"[The Scott Walker campaign] might want to explain why the agriculture section on their campaign website was clearly lifted from a UW Extension press release," notes Uppity Wisconsin in an exclusive (Lounsbury).
Deny-and-run is the Scott Walker response when Walker is caught cheating, lying, laundering money and other typical Walker practices, though this time the Walker campaign will likely just run.
In other news, Scott Walker—who is the Wisconsin champion of concentrated agricultural feeding operations (CAFOs)—might offer some PR advice to his friends at the Dairy Business Association.
Turns out that CAFOs, designed to employ the least number of people under biologically hazardous conditions, are having problems attracting the migrant employees who would risk their health for a small pay check.
Admits a Dairy industry sheet: U.S.dairies seek ways to deal with labor shortages. (Ag-Web. Catherine Merlo)
Pete Wiersma used to get up to 10 applicants a week seeking work at his dairy in Idaho’s Magic Valley.
"Now I’m lucky if I get one person every two weeks," says Wiersma, who milks 1,500 cows near Buhl, Idaho.
The Dairy industry piece attributes the labor shortage to an improving economy in Mexico.
Left out of the piece are the health threats of working in and living near a CAFO, resembling a swim in a Central American lake.
Writes Don Ystad of Rome, Wisconsin in Adams County:
Thought you and your board might find this interesting regarding the jobs the proposed Wysocki dairy CAFO might bring to the area.
This confirms what many of us suspected, the 25 to 35 CAFO jobs are primarily migrant labor.
As the article shows, there is little interest in farm labor jobs from local labor pools.
If you've read the many articles regarding immigration, you understand the demands a migrant population poses on local services.
So, when the chamber endorses the CAFO, saying "they are all about jobs", I wonder how deeply they've thought about that stance.
I wonder also, how their stance conflicts with the promise of 475 real jobs from the Sand Valley Golf development just down the road in Rome.
Certainly they read the newspaper and would be aware of the conflict between a resort type tourism generating business as opposed to a stinking 5,300 cow dairy CAFO 3 miles away.
The chamber of commerce is made up of business people. Most successful business people have the ability to weigh the pros and cons of a business proposition; that's what makes them successful.
Knowing that the Wysockis are members of your chamber of commerce, one must assume that we are dealing with the blind defense of a fellow chamber member, rather than the businesslike comparison of what's good for the business community as a whole.
Take the blinders off.
You and your chamber of commerce board know full well that Sand Valley can be a boon to many of their own personal businesses and the business community as a whole. Even the ancillary jobs related to the proposed CAFO bring little directly to our area, especially when compared to the resulting loss of area property values, the declining lifestyle issues and reduction of tourism growth.
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