Revealing Names

Revealing Names

Revealing Names. I'm Greg Martin with Washington Ag Today.

Washington State Senate Bill 6551is looking to name names. Evan Sheffels, lobbyist with Washington Farm Bureau explains why this bill is important to farmers in the state.

SHEFFELS: That bill, 6551, is a bill that Senator Warnick who is the chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture, Water and Rural Economic Development Committee so that bill was heard, had a good hearing and then it was moved out of committee. I know it didn't get any no votes and it had some Democrat and some Republican support moving out.

Sheffels says the bill helps with government transparency.

SHEFFELS: I consider it kind of right to know; a right to farm measure and what it says is if you are doing an ag activity, you're a farmer or rancher, and there's an anonymous third-party complaint about a water quality violation that maybe your neighbor or some environmental organization, somebody else thinks that you're violating the law; but it can no longer be an anonymous complaint.

In Oregon, their complaint process is not anonymous.

SHEFFLES: Farmers can talk to the person that had the problem and explain to them, "No, I've got a right to farm, this is wha the law is, this is how farming works." And so it just brings fairness and balance back into a process that frankly is lost at least from the producers perspective.

A public hearing in the Senate Committee on Ways & Means tomorrow at 1:30 on SB 6551.

And that's Washington Ag Today. I'm Greg Martin, thanks for listening on the Ag Information Network of the West.

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