Karen Newman
At their April 19th meeting, the Clay County Commission heard from Kevin Kassenborg, Soil and Water Conservation (SWCD) District Manager and Craig Halvorson, Clay County Feedlot Officer, as they requested an appeal of their annual review.
In 2007, the Clay County Commission transferred oversite of the Feedlot Program to SWCD. The feedlot program is reviewed annually. The Minnesota Association of County Feedlot Officers Board, the Feedlot Management Team and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency determined that Clay County will not receive any performance credits for the year and will not receive the funding that is distributed to the county for meeting the requirements set by the state for an approximate loss of about $3,000.
Kassenborg explained that the county formerly received many complaints about feedlot operations. It was decided that SWCD would assume responsibility for overseeing the program and that a Feedlot Officer would be hired. He said that Clay County was placed on a two-year probation for failure to meet Minimum Program (MPRs) requirements.
At the present time, it is required that seven percent of the county feedlot operations must be inspected and that non-inspected operations meet MPR requirements. Kassenborg explained, “The field work has been done. It is the paperwork that we are finding has some deficiencies.” The review letter was received by SWDC on April 5.
Commissioners Mongeau and Campbell and SWDC/Feedlot representatives met April 11 to discuss appealing the findings. The appeal deadline was April 19. Attempts to coordinate a meeting with the MPCA coordinator from Brainerd to discuss the report were not successful.
Commission Chair Jenny Mongeau stated, “Just in terms of the timeline, this board probably wouldn’t be talking about this had those inspections not happened. But the inspections have happened, and it seems there is an issue with the reporting piece. Your board [SWDC] has lobbied to change the reporting program. There are several other counties that are in the same boat as us. It seems to be a technicality piece. We are hoping that by appealing this decision we could either advocate for some additional training or help us to understand the real reasons for the problem.”
She added that while the SWDC oversees the position and Halvorson carries it out, it is still Clay County’s responsibility. The Clay County Administrator was not notified about the April 5 letter or the April 19 deadline to appeal. She said that the commission hopes the MPCA will be able to meet with them in the next ten days.
Commissioner Kevin Campbell spoke as a long-term county commissioner who signed the 2007 documents. He spoke about the time before the Feedlot Program was instituted, “Prior to this there was constant complaining throughout the county about feedlot issues. Prior planning commission minutes would show that these issues were brought to that commission.”
Campbell continued, “Part of the reason behind this is that all of those inspections were supposed to be done by MPCA. Unfortunately, MPCA did not have the manpower to constantly be doing these inspections, especially on a timely basis across the state.”
He reported, “After a lot of discussion and research, the Clay County board took over the feedlot officer position because Minnesota statue permitted that action…ultimately the county invested additional dollars into that.” He added that SWDC was given responsibility for the program in 2007. He said, “Since 2007, we as a board, have not received one complaint regarding feedlot issues in Clay County. That in itself says a lot.”
Campbell stated that training to effectively do reporting via computer for personnel is appropriate He feels that if the county can meet with MPCA and discuss providing technology training for staff, it will be effective. He thanked SWDC, Kassenborg and Halvorson for their dedication to the program.
County Administrator Stephan Larson added his frustration, “When Kevin and the staff were initially meeting with the state, they read them the findings of the report. To this point, we have not seen the actual document. It’s hard to move forward, make an appeal, and make necessary changes without knowing exactly what it says. We are hopeful that the appeal process will get us that document. From the county’s perspective as the overseers of this project, we should be provided that anyway.”
Concerning communication issues with MPCA, Commissioner David Ebinger remarked, “Maybe the state has a valid point on issues that we need to address, but the state isn’t doing a real effective job of following their own methods that they set up to tell us what the problem is and give us a chance to correct it. I am strongly in favor of an appeal on this.”
The board voted to appeal the decision based on getting MPCA to a meeting where they can directly inform the county with documentation concerning the corrections they wish to see implemented and how to accomplish those corrections.
It’s not so much about the money, but the process,” concluded Campbell.