SPCC [Spill Prevention Controlling Countermeasures], and we were finally able to obtain an extension on implementation of that regulation. EPA has promised. 

We debated that for five years with EPA. A plan came out with a 

plan which we had agreed to with a promised five-year implementation and then all of a sudden it changed to one year. It was 

promised education to know what to do. That was never done. Most 

farmers even today when they got the extension did not know what 

they got the extension for. There is very little information that 

comes from the EPA. It is assumed that we know everything they 

do. It is difficult to do. 

We, in the rice industry, consider and debate the fact that we 

should be exempt because our water issues on the production of 

rice is return flow irrigation water and storm water runoff. Those 

two are exempt by law in the Clean Water Act. Period. But EPA 

is trying to circumvent that by the fact of writing regulations that 

bring on environmentalist lawsuits. That is the way they regulate 

now, judicially, not legislatively. And that is what we face each and 

every day. And the NPDS permit, as I said earlier, they tell you 

to use as little chemicals as possible with no set amount which 

opens that to lawsuit trying to establish what amount. Then they 

say that you can only use it as a last resort. So who decides what 

is last resort? And last resort does not work. 


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You know, we are dealing with an agency that writes rules for 

what we do and they do not know what we do. They do not know 

how we do it. They just know that there ought to be rules for it. 

We have people who have spent their entire life on concrete trying 

to tell farmers how they should run and operate their business, 

how they should plant crops, how they should grow crops. The U.S. 

farmer produces the most abundant, the safest, cheapest supply of 

food to the American public and we get beat over the head every 

year because we are not doing it right. You know, I do not know 

what our answer is. You know, how do you not spray a pesticide 

on your rice to take care of insects, disease, and grasses and weeds 

when it is an aquatic crop? Now, the water seldom ever leaves that 

farm because in our state most of the water is retrieved, placed in 

reservoirs, and reused. 

In the 1980s, EPA did a study in Western Tennessee on rice 

fields where water was put in and where it came out. And the results of that study were the fact that the rice was cleaner coming 

out of the rice field than when it was put in, whether it was service 

water or well water because of the marsh-type atmosphere of a rice 

field. But that study was never released. It was never made public 

because it did not give the results they wanted. Water coming out 

of a rice field is safer and cleaner than the water going in because 

of its marsh-type atmosphere. It is a daily battle with EPA for us. 

And we have continuing regulation that, you know, what is our answer? I do not really know. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, Mr. Vester. I appreciate that. 

I would now like to yield to Ranking Member Critz for his questions. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And because of our testimony and the questions you have answered, I had a whole slew of 

questions I wanted to ask but you have given me a whole slew of 

new ones that I want to ask because obviously part of the process 

here is for us to learn more about what is going on so that we can 

make educated decisions, but also to make sure that anyone who 

is listening and that the testimony goes around so that other members of Congress can learn as well. 

But because you are my guest, Mr. Shaffer, you get my first 

question, of course. It is a little off the defined topic of why we are 

here today but it is such a big issue in Pennsylvania. It is, of 

course, the Chesapeake Bay discharge concerns. And actually, I 

was showing Carl when I came in that Farm Bureau News—American Farm Bureau News has Carl on the front testifying before the 

House Agriculture Subcommittee on Conservation, Energy, and 

Forestry about Chesapeake Bay issues that we are having in Pennsylvania. 

So Mr. Shaffer, your testimony talks about the billions that could 

be spent on EPA’s Chesapeake Bay TMDL. Does anyone know how 

much this will cost taxpayers and/or businesses? 

Mr. SHAFFER. Unfortunately, no. This is the mindboggling part 

of this. EPA is projecting this regulation and they have never done 

an economic analysis or cost-benefit analysis on this. Recently, Virginia has come out and they said they are estimating that it is 

going to cost them $7 billion to comply. New York has come out 


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with a figure of $6 billion. But the bottom-line is there has not 

been a cost analysis or a cost-benefit analysis. 

And let me make one other point. We look at the Chesapeake 

Bay and think this is a regional issue but I will tell you exactly 

what EPA has said. This is a pilot project that they are going to 

use throughout the United States. So to all your other colleagues 

across the United States, this is going to be an issue they are going 

to have to deal with as well. 

Mr. CRITZ. Well, and for those in the audience and in the panel, 

the reason I asked Carl to be here is that he is in Mr. Barletta’s 

district and represents farmers and the Chesapeake Bay watershed 

really does not impact my district but because of this pilot issue, 

because of the cost. And when you mention it is going to cost New 

York $6 billion and Virginia $7 billion, that is not the state, that 

is the farmers. Is that correct? 

Mr. SHAFFER. No, that is the state. Because this is going to go 

beyond the farms. This is going to go and involve communities. It 

is going to be involving their regional planning. It is going to involve their municipal water treatment systems. It is going to have 

very far reaching effects beyond the farm. As you indicated earlier, 

their own numbers say that they are going to take—we are going 

to have to take 20 percent of the land out of crop production. 

