A week later, Moe-Merritt and Janes received a reply. In West Virginia, state government has never tried to regulate poultry farmers. Before the poultry boom began nearly a decade ago, the state did not do things it could have to keep chicken farmers from polluting. Since then, the state has not done other things it could have done to clean up the problem faster. No permits required The DEP, for example, has never required a poultry farmer to obtain a permit that would require measures that limit the amount of chicken manure that runs off his farm into streams.
Farmers can build their chicken houses as close to streams as they want.
They don't have to carefully calculate and apply the right amount of manure to crops. They don't have to store their chicken manure under sheds that keep rain from washing the waste into streams. Under the 1972 Clean Water Act, signed into law by President Nixon, most businesses that pollute rivers and streams must get permits that limit that pollution. Traditionally, farmers are exempt from this requirement. Because it doesn't come out of a pipe, it's hard to trace.