News

The Iowa Department of Natural Resources public meeting on the request for a construction permit for the Baaken oil pipeline, the pipeline that would pass through parts of Lyon, Sioux and O’Brien counties, started out at a fever pitch Wednesday evening. Dakota Access is requesting the permit to allow the pipeline to cross public land in four areas.

Those who wanted to speak out at the meeting became upset when the head of the D-N-R told the audience members who had signed up to speak that they would be taking and recording comments from two people at the same time.

D-N-R director Chuck Gipp explained that they needed to record the comments to be able to transcribe them for use in making the decision. Jonas Nagram led off the comments by standing and shouting out to the audience.

Gipp directed him to sit down and Nagram replied “I don’t need to sit, thank you.” Gipp then instructed the staffer calling out the names of the speakers to move to the next person. That set off another round of chants.

Nagram was then allowed to continue his comments.

Things calmed down after that as the speakers came forward and gave their comments into a recorder. Emily Schettler of the Iowa Association of Business and Industry spoke out in favor of the pipeline.

Richard Hulley of Fairfield is against the pipeline.

J.D. Ramanco spoke out in favor of the pipeline, saying it would create jobs for people like him who are professionals in such work.

Around 140 people gave their comments on the issue. The permit request is to cross the Big Sioux River, the Big Sioux Wildlife Management Area, the Des Moines River and the Mississippi River. The D-N-R will continue taking comments on the permit request through January 5th. A D-N-R spokesman says they will likely not be making a decision on the issue until February.

Ames, Iowa — The situation regarding labeling of retail meat cuts with their country of origin is changing.

The Country of Origin Labeling or “COOL” provisions in the 2002 Farm Bill require that retail sellers of certain food commodities inform consumers of a product’s country of origin. While it aimed at keeping American consumers more informed about where their meat came from, Iowa State University Agriculture Economist Lee Schulz says the governments of Canada and Mexico are not in favor of mandatory COOL. He says the World Trade Organization or WTO has ruled that Canada and Mexico should be able to retaliate via over a billion dollars in tarrifs per year to compensate them from losses they suffer due to COOL.

Schulz says a WTO panel set Canada and Mexico’s annual retaliation level at $1.055 billion.

He says Canada and Mexico will probably choose products that would be likely to force Congress to repeal the Country Of Origin Labeling law.

According to Schulz, Canada and Mexico could act as early as the first of the year, and they would be allowed to retaliate at the $1.055 billion per year level until the US repeals the law. Canadian International Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland has said that Canada will retaliate if the U.S. Senate does not take “immediate action” to repeal COOL for beef and pork. The US House passed a bill to repeal the law in June, but the Senate has not yet voted on it.

Schulz says commodity prices are already being affected, and that may or may not translate into retail prices in the longer term.

Harris, Iowa — The City of Harris is one of fifteen Iowa cities that will benefit from a combined total of more than $9.1 million in low-cost water quality loans through the State Revolving Loan Fund.

The City of Harris has been awarded a Sewer System Planning and Development Loan of up to $192,000.  Harris City Clerk Holly Wilson tells us more.

She tells us what the loan can be used for.

Wilson talks about how the loan works.

The Planning and Development Loans are zero-percent interest loans that are designed to assist with the first phase of project expenses.  The Iowa Finance Authority and the Iowa Department of Natural Resources jointly administer the State Revolving Loan Fund in Iowa.

Once the planning and development work is done, the City of Harris can apply for a low-cost State Revolving Fund Construction Loan to help pay for the construction of the project.

Several weeks ago the Osceola County Board of Supervisors, in a controversial move, voted to allocate Tax Increment Financing dollars to help pay for the Harris Sewer project.