By Steve Brawner, © 2019 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.
June 20, 2019
If you’re a red-blooded Arkansan, you know what words follow these: “You’ve got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to …”
In “The Gambler,” it’s “fold ‘em.” In politics and the legal environment, it sometimes is “settle,” as I’m sure Gov. Asa Hutchinson knows, along with the owners of C&H Farms.
Hutchinson and the farm owners realized it was time to walk away before it came time to run. So that’s what both sides did with an agreement to close that big hog farm near the Buffalo National River.
Hutchinson announced June 13 that the state would pay Richard and Phillip Campbell (the “C”) and Jason Henson (the “H”) $6.2 million to close the concentrated animal feeding operation located 6.6 miles from Big Creek, which flows into the Buffalo National River. Of that, at least $5.2 million will come from the taxpayers, with the rest coming from private donations through The Nature Conservancy.
The governor announced the deal, hours after it had been reached, during a gathering of the Arkansas Municipal League.
The $6.2 million will let the farm’s owners pay off their debts and will compensate them for the business they are losing. They can keep the land and even use it a little, but they can’t raise hogs there under a “conservation easement.” Under the agreement, they have six months to completely close the hog farm.
Meanwhile, Hutchinson directed the Department of Environmental Quality to make permanent a temporary ban on new medium-sized and large farms in the watershed.
The owners received a permit in 2012 and the next year opened a farm raising up to 6,503 hogs, generating strong opposition from those who feared the waste would pollute the river. Hogs poop a lot.
In order to stay in business, the owners took extraordinary measures to keep hog waste from entering the watershed. Arkansas Farm Bureau became the operation’s staunch defenders.
Indeed, the farm potentially served as a demonstration project for how large-scale production can occur in close proximity to environmentally sensitive areas. With seven billion always-wanting-more humans on the planet, such situations sometimes may be hard to avoid.
But this wasn’t just any environmentally sensitive area, and opponents were not just anti-progress tree-huggers. This is the Buffalo National River, the nation’s first national river, the home to one of Arkansas’ most beautiful areas, and an important tourist draw for The Natural State. Generations have floated the Buffalo. It now has elevated levels of E. coli bacteria, though government agencies have not identified the farm as the source. If man’s activities sicken the river, it could take years, and many millions of man’s dollars, to make it well.
As Hutchinson said Thursday, the owners should not be blamed for obtaining a permit and then operating within its bounds. But that permit should never have been granted by the previous governor’s administration. It simply was not worth the risk.
Last year, the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality rejected the farm’s application for a new operating permit, and of course the owners sued.
We don’t know who would have won in court. What was certain was this: It would have taken years. The state and the farmers would have spent millions in legal fees. The hog farm would have continued operating within close proximity of the river. The farmers would have continued to face unwanted controversy. The river’s supporters would have continued to focus their attention on protecting it rather than enjoying it.
Instead, we have a win-win-win-win-draw-win. The river is protected. The farmers were compensated. The state ended the lawsuit. The opponents can breathe easier. The taxpayers paid $5.2 million but potentially saved millions more in cleanup costs. And once the ban on future operations is made permanent, we don’t have to do this again.
It was time for everyone to settle and walk away. Or float away, in this case.