Mr. CRITZ. Six hundred thousand acres. That is right. Yeah. 

Mr. SHAFFER. Which is unreal. And looking at their model, as I 

indicated, it is faulty. They do not indicate in their model that we 

utilize any best management practices whatsoever where we have 

been doing it for 40 years utilizing best management conservation 

practices. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thank you. Thank you. And Mr. Felix, you made a 

comment and I am actually going to say something that is extremely sarcastic and I think you will get it when I am through, 

is that obviously you have run probably a $20-, $30 billion dollar 

business and you have a staff of attorneys that go over regulations 

and things that are coming down. Is that true? 

Mr. FELIX. No, sir. 

Mr. CRITZ. No, sir. [Laughter.] 

So you have 20 employees? One hundred employees? 

Mr. FELIX. Actually, nine full-time employees. That includes mechanics, my two sons and myself, and loaders and field scouts. And 

we provide a turnkey operation. So we go out to the farmer and we 

check the fields, assist them in decision-making on what kind of 

applications they need to save them the money they need and still 

put a crop in their storage so that they can have something to go 

from one year to the next, whether it is livestock—we do range 

land, all the farm land around there, forestry. I mean, it is a turnkey thing. We also do surveillance and game surveys for the DOW 

with the helicopters in the wintertime and provide search and rescue for the communities and the counties in the local area, plus fire 

suppression for the sheriff departments in the local areas with both 

aircraft. 

Mr. CRITZ. Well, good. And the reason I asked my very sarcastic 

question at the beginning is that this label change that happens, 

that comes as a surprise, is that you find you have stock that you 

cannot use for certain items. And what you are saying is that there 


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was no notification. It is up to you to somehow—to read the Federal Register every day to find out what is going on because of the 

impact. So you end up with stock that now has devalued if you 

have carried something over. Is that—— 

Mr. FELIX. Well, or you have to use it in a different way or return it. I mean, sometimes we can do that. But if they take a product completely away then you are just stuck with it and you have 

got to pay to have it disposed of with hazmat people. And that just 

happened last year with carbofuran. 

Mr. CRITZ. I can understand your frustration. That is an interesting item that certainly we need to look at that. 

Mr. Vester, you made—you used an example and I want you to 

further clarify this. And you used the strep throat example for 

NPDS permitting. 

Mr. VESTER. Right. 

Mr. CRITZ. Can you go through this again and maybe use a different analogy? Because I am trying to figure out—is that the 

NPDS is a—you are saying let us wait until the patient is dying 

before we—well, I will let you explain it because I am trying to get 

it straight in my head. 

Mr. VESTER. I understand. In the NPDS draft permit it makes 

a statement that you should use the lowest amount of pesticide 

possible to apply to your crops and apply it specifically so there is 

no drift. We do that regularly because that is the plan. When you 

first see one and two leaf grass you spray to kill it. When you first 

see five to 10 worms every so far in a sweep you spray to get rid 

of them. When sheath blight and blast, which are funguses that 

grow in rice, when you find 10 stalks in a certain area, you spray. 

When the least amount of disease and insects and weeds are there 

you spray with a small amount of pesticide. But then in the next 

paragraph or later on they say that pesticide should be the last 

thing you do to prevent these pests. That you should wait until it 

is intolerable, I think they say, to apply anything to stop them. So 

if you do that, if you follow that practice—— 

Mr. CRITZ. So that is almost contradictory. 

Mr. VESTER. It is contradictory because they do not understand. 

They have written a regulation dealing with something they do not 

know what they are talking about because if you wait too long then 

you use a 2X rate in what we call a salvage operation because the 

weeds are starting to choke the rice out they are so big and strong 

or the worms have eaten 90 percent of what is there or the fungus 

has spread so bad it destroys the yield and the quality of the rice. 

And it would be like taking a child to the doctor or yourself to the 

doctor with a bad cold and they say you have strep throat and you 

tell them, well, I am strong. I can survive it. And you keep going 

back until you are finally in the hospital and the last resort, you 

take antibiotics. You get an IV because you are dehydrated. It is 

the same ignorance that you would be if you did not accept what 

is needed for you physically for health as if you do not do what is 

needed physically for the health of your crop. 

Mr. CRITZ. So it is almost like preventive medicine? Is that—— 

Mr. VESTER. Well, it—— 

Mr. CRITZ [continuing.] Spend a little upfront to save the huge 

amount down the road. And plus, if you are losing crop, you are 


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losing—you are spending more and losing—you are not making as 

much. 

Mr. VESTER. When you wake up in the morning with a sinus 

headache and pressure, do you take something to stop it? You do. 

If you do not, what happens? It keeps getting worse and worse and 

finally you may have a sinus infection and you go to the doctor. If 

you walk into your field and you find one and two leaf grass, it 

takes a small amount of herbicide to kill that. If you wait till it is 

five- to six-leaf grass it takes an enormous amount of pesticide to 

kill it. And so on one hand they are telling you, you know, do not 

use a whole lot but wait to apply pesticides or herbicides until 

there is no other option. Well, in the first place that is the only option. 

