After two incumbents on the Laketown town board were unseated by challengers earlier this month, the new supervisors have swiftly overturned an ordinance intended to protect the community from pollution created by hog factories. The rural town is one of four in northwestern Wisconsin that passed similar ordinances in the past year, and has been the subject of a lawsuit by a Wisconsin business group challenging the rules.
The election held April 4 was widely seen as a referendum on Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, and two supervisors who had helped draft Laketown’s ordinance were unseated by two individuals who support the industry. At their first meeting as supervisors, newcomers Merle Larson and Ron Peterson joined Daniel King, who had voted against the ordinance originally, in overturning local control over the hog industry.
The tight election illustrated how divided the community is over the issue. The challengers prevailed by just 16 to 25 votes over the incumbents, or about 12 percent of the votes cast.
“With little ado on April 18, 2023, Laketown’s new supervisors ended all protections against hog factories for residents’ health and property values,” wrote Protect Laketown, a local group which had supported the incumbents. “At a meeting that wasn’t announced until 7:00 pm April 17, two new supervisors took their seats about 7:30 on April 18. Within minutes they rescinded Laketown’s livestock ordinance. The red carpet is now laid for factory developers desperate to get out of Iowa and Minnesota where viruses are wiping out herds.”
The ordinance was the result of two years of work by town officials and residents, who researched legal issues and environmental threats to develop it. Facilities to house as many as 26,000 hogs have already been proposed in the neighboring town of Trade Lake, and several area communities are concerned they could be next as the industry seeks to expand out of Iowa and develop networks of CAFOs that raise hogs from birth to slaughter.
Large-scale livestock facilities are associated with numerous risks to lakes, rivers, and groundwater, as well as air pollution and other impacts that contaminate the environment and reduce property values. The overturned ordinance would have required anyone proposing to keep more than about 1,000 hogs to apply for a local permit, provide a “security deposit” to clean up contamination if the company does not, and operate in ways that reduce the impact on neighbors and the environment.
Laketown was sued last fall by the Wisconsin Manufacturing Council, the state’s largest business group, over its ordinance. Industrial farming proponents say state law prevents local communities from enacting stricter regulations than what those created by the legislature and DNR. The town’s lawyers had argued the community has the right to regulate the facilities if its policies were supported by science.
The lawsuit now seems fated to fizzle out. Since the complaint was first filed in October, attorneys had been exchanging motions and filings in Judge Scott Nordstrand’s courtroom. But now, without an ordinance in effect, there is nothing to argue about. On Tuesday of this week, a proposed order for dismissal was filed in Polk County district court.
One of the ordinance opponents celebrated the new supervisors’ actions. Plaintiffs Sarah and Michael Byl operate a small dairy in Laketown and had joined the lawsuit led by the statewide group.
“I was really glad to see our new township board rescind the ordinance tonight,” said Sara Byl in a statement released by a dairy industry lobby group. “For almost 5 years, we tried to get the old board to listen to us. Instead, they shut the farmers out and only listened to the activists. This was a great win for all of us. It can be done, and Laketown is a good example to never give up.”
Environmental and health advocates point out the Byl farm has previously been part of the problems they are seeking to prevent. In 2018, Michael Byl was convicted of illegally dumping fill into a wetland.
Local ordinances to regulate large-scale livestock facilities remain in effect in four other nearby towns: Bone Lake, Eureka and Luck in Polk County and Trade Lake in Burnett County. Last month, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources rejected the first CAFO proposal in the region for failing to provide information about where it will spread nine million gallons of manure and other waste each year.
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16 responses to “New members of Wisconsin town board revoke factory farm rules”
Spring water runs all over this area in as little as 3 feet below the surface and all across my Land. Hope you know what you are doing!!! Let us ALL pray you know what your doing!
CAFO’s are basically point sources of wastewater & should be treated as such by WIDNR, ie requiring a mechanical wastewater treatment plant vs applying/spraying raw manure on nearby farmland.
Liquid CAFO manure should be declared a Hazardous Waste!
CAFOs are included in the statutory definition of “point source” and are heavily regulated by the state DNR and state DATCP. As our supreme court recently explained, “CAFOs are statutorily required to apply to the DNR for a WPDES permit because they are ‘point sources’ as defined in Wis. Stat. § 283.01(12).” Clean Wisconsin, Inc. v. DNR, 2021 WI 71, ¶ 18.
And CAFOs’ spreading of manure on nearby land is regulated by the DNR under WPDES permits. See generally Maple Leaf Farms, Inc. v. DNR, 2001 WI App 170.
All true. Also true is the continued negative impact of manure storage and spreading at another nearby CAFO, Emerald Sky Dairy, which continues to operate after repeated violations.
Taking big corporate’s word at face value that they’ll be responsible for environmental concerns always seems a big stretch. Water table, underground stream strata and movement is very complex. I would hope that bare minmum there’d be monitoring wells sufficient in number and scope to asses contamination. Otherwise it’s just a wishin and a hoping.
So we can keep the crap here and send pork to China?
Yes like China’s Smithfield’s CAFO’s in Iowa do.
https://www.wmc.org/environment/
WMC has NO interest in the environment. This land is free of disease and industry. They don’t care!
Why can’t US hog factories be dry not wet like the ones in Jalisco, Mexico? Dry stalks suck up the hog feces and compost dry. Is the US behind Mexico in technology or in caring for the waters?
I wonder how much those council members were paid for their overturning of a ordinance meant to protect the water and our future. I don’t know which is more disgusting, the greed or the ignorance.
The data and supported science that that CAFOs harm the land, water, and air has been 100% known for years.
It is also known that CAFOs operate with greatest amount of cost cutting measures as possible and disposing of the liquid waste from the pigs is one of those actions.
You can support farming and the environment at the same time with Best Management Practices and I find it very hard to believe that management and investors that will own theses CAFOs will do anything to support the local community, land, air, and water over profits and numbers on paper.
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I’m all for protecting the environment. And even more concerned about the cruelty the animals have to live with their entire lives in these crowded factory farms.
And we just continue to destroy the environment, and poison everything. That’s how stupid the world of humans have become.
If the Laketown ordinance was “intended to protect the community from pollution created by hog factories,” then why did it apply to mid-size family farms with only 500 dairy cows?