Senate Agricultural Committee Holds Informational Hearing in Salinas

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Senator Anthony Cannella (R-Ceres) held an informational hearing of the California Senate Committee on Agriculture, which he chairs. The hearing covered the impact the state’s regulations have on the agriculture industry. The February 24 hearing featured testimony from stakeholder industries on issues concerning AB 32 and the Irrigated Lands Conditional Waiver in the Central Coast. Assemblyman Luis Alejo (D-Salinas) joined Senator Cannella for part of the hearing.

Senator Cannella termed the hearing as an opportunity to hear directly from the agriculture community on exactly how they are impacted by state regulation. Senator Cannella characterized California agriculture as the most regulated in the nation, requiring farmers and ranchers to comply with everything from environmental quality to product maturity standards.

Given the continuing recession and the state budget deficit, the senator is taking a hard look at ag regulations "to ensure that they are accomplishing their goals without being needlessly burdensome."

The informational hearing was organized into three panels. The first focused on the regulatory impacts on agriculture with speaker Jim Houston, Deputy Secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, Rich Matteis with the California Farm Bureau and Matt Allen of Western Growers Association. Houston acknowledged the regulatory impacts on California agriculture and indicated that the DFA was working with the industry on ways to improve the regulatory environment.

The second panel featured Steve Cliff with the California Air Resources Board, P.J. Mecozzi, President of Del Mar Food Products Corporation, Tim Durham, Director of Operations for Ingomar Packing Company and Mona Shulman, Vice President and general counsel for Pacific Coast Producers.

A third panel addressed the impacts from the Draft Agriculture Order from the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board (Regional Board). In addition to the Regional Board’s Michael Thomas, additional panelist included Norm Groot, Executive Director of the Monterey County Farm Bureau and Abby Taylor-Silva, Vice President of Policy and Communications for the Grower/Shipper Association of Central California.

The hearing addressed California’s burdensome regulatory climate and specific regulations impacting growers and processors both locally and statewide. Testimony from food processors focused on the impacts of AB 32 and what the significant costs of compliance will mean for processors, growers, and the communities they support. The main message from each processor all but guaranteed that the policies of AB 32 will increase food costs for Californians. Thus, given the continuing recession and high unemployment in the agricultural sectors of the state, increasing food costs and decreasing working opportunities, it will disproportionally affect the rural agricultural communities of the Central Valley. In closing, the food processors urged that they be exempted from direct GHG regulation.

The hearing also focused on the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board’s attempt to renew the conditional waiver for waste discharge from irrigated lands, which has the potential to have significant impact on the local agriculture industry.

Article written by John Larrea, Director, Government Affairs

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