Mr. CRITZ. So let us take this a step further. So common sense. 

We are going to use common sense. We are going to use the reasonable man approach here. Do you spray when you see those two 

blades of grass? Now, what happens with the permitting? Does it 

come back that you get pushback from the agency or what—I 

mean—— 

Mr. VESTER. We have not, you know, we are starting a new year. 

Okay? We are regulated at the state level because EPA directly 

regulates six or seven states and the rest of the states it is delegated to state authority to regulate. In Arkansas it is DEQ. So—— 

Mr. CRITZ. Pennsylvania—is DEP Pennsylvania or is it EPA? 

Mr. SHAFFER. In Pennsylvania the pesticide rules fall under the 

Department of Agriculture. 

Mr. VESTER. And it varies state to state. So we all have different 

rules and the only stipulation that each state has, they have to 

have a rule as stringent or more stringent than what the U.S. EPA 

rule is. You cannot be less stringent. So—— 

Mr. CRITZ. Right. Okay. 

Mr. VESTER. Our rule is just now coming out to be known. So 

whether we need to—we have to read that rule for the coming year 

to see if we are going to have to have a permit and what establishes that if it is approved what we write in the EPA. Now, we 

have only seen and the State of Arkansas has written off the draft 

regulation because we had to—we had to have the state regulation 

ready by November 1. Well, EPA did not have the full regulation 

ready until November 1. So we had, you know, we could not—— 

Mr. CRITZ. Right. You had to use the draft. 

Mr. VESTER. We had to use the draft. Well, the draft does not 

look anything like the new regulation. So I do not know even if Arkansas or any of the other states have a regulation—— 

Mr. CRITZ. Or if they will be—— 

Mr. VESTER [continuing]. That is approved by EPA. 

Mr. CRITZ. Yeah. 

Mr. VESTER. So, you know, the original draft that EPA—draft 

that EPA came out with, you know, there was talk that you had 

to apply for a permit in the winter for the coming year listing all 

the pesticides you were going to use in that coming year. You do 

not know. You do not know when you are going to use them. 

Weather and time of the year dictate what we do as farmers. You 

know, when the crop is planted. We cannot—we do not have a busiVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:18 Jan 26, 2012 Jkt 072378 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A378.XXX A378

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ness plan that says today we are doing this and tomorrow we are 

doing that. 

Mr. CRITZ. Right. Right. 

Mr. VESTER. You know, like I said, EPA is regulating something 

they do not know anything about. 

Mr. CRITZ. Yeah. Well, I think we had it in Pennsylvania this 

last year is we had—it was wet early, then it got hot, and then it 

got wet late again so it changes. So I see what you are saying. 

I have one last quick question. Well, I do not know if it is going 

to be quick. You know me. 

But Carl, you had mentioned about EPA, and this is another 

issue I am trying to get my hands around, EPA issues a rule, gets 

sued, and then settles and that is now new regulations are created. 

Can you walk through that a little and maybe give a specific example? 

Mr. SHAFFER. Yeah. I can give you a very specific example of it. 

And that is the Chesapeake Bay TMDL. 

Mr. CRITZ. Okay. 

Mr. SHAFFER. The Chesapeake Bay Foundation filed a lawsuit 

against EPA saying they were not acting in a timely—they needed 

to act in a more timely manner and put more enforcement into 

cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay. Instead of even leaving that and 

go to court and have a court decide whether that lawsuit had validity or not, EPA settled and said okay, we will settle. Now it is our 

responsibility. We have to come out with a whole new set of rules 

to meet the challenge of the settlement of the lawsuit. So the 

Chesapeake Bay TMDL came out of just one environmental group 

suing EPA and EPA not even defending themselves for any practical purpose. They just agreed to settle and put out a whole new 

set of rules. This is happening time and time again. And unfortunately, as I said in my testimony, you are the entity that should 

be setting rules and regulations, Congress, and instead EPA is 

doing this by settlement agreements. And a lot of different issues 

are being promulgated this way. 

Mr. CRITZ. Thanks, Carl. I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. I recognize Mr. Barletta for questions. 

Mr. BARLETTA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

The word I heard most here this morning was the word ‘‘common 

sense.’’ And I could tell you in my short time here in Washington, 

the 10 months I have been here, I found that common sense is not 

as common here as it is in Pennsylvania, Illinois, Arkansas, or Colorado. 

I think we all agree that farmers have a vested interest in conserving and protecting their land and the agricultural sector is 

vital to our nation’s economy. And also, you know, people may not 

realize it is vital to our country’s national security. It is very, very 

important that America continues to produce its own food. And I 

am very concerned about that. Some of the regulations that you 

have to live under, other countries are not. And we are putting 

America’s farmers at a disadvantage as we have done in manufacturing and then we wonder why we do not have any more manufacturing in America. We are doing the same thing in farming. And 

I believe it is a national security issue. 


