# CRP on the chopping block!



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

Get ahold of you legislators on this and let them know how you feel about the proposed cuts!!!

Senator Conrads Site: http://www.senate.gov/~conrad/

Senator Dorgans Site: http://dorgan.senate.gov/

Congressman Pomeroys Site: http://www.pomeroy.house.gov/

Senate Agriculture Committee Approves Budget Reduction Plan Conservation Programs Suffer WASHINGTON, DC - By a narrow 11-9 margin, on Wednesday, October 19, the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry approved the Agricultural Reconciliation Act of 2005.

The Reconciliation Act, as passed, included cuts of $3 billion to 2002 Farm Bill-authorized programs. Conservation programs, including the tremendously popular 20-year old Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), the Conservation Security Program (CSP), and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, account for more than 30 percent of the total reductions agreed upon by the Committee, even though the Conservation Title comprises only 8 percent of total 2002 Farm Bill spending.

Wednesday action was a wake-up call to hunters, anglers, conservationists, and the thousands of farmers who utilize these conservation programs to practice sound land stewardship practices. Double-digit increases in waterfowl, upland game birds, songbirds, and other wildlife numbers have been documented in multiple states, thanks to the CRP. Additionally CRP benefits have included cleaner water and millions of tons of topsoil saved due to reduced erosion. All of this thanks to twenty years of CRP which currently has more than 35 million acres planted to permanent vegetative cover. Department of Agriculture personnel have indicated in estimates that if the proposal to reduce the number of acres allowed to be enrolled in the CRP by 2.8 million becomes law, signups to enroll new acres into the CRP and CSP will be stopped something that has never happened in the CRPs twenty-year history. Both CRP and CSP will be limited to maintenance only of existing contracts. On October 18, twenty-nine of the nationâl hunting, angling, conservation and wildlife organizations sent a letter (letter available by request) to the Senate Agriculture Committee which pointed out that the Committee's proposed cuts to 2002 Farm Bill programs were disproportionate when comparing the size of conservation programs to all others. Wednesday's Committee vote included cutting certain commodity payments by 2 ½ percent, authorizing a $1 billion, two-year extension of a controversial dairy program, and ending export subsidies for cotton. The letter sent Tuesday acknowledged the difficult budget situation in Congress and tough spending cut decisions facing the Senate Agriculture Committee, but urged the Committee to make cuts to Farm Bill conservation programs proportionate to cuts in other Farm Bill programs.

The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership (TRCP) facilitates coalition work on Farm Bill conservation programs through the Agriculture and Wildlife Working Group (AWWG). David Nomsen, Vice-President of Governmental Affairs for Pheasants Forever, is one of AWWG's co-chairs. Thursday Nomsen said, "Although Committee passage of the Agricultural Reconciliation Act of 2005 with its substantial cuts to future CRP acreage is disappointing, the budget reconciliation process is still in the first inning," adding, "I look forward to other opportunities our community will have to make our case for the need to fund CRP and other Farm Bill conservation programs as fully as possible."

*TRCP President, Matt Connolly, after learning of the Committee vote pointed out that Hunters, anglers, and conservationists need to continue to send a unified message to Members of Congress that cutting conservation programs to the extent approved would deal a direct blow to wildlife habitat, hunting and fishing, and to agricultural producers who exercise good stewardship of what remains of Americas diminishing undeveloped landscape. *

*James Mosher, Executive Director of the North American Grouse Partnership and AWWG co-chair stated, I urge every American hunter, angler and outdoor enthusiast to contact each member of their Congressional Delegation immediately and urge them to vote against inequitable budget cuts to conservation programs in the upcoming votes in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. *

*Our Federal Legislators don't know how you feel unless you let them know!!!*

Please contact them.

Bob


----------



## DJRooster (Nov 4, 2002)

Just contacted all three! This is probably one of the most important posts but has yet to generate a reponse.


----------



## duxnbux (Feb 25, 2002)

This is real critical guys...


----------



## fishless (Aug 2, 2005)

You can count on me to get hold of my wi legislators and I will also contact the ND legislators since Im also a nr absentee land owner with my land in crp, by the way being the rotten guy that I am none of my chunk of paradise is posted. Everyone dont be shy contact these people they work for you.


----------



## sierra03 (Jan 27, 2005)

Thats really awesome of ya fishless, not everyone here is against NR's. Lets hope this issue gets reversed!


----------



## Lvn2Hnt (Feb 22, 2005)

10 emails from aquaintences sent today.