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But assuming this is true, Mr. Nelson, how can the Environmental Protection Agency justify—how can they justify imposing 

these burdensome regulations on American farmers? 

Mr. NELSON. Well, that is the question we have been asking ourselves as producers because when you start looking at their proposed regulations, whether it is in clean air or clean water. And I 

think the frustrating part that we see on behalf of the farm community is we are not given any credit for the environmental practices that we have in place. Case in point, over the last two decades 

we have reduced the use of pesticides almost 30 percent through 

biotechnology that we use in our crops. Secondly, we probably use 

25 percent less fertilizers over the last two decades. We plant filter 

strips as was alluded to earlier to make the water cleaner. In Illinois, we have private pesticide applicator training. Every three 

years you go through a training exercise and have to be licensed. 

So I think the frustration that we have is we have a lot to offer 

as an ag community to put on the table of practices that we do 

have in place, which are best management practices but we are not 

given any credit for that. And I think that is the frustration that 

we see in the justification of the EPA. 

I use a recent court ruling in the Fifth Circuit as it relates to 

livestock production. It said if you do not discharge, you do not 

need an NPDES permit. The EPA did not appeal that, but yet at 

the present time in the state of Illinois and other states, we are 

facing the fact that the state or the regional EPA offices are saying, 

well, that was the case in the Fifth Circuit but we are still wanting 

producers in the case of livestock to obtain permits. And we do not 

necessarily agree with the definition of a discharge. So I think we 

are wrestling right now on that segment the same as we are with 

this general permit of which we tried to have input into the drafting of that, and the final stages of that permit look far different 

than they did in the drafting phase. So it is a very difficult question to answer but in the eyes of agriculture we have a lot of question marks of how they can justify doing this and taking what we 

said today and the production side of what we do best and producing a safe, abundant food supply and trying to hinder that. 

Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Shaffer, I agree with you. You are right. The 

regulations of what we are seeing in Pennsylvania, folks around 

the country should be paying attention because it will be coming 

soon to your neighborhood. As you know, much of our congressional 

district, including your hometown of Mifflinville, is located in the 

Chesapeake Bay watershed. I know that you, like many other 

farmers in Pennsylvania, are concerned about EPA’s regulatory approach in the Bay watershed. Yet the EPA has been assuring congressional panels that states will have control over implementing 

water quality programs in the Chesapeake Bay region. Has this 

been your experience? 

Mr. SHAFFER. Absolutely not. The Clean Water Act, in my opinion and our opinion, simply says that the state should have control 

over their waters. And in implementing the TMDLs the state of 

Pennsylvania, all the states in the watershed, are required to do 

water implementation plans. So Pennsylvania started working with 

the stakeholders, who are farmers and other people, working to develop its first phase of the watershed implementation plan. It had 


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questions. It reached out to EPA and said, well, is this part of the 

water plan going to be acceptable or not? And EPA’s answer was 

submit the plan, and we will tell you if it is acceptable. They developed a plan, submitted it. It was immediately rejected and EPA 

said it did not have enough backstops, enough enforcement. So how 

do you say the states are controlling their own waters when the 

EPA is rejecting the plans and dictating what they have to do? 

So I am very concerned about that. And, you know, every state 

is different. Topography is different. Weather conditions might be 

different. So we go back to common sense. It just makes common 

sense that each state is in a better situation to develop a plan to 

protect the waters in its state. A one size fits all plan just will not 

work. 

Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Shaffer, common sense is a dirty word around 

here. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you, Mr. Barletta. 

You know, listening to you, and Mr. Felix, I hope you do not 

mind if I share a little bit of a conversation you and I had had before this hearing. 

Mr. FELIX. Go ahead. 

Chairman TIPTON. I would like to preface this, you know, if you 

look back at the census in this country—I believe it was 1950– 

1960—we had 130 million Americans in this country. Our latest 

census shows we have over 300 million Americans. That population 

growth is happening worldwide. Mr. Felix, you shared with me in 

our part of the country, on the west slope of Colorado, that you are 

seeing fields now that used to grow crops growing subdivisions. 

Mr. FELIX. The last crop, asphalt and shingles. 

Chairman TIPTON. Asphalt and shingles. And is the experience— 

we have the rice community represented here, a couple of Farm 

Bureaus, are you seeing more and more farmers simply throwing 

up their hands and saying we cannot comply. We do not know what 

the regulations are going to be. It is not worth the cost. It is not 

worth $37,500 per day in fines just to try and conduct business and 

to grow food for the American people? Are you seeing more farmers 

just reluctantly saying we have had enough? 

Mr. FELIX. I will say emphatically on the livestock side they are 

just frustrated. I just talked about with the definition of a discharge, we think of that as if something were to happen in a lagoon 

which stores the manure from livestock—would break if something 

like that would happen. We consider that a discharge. EPA is considering a discharge a rain event that comes off of a roof that hits 

a ventilation fan that might end up in the grass as a discharge. 

That is how farfetched this is getting. So the livestock community 

is very frustrated. And I am seeing people that are middle aged or 

approaching, you know, the latter part of their life. They are just 

throwing the towel in and saying forget it. 

I think on the crop production side we alluded to this earlier 

with your sarcasm, Mr. Congressman, but we are getting to a point 

and it is not a laughable matter that farming operations are going 

to have to have a regulatory specialist to keep up with regulations 

to keep their farming operations in compliance. And as I said before, the ironic thing is today an American farmer feeds themselves 

and about 155 other people. If we continue down this pathway, you 


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can look out 10 years from now where that number might be half 

or even a third of that if we keep hamstringing what we do best. 

And by the same token, I think we consider ourselves to be the 

true environmentalists who do protect the water that we drink in 

the farming operations that we are a part of and the air that we 

breathe. 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. Anyone else care to comment on 

that? 

Mr. VESTER. Go ahead. 

Mr. FELIX. The thought that comes to mind about this whole 

thing is—and you can take it to the economy even—is that there 

is no new wealth in this country except for what we grow, what we 

mine, what we fish out of the oceans or the rivers, and cut from 

the forests. Everything else is a turnaround, a reuse over and over 

and over. And without that new wealth from this country, we are 

going down. You have to have new wealth. It does not come from 

anywhere else. It is either the sun or the earth. That is it. 

Chairman TIPTON. All right. Thank you. Mr. Vester. 

Mr. VESTER. You know, to be—I will use a term I do not like— 

but sustainable rice producer in this day and time—I do not agree 

with that terminology although I do serve on a committee that we 

discuss that. But a rice farm in our area, to be sustainable as a 

family farm, you need to be farming a minimum of 1,500 acres in 

a crop rotation, which normally there is rice, soybeans, and wheat, 

or rice, soybeans, and corn. That steadily grows and grows. Farms 

have to be larger because of the economy of size. No matter how 

much commodity prices climb, no matter how much you get for a 

crop each year, the cost of producing that crop comes up right 

under it. It is a margin about this wide. I tell people that farmers 

are people who faithfully every year go to the bank and get a crop 

loan to produce your crop and they mortgage everything they 

have—their equipment, their crop they are going to grow, the crop 

they have not sold all of yet, their wife and children, if the bank 

would accept it as collateral, with the hope and a prayer that by 

fall when that crop is harvested that the commodity prices will be 

high enough and the yields will be good enough, which in reality 

we do not control. A lot of that is controlled by weather conditions. 

And they have enough return to pay off that crop note and enough 

money left over till the next crop loan is funded. That is basically 

what we do because the margins are that thin. Some people are 

very successful because maybe it has been generations of families 

buying land but the average farmer, that is what they look at each 

and every year. With new regulation, new cost, new things they 

face each and every day, it is very discouraging. 

You are not finding—I have to say in our area we have got a lot 

of young farmers coming in right now who are following dads in 

and dads are retiring. But people get very frustrated. It gets very 

difficult. Costs are enormous. Returns are low. And you know, I sit 

on a bank board and if you look at most crop loans that we look 

at, the margin in that crop loan, whether they are a corn farmer 

or a rice farmer, is equivalent to that deficiency payment they received. That is the margin. That is what is left over. Okay? And 

some years it is not that. This year it will not be that because costs 

were so high. We were the same way in Arkansas. We had a flood 


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period. We were dry first. We had floods. We had land that was 

flooded and could not be planted until late and they lost their crop 

due to drought. I mean, that is what you face in agriculture. And 

when the young people can go to town and work 40 hours a week 

and make more money than mom and dad, why would they stay 

there? I mean, that is what you look at. 

You know, years and years ago it was said if farmers took everything they had invested if they owned land and put it in a savings 

account at 2 percent interest, they would make more money than 

they did farming. And that was true. You know, we are kind of— 

maybe we are not very intelligent. I do not know. But we love what 

we do. It is a great joy. I have a grandson that is 12 years old and 

that is all he wants to be. And that is wonderful. But Mr. Felix is 

correct. We are facing, I think a frightening thing. 

I lived through the ’70s when they told us to plant fence row to 

fence row. We were going to run out of food and we did not because 

some things happened. But are those things going to happen this 

time? Are we running to the end of the line? You know, I really 

question that. The economic conditions in the United States right 

now are going to be devastating to agriculture. We are down—right 

now we are down to seven major seed companies in the United 

States. Two of those are considering selling out. Of those seven 

seed companies, they own the five chemical—major chemical companies in this country. Okay? They have united. All of those seed 

companies own a chemical company except for one or two. We are 

down to two major fertilizer providers nationally in the world. 

When the products you need are that closely held, do you know 

what happens to the cost of them? They go out the ceiling. 