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

173 views and a handful of people feel it is important enough to reply to the Federal Boys..... ? Time to get off the bench and into the Game!! If you have no place to live life is tough right? same goes for wildlife. Habitat is what wildlife is all about, the tooth fairy isn't going to make it all better for you 

Bob


----------



## fishless (Aug 2, 2005)

Everyone this takes a few minutes of your time, these people work for you. You know how the internet works use it!!!


----------



## redlabel (Mar 7, 2002)

Take the time and send them a letter. That's what I did the first day this went up. They get thousands of emails a day and difficult to sort out if the are from a constituent or not.

I have always received an answer to any letter ever sent to a Senator or Congressman.


----------



## MSG Rude (Oct 6, 2003)

Done and the word is being spread in my circle.

Get off your arse's folks, send the email...

If you forwarded one email joke today and not this then you are as wrong as eaten tofu at a wild game dinner.


----------



## NWWalleyeGuy (Oct 9, 2004)

I'm in the same boat as Fishless and will be contacting the WA state legislators as well.


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

BUMP!

Please read the thread and contact your Federal Legislators and let them know how you feel about this.

Habitat=Wildlife it is that simple!!!

Bob


----------



## farmerj (Jun 19, 2004)

add a stipulation to make it public walk in access and I would concider it.

They get all the money, benefits, game AND the habitat....

And we get left with the bill.


----------



## gandergrinder (Mar 10, 2002)

And if they don't renew it we will get a bunch of other bad things. Like absolutly no wildlife.

We are going to foot the bill if it is in crops too. I would rather my tax dollars go to CRP than for price supports for grain.


----------



## farmerj (Jun 19, 2004)

gandergrinder said:


> And if they don't renew it we will get a bunch of other bad things. Like absolutly no wildlife.
> 
> We are going to foot the bill if it is in crops too. I would rather my tax dollars go to CRP than for price supports for grain.


They already do both.

It's called CRP and production flexibility contracts.


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

????
Farmerj FYI

February 1999
*Production Flexibility Contracts, Marketing Loss Payments and Marketing Assistance Loans 
Production Flexibility Contracts (PFCs) Eligibility for Payments *

Producers enrolled in 7-year PFCs during the one-time sign-up held in 1996 are eligible to receive contract payments. All contracts -- except those executed after the expiration of Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) contracts, as discussed below -- began with the 1996 crop and extend through the 2002 crop. A farm was eligible for enrollment if it had a wheat, corn, sorghum, barley, oats, upland cotton, or rice acreage base established for 1996. Once the farm was enrolled, the crop acreage base became contract acreage.

Farms not enrolled during the one-time sign-up period are ineligible for program participation, unless they are currently under a CRP contract with an associated crop acreage base reduction. The land under an expiring CRP contract may be added to an existing PFC or enrolled as a new contract from October 1 through April 3 in the year following the fiscal year in which the contract expires.

If land currently under a PFC is transferred to another producer or operator, or if there is a change in interest in the operation, the contract may be transferred to the new producer or operator, who assumes all obligations under the original contract.

An owner or producer must inform the local Farm Service Agency (FSA) county office of changes in interest by August 1 of the current fiscal year, if producers remain the same but the shares change, or if a new producer is being added to the contract.

Producer Requirements

*Producers must:

Comply with the conservation and wetland protection requirements on all of the producers' farms; 
Comply with the planting flexibility requirements; 
Use the contract acreage for an agricultural or related activity; 
Obtain at least the catastrophic level of crop insurance for each crop of economic significance or provide a written statement that waives any eligibility for emergency crop loss assistance for the crop; and 
File annual acreage reports to maintain eligibility for loans, and report any fruit and vegetable plantings on contract acreage. 
Payment Dates 1996-1998; 2000-2002*

Annual payments will be made no later than September 30 of each fiscal year through 2002. Producers may elect to receive a 50-percent advance payment on December 15 or January 15 of the fiscal year, and may change that date from year to year.

To receive an advance payment on:

December 15: The advance payment must be requested by November 30 of that fiscal year. 
January 15: The advance payment must be requested by December 31 of that fiscal year. 
A producer who does not request advance payments by those dates cannot receive advance payments for that fiscal year.


----------



## gandergrinder (Mar 10, 2002)

Farmerj,
I have read plenty of your posts and I have some questions for you. Do you ever smile and have you ever been happy?  Seriously. I mean you no ill will. I am just trying to figure out if you are really that way or just come off that way. I can never tell if you are joking or dead serious.


----------



## farmerj (Jun 19, 2004)

gandergrinder said:


> Farmerj,
> I have read plenty of your posts and I have some questions for you. Do you ever smile and have you ever been happy?  Seriously. I mean you no ill will. I am just trying to figure out if you are really that way or just come off that way. I can never tell if you are joking or dead serious.