In reality, I think financing is shrinking. Bank of Cooperatives, 

which loans money to co-ops and big farming operations around the 

country, in several areas have combined with Farm Credit. Even 

financing for agriculture is becoming closely held. I really feel personally that we are almost entering a period of feudalism where 

the margin in agriculture is so small that the farmer is going to 

have so much wrapped up in fertilizer, seed, and chemicals, and 

paying for regulatory issues that if he stumbles and has a bad crop 

he will never be able to climb out of the hole and put those seed 

companies—and they will finally merge seed, fertilizer, chemical, 

and finance altogether. They will say that is all right. You can keep 

farming your farm. You will not own anything but we will pay you 

a salary. That is where we are headed in agriculture in this country right now. I think we are very close to it. Do you not? 

Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. 

Mr. FELIX. I think that is where we are headed, a system of feudalism. And, you know, we need to do something for the agricultural community, to slow this down and get it back to where we 

are a production agriculture feeding the nation and the world. 

Chairman TIPTON. Mr. Shaffer, any comment? 

Mr. SHAFFER. Just to follow up on your statement of farmers getting disgusted and giving up frustrated. I am as concerned about 

our young people. Where is the next generation of agriculture going 

to come from if they are discouraged from even entering into it? 

And where are the next food providers in this country going to 

come from if that frustration is carried to the younger generation? 


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Chairman TIPTON. Thank you. Congressman Critz, do you have 

another question? 

Mr. CRITZ. Well, I had another question but, you know, one quick 

story is after the tsunami in Japan, you know, a lot of the farmers, 

because of the nuclear issues, had to move away. And I will never 

forget they were interviewing one rice farmer in Japan. He said, 

you know, he did not know what he was going to do because he 

had been farming—his family had been farming that land for 600 

years. And the farmers that I encounter in my district, that is the 

stock we are talking about. These are people who want to do this 

and their families want to do this for a long, long time. And it is 

up to us to try and help. And that is, of course, what this is all 

about, is trying to be in a position where we can offer some help. 

You know, obviously, we are never going to solve every problem but 

we are on your side and we are trying to do our best. And we try 

to listen and learn to come up with solutions. 

But the one question I did have is that when we are talking 

about this, you know, I am going to go back to our pilot program 

in Pennsylvania, the Chesapeake Bay issues, if you could look back 

20–30 years and compare it to today on the environmental impact 

that farmers are having at this point, what are the things that 

farming has done over these last years? And a lot of times I know 

you can share statistics with us that show that, you know, the 

work that has been done or the work that is being done on farms 

now is so much more environmentally friendly than it was in the 

past because you have implemented a lot of things. And I think, 

Mr. Shaffer, Carl, you had mentioned in your testimony or in some 

of the information that part of your heartburn with EPA right now 

is that they do not give credit to farms that are doing clean up already. 

So if anyone or everyone, anyone who wants to comment on the 

difference now between—between now and if you want to go back 

10, if you want to go back 50 years—what the difference is that you 

are seeing on farms and how you really are the stewards of the 

land. And the reason I ask this is because I want to make sure it 

is in the record so everyone gets to hear it. 

Mr. SHAFFER. Well, Congressman, and Congressman Barletta, as 

you know exactly where I live, I was born and raised along the 

shore of the Susquehanna River. And when I was a child I would 

go down to the river. The rocks along the bank were fluorescent orange. There was all kinds of things floating in that river and there 

were no fish. Today it is one of the best smallmouth bass fisheries 

in the world. The waters have been cleaned up. 

My father used to raise beef cattle and I can remember on hot 

days those cattle standing in the creek to keep cool. Now, my father was not a bad man. He just did not know that was an opportunity for pollution. We have learned that. We now have stream 

bank fencing. We have adopted so many practices over the last 40– 

50 years—no-till farming, cover crops—it goes on and on with best 

management practices. We have done this voluntarily without 

EPA’s foot on our head telling us to do this. And we have been able 

to do it through the development of technology and new ways of 

farming that are more environmentally friendly and we have 

adopted it on our own. And that is why you can go to EPA’s numVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:18 Jan 26, 2012 Jkt 072378 PO 00000 Frm 00028 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 E:\HR\OC\A378.XXX A378

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bers of how much nitrogen reduction there has been, how much 

phosphorous reduction there has been, and how much sediment reduction there has been. And it proves it. 

And we still, as you mentioned, I was in that Congressional hearing two weeks ago. The administration official from the EPA stood 

there and said this is like trying to run a 10K race and we are still 

standing at the starting line. Now, after all we have accomplished, 

for them to say we are still standing at the starting line, you talk 

about frustration. There is not any bigger frustration than comments like that. 