You got me pegged. I am so retentive it is pathetic. I just have a hard time with someone saying we gotta protect this program when everyone else is paying for it and only the landowner benefits. It wreaks of welfare.

Having been raise around farms, worked on farms and wanted to move to a farm, it is pretty bad when you have to go so far into debt to do something you love so much.

It is also pretty bad when you have to rely on crop deficiency payments after harvest to make it into the next year. The latest data of which is current to 2002.

Bob can go and get all the reports he wants to show the ag programs are great. The reality is, the ag program is the biggest welfare program system the feds have produced...

And all we do is support it and promote bigger and more wanton spending.

Do we need to protect the habitat....Yop, thought the GF Heralds article this week on the prairie grasslands was spot on. So lets promote the GNF's program and reclaim it back that way.

So there for I cannot support writing to a fed to support this without benefit to the general populance. Even if all someone wants to do is walk in and smell the flowers.

On a more serious note......

I just saved a bunch of money with Geico. :wink:


----------



## The Norseman (Jan 8, 2005)

Thank you for all the advise, this will help us decide what to do with our
CRP. We can rent pretty close to what we are getting for CRP. We maybe can get $2-$5 more, still investigating this.
If you have CRP, there is more to the story. Extendions are based on how the land is scored.
Wet-land or Ag. The number of years it will be extended is also determined by the apprisal.
Looking into this more, I don't think it is as bad as this thread is making it.
If there is any questions, take them up with your Ag Service.


----------



## Dick Monson (Aug 12, 2002)

Understand please that there is huge lobbying effort by chemeical companies, fertilizer co's, implement co's, transportation co's, grain co's, etc to get CRP killed and back into producing more grain that we cannot sell. For the Federal government (us) the CRP payment is cheaper than the farm program payment, but big biz is going to lobby this hard.


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

Habitat is the most important thing we have for wildlife in North Dakota. Without it, North Dakota Game and Fish would have little or nothing to manage and outdoor enthusiasts would have limited amounts of fish or wildlife to pursue.

CRP is going to be a contentious issue that will be hotly debated in the next Farm Bill. Some here have expressed opinions that the Farm Bill is nothing more than a big welfare program for farmers. In reality, few corners of society are not affected by the farm bill. In a perfect capitalist socioeconomic world free market, supply and demand would eventually level the playing field, leaving in its wake producers as well as consumers.

CRP is one aspect of the farm bill that every sportsman should look at with keen interest. It is going to be a debate of renewable fuels vs. habitat. There are going to be some that are using CRP payments to fund their retirement years. If payments are cut they will need to find a source of income generation and tillable agriculture will be the most cost-effective comparison. This is based on the ability of the landowner to rent or sell the land. Those that have income to shelter will purchase what they can and chances are some will remain in habitat. The status of hunting on it will as always remain a big question mark.

The North Dakota Farm Bureau has stated that tillable acres produce more income than habitat and the wildlife will survive just as well in those tillable acres.

I can see both sides of this issue and I agree to a certain degree that some species of wildlife will do quite well in cereal grain habitat. Any ground nesting species will be in a crisis because the nesting process for almost every species is in direct correlation to the tilling practices required for farming. Therefore, I take exception to the NDFB making a blanket statement such as thy have.

The other issue that is often overlooked when talking about CRP is the original purpose for creating it in the first place. Soil erosion. CRP has been instrumental in helping to keep our water systems clean and reducing the amount of air pollutants due to wind blown soil. Do we really want to take a step backwards? Tillable acres will not provide these benefits either.

CRP is also to a degree single handedly responsible for the decline of some small town in North Dakota. The retiree aspect of the program no longer purchases goods and services in the local communities and the communities have continued the decline in the years that have followed.

CRP is not a "magic bullet" it has shown its benefits and deficiencies for the nation to see. That being said in the world of wildlife habitat it is the best thing we have or ever have had. There is nothing on the drawing board to replace it so the options are to say nothing and let the process take its coarse without objection. Alternatively, to voice your opinion, contact you Federal Legislators, and let them know that until something better is designed we need to keep as much CRP in the program and the State of North Dakota as possible.

This is not the time to wait for someone else to do our bidding. If you hunt, fish, camp, bird watch, hike and just enjoy watching wildlife. You owe it to yourself to do what you can to preserve the activities in which you partake.

Thank you for reading this post.

Bob


----------



## farmerj (Jun 19, 2004)

Bob,

I realize that you and I and, mildly put, butted heads in the past.

I will also agree with alot of what you just said in your last post.