Mr. VESTER. In the rice industry, compared to 20 years ago, two 

of the major input costs in rice have always been nitrogen fertilizer 

and water. We use half the water we used to use because of developments of seed that mature more quickly, because of practices 

how we do not lose water. It is a precious item to us. Farmers conserve their water faithfully because they have to have it. I would 

say that nitrogen use has been cut by 40 percent and they are 

doing experiments now and testing now not run by EPA, run by 

the Extension Service in our state of how we can use less fertilizer 

yet. 

We have made huge inroads. Nearly all farmers plant grass barriers around their field to keep pollution down, to keep erosion 

down. Farmers know that their land and what they do is precious 

to them. It is no different than the man that has a lockbox full of 

cash money. He is not going to leave the lid open and let the money 

come out. That is our livelihood. That is what we pass on to our 

children and to the next generation. That is the way we make our 

living. We take care of what we have. 

As Mr. Shaffer says, you know, it is disheartening to hear people 

say, well, you are just not doing enough. You know, what you have 

done, well, anybody would have known to do that. And there is an 

opinion in U.S. EPA that we are ignorant, straw chewing people 

who wear overalls and do not have an education. That is what 

comes across to me. 

Mr. CRITZ. And it is interesting because I have yet to meet a 

farmer that is not highly educated and can talk about agricultural 

science, pesticide science. I mean, all these things. It is amazing to 

me. It was actually an education for me because, you know, I guess 

growing up you read books about farming and it is just you work 

with your hands, people work with their backs, but the education 

required is unbelievable. 

And to your point, you are doing things so they have to be smarter. The next generation has to be smarter because they are innovating and they are doing good things. I did not mean to interrupt 

but I am amazed at the level of education farmers have. 

Mr. FELIX. I would like to go back to what we were talking about 

the young farmers and where they are coming from. Our farmers 

have implemented the very similar things that these other gentlemen have related to, the no-till and the irrigation practices. With 

the dust controls, we do not plow everything anymore. All those 

things are being done every day in the interest of not only the environment but also more efficiency and better crops. 

But back to the young people. There is a tremendous resource 

there that if we lose it, I do not know where you are going to get 


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it back. Because if you think about this green thumb that comes 

along with a grower or aerial applicator or somebody that understands the cropping system and how to get it done, how to do a 

minimum amount of applications to get the maximum out of your 

pesticides, you cannot learn that in school. That is something that 

is passed on from father to son to son to son. And if you lose that, 

and I can attest to this because I have got young farmers out there 

that came from the city and they want to farm. But I can tell you 

what, they have a heck of a time. And we offer them a lot of help, 

but even so they make bad decisions and they do stupid things. 

And it is really difficult to get them up to speed so that they can 

farm. And most of them do not make it and that is what I see in 

our area. 

Mr. NELSON. And I think a lot has been said but, you know, the 

one comment that I guess I failed to bring up through this hearing 

and the frustration the farmers have with these proposed rules is 

we cannot pass it on. I mean, we are a price taker, not a price 

maker. And I think that that is a very important point that I think 

this agency does not understand from time to time. 

But getting back to your question, 30-some years ago I graduated 

from college and, you know, at that time the push was to go towards no-till. And I remember coming home to farm being the only 

one out of the six in our family that came home to farm with dad. 

And the first year I said, Dad, we need to rent a drill and we are 

going to no-till our soybeans. And I thought he was going to kill 

me because he said, there you are, the college-educated kid that 

does not get it. And at that time no-till was not very common. But 

you know something? That year we had above normal rainfall, the 

soil did not move, the trash was there to protect it, and we looked 

at the T By 2000 campaign that went on in Illinois in protecting 

our soils and our fragile lands. 

We looked at the conservation programs that we put in place. 

The water is cleaner. The filter strips have protected our streams 

and our rivers. And in crop production today I make the comment 

we use prescription farming. We farm by the square inch, through 

global positioning. We have auto steer technology. We do not apply 

pesticides and fertilizers that we do not have to because it impacts 

our bottom-line, and secondly, we are environmentally friendly in 

what we do. 

And I think shifting gears to the livestock side, being a livestock 

producer, 30 years ago we raised a lot of our animals in outside facilities. We brought those animals into controlled environments 

where they live in sheds that are cooled and heated during the 

winter time. A lot of places better than humans live. And we raise 

a type of meat today that is rivaled around the world. And yet we 

also take credit. Thirty years ago we did not think of manure as 

a bonus to a farming operation. Now we use it in our nutrient management plans that we put in place as practices. 

But I guess my closing comment is, you know, a lot has changed 

in 30 years and it has all been for the good. But yet we do not get 

credit for that it has been alluded to. 

And I will use the analogy. I have a son who would like to push 

dad out of the farming operation today and take it over but he sees 

the storm clouds on the horizon of the EPA pushing some of these 


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rules and he is skeptical about whether or not he wants to be a 

part of this business. And as Congressmen, as members involved 

in agriculture, we have to get it right and get this thing under control and get back to the common sense that really, you know, needs 

to be injected into this debate. 