I just think the GNF's program for creating wildlife plots makes more sense than CRP dollars. And the ag land owner still profits and the public benefits with walk-in access.

http://www.nd.gov/gnf/info/pli-program.html

The Coverlocks program is the program I really like and the Working Lands program is right there with it.


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

I agree that a State sponsored program would be better for North Dakota if and when it was implemented. The problem is that many acres of the 800,000 +/- currently in PLOTS is in the CRP program. If CRP is phased out the PLOTS land will be as well, Probably not all of it but a significant amount IMO. The cost share for PLOTS does not even come close to competing with compensation received from CRP and asking anyone to take a pay cut in today's world is pretty bold.

There is a potential to increase the funds available by asking the legislature for an additional appropriation for NDGF for the cost difference. there is also the possibility of raising the license fees or implementing a sportsmans tax or re-allocation of Pittman-Robinson funds to cover the cost. No matter what the scenario is we will be looking at a major fight in the legislature to get this passed. Is there enough sportsman support out there to accomplish this goal? IMO no there is not based on responses for help with the last ND legislative session.

The Legislators are going to look at it like this. We need to allocate money for education, and a multitude of other programs to keep the state going and you want me to take money from them to allocate it toward hunting and recreational issues?

The ONLY WAY that any of this would have a chance is for the landowners to be united with the sportsmen. NDFB is never going to let that happen to any large degree. They will do anything they can to promote farm income including pay hunting. That my friend is what we will end up with if something is not done.

So CRP is involved in the issue no matter which way you look at it. It is already in place, you do not have to re-invent the wheel to make it work toward its intended use. IMO we need to fight to try and save at least some of the habitat we currently have. future years will tell the tale as to what will happen with hunting in ND, I hope we can say we did the right thing whatever that may be.

Bob


----------



## Bob Kellam (Apr 8, 2004)

Forum editorial: CRP lives up to its promises
The Forum
Published Friday, December 09, 2005
Proposed changes in the Conservation Reserve Program represent a dual threat to North Dakota: the loss of wildlife habitat and the erosion of rural economies because of the loss of wildlife habitat.

CRP has been one of the most successful land set-aside programs in the history of USDA conservation efforts. Its strength has been multi-year contracts that allowed land to be retired and mostly undisturbed for up to 11 years at a time, with additional contract extensions. One result has been an explosion of upland game bird and deer populations. CRP also has provided habitat to keep non-game bird and animal populations healthy.

The threat to the program comes from a revision of CRP contract requirements by USDA Secretary Mike Johanns. Only farmers and ranchers who own the most environmentally sensitive land would get new 10- to 15-year contracts. Others who have gotten long contracts in the past would only be offered extensions of two to five years.

It's started already. For example, only 10 percent of North Dakota contracts were accepted in 2004, and only 8 percent in 2003. So some 90 percent of landowners who wanted to participate were rejected.

There are two problems with Johanns' revisions. First, the definition of "environmentally sensitive" is not clear. Farmers who like the program and put their poorest land into CRP might not be eligible under the new standard.

Second, contracts of only two to five years would not be as attractive to farmers who like the program. Additionally, the destruction of CRP habitat after only two years would damage, rather than enhance, wildife habitat.

Farmers, ranchers and others who never liked CRP contend the retirement of tens of thousands of acres of land has hurt the economies of rural towns. They cite fewer sales of seed, fuel, fertilizer and equipment. They contend retired farmers put their acreage into the program, take the payments and live elsewhere.

But the other side of the economic coin is the infusion of dollars into CRP counties from hunters. Hunters in greater numbers have spent their money in rural North Dakota counties because game populations are up. And game populations are up in large part because of CRP.

The preservation and enhancement of habitat via CRP has helped generate new kinds of economic activity based on hunting and other kinds of outdoor recreation: guide services and outfitters, hunting lodges, real estate sales and stronger sales at motels, restaurants and gas stations. As a North Dakota State University study found a couple of years ago, the economic impact on small towns is significant.

CRP is a good program. It's lived up to its promises to retire marginal land that was not needed for food production, pay farmers and ranchers a decent price for retiring the land, and provide excellent habitat for wildlife. It makes no sense - either economically or environmentally - to put in place changes that seem designed to kill the program. Johanns and USDA should rethink a bad decision.

Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper's Editorial Board.


----------



## buckseye (Dec 8, 2003)

Thank God it is not a state wide problem, the greatest concern must be in the areas that have a lot of pheasant to sell. We sure see no extra hunters around here because of CRP, probably less in fact. The CRP did help reduce the number of waterfowl hunters in this area along with the number of beginning farmers.


----------