Chairman TIPTON. Well, thank you, gentlemen. I appreciate your 

comments on that and fellow members of the Committee. Sitting on 

the Small Business Committee it is an interesting observation. All 

of our small businesses, be it farming, ranching, small retailers, 

small production companies across this country. As I have traveled 

throughout my third congressional district to Colorado, 54,000-plus 

square miles, at every meeting that we were at, within no more 

than 10 minutes the EPA comes up. The overreach of this body is 

enormous and I think, Mr. Nelson, to your point, particularly with 

our farm and ranch community, something that we cannot ever fail 

to underscore for the American public is the farmer, the rancher 

does not set their price; they pay the price, not only in terms of the 

sweat off of their brow but out of the limited resources that they 

have. And when we have a moving target, and as Mr. Shaffer was 

noting, that the EPA views us still at the starting line. 

We have seen tremendous improvement because the best 

custodians of our land is truly our farm and ranch community. And 

I want you to know on my behalf, and I know on Congressman 

Critz’s behalf and Congressman Barletta as well, this nation owes 

a deep debt of gratitude to that farm and ranch community and 

what it is able to provide. And believe me, we will take your admonitions, particularly with the uncertainty that we are seeing out of 

the EPA greatly frustrating when we ask a state to be able to put 

forward a plan and then the EPA sits in judgment it is not good 

enough without guidance. That is unacceptable. 

To my ear in particular, I would like to let you know that we 

have a lot of frustration on both sides of the aisle when it comes 

to the regulatory bodies right now that are putting out regulations 

under the legislative mandate of Congress but exceeding that mandate. And there has to be a good solution, a good piece of legislation, and a number of us are working on that simply to be able to 

address getting it back to that authoritative body. The EPA should 

not be writing legislation; it should be fulfilling the legislation that 

Congress had entitled it to be able to do and it is overreached. 

So thank you, gentlemen, all for being here. I know that it is no 

small effort to be able to come here and to be able to participate 

in these. So as the Subcommittee continues to focus on burdensome 

regulations that affect our farmers and ranchers and small businesses, I would again like to be able to reiterate how important it 

is to provide regulatory certainty in relation to our nation’s job creators. 

[Whereupon, at 11:36 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.] 


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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 118 here 72378A.044
72 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 119 here 72378A.045
73 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 120 here 72378A.046
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 121 here 72378A.047
75 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 122 here 72378A.048
76 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 123 here 72378A.049
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 124 here 72378A.050
78 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 125 here 72378A.051
79 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 126 here 72378A.052
80 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 127 here 72378A.053
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 128 here 72378A.054
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 129 here 72378A.055
83 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 130 here 72378A.056
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 131 here 72378A.057
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 132 here 72378A.058
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 133 here 72378A.059
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 134 here 72378A.060
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 135 here 72378A.061
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 136 here 72378A.062
90 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 137 here 72378A.063
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 138 here 72378A.064
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 139 here 72378A.065
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 140 here 72378A.066
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 141 here 72378A.067
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 142 here 72378A.068
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 143 here 72378A.069
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 144 here 72378A.070
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 145 here 72378A.071
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 146 here 72378A.072
100 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 147 here 72378A.073
101 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 148 here 72378A.074
102 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 149 here 72378A.075
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 150 here 72378A.076
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 151 here 72378A.077
105 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 152 here 72378A.078
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 153 here 72378A.079
107 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 154 here 72378A.080
108 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 155 here 72378A.081
109 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 156 here 72378A.082
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 157 here 72378A.083
111 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 158 here 72378A.084
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 159 here 72378A.085
113 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 160 here 72378A.086
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 161 here 72378A.087
115 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 162 here 72378A.088
116 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 163 here 72378A.089
117 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 164 here 72378A.090
118 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 165 here 72378A.091
119 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 166 here 72378A.092
120 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 167 here 72378A.093
121 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 168 here 72378A.094
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 169 here 72378A.095
123 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 170 here 72378A.096
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 171 here 72378A.097
125 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 172 here 72378A.098
126 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 173 here 72378A.099
127 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 174 here 72378A.100
128 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 175 here 72378A.101
129 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 176 here 72378A.102
130 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 177 here 72378A.103
131 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 178 here 72378A.104
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 179 here 72378A.105
133 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 180 here 72378A.106
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 181 here 72378A.107
135 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 182 here 72378A.108
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 183 here 72378A.109
137 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 184 here 72378A.110
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 185 here 72378A.111
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 186 here 72378A.112
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 187 here 72378A.113
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 188 here 72378A.114
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 189 here 72378A.115
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 190 here 72378A.116
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 191 here 72378A.117
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 192 here 72378A.118
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 193 here 72378A.119
147 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 194 here 72378A.120
148 


tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 195 here 72378A.121
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 196 here 72378A.122
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 197 here 72378A.123
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 198 here 72378A.124
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 199 here 72378A.125
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tjames on DSK6SPTVN1PROD with HEARINGInsert graphic folio 200/300 here 72378A.126