gone from spending bill
By SAM HANANEL
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON Farmers
and ranchers hoping for federal
help for the cost of natural disasters
and soaring energy prices
are out of luck, much to the dismay
of Midwestern lawmakers.
Negotiators
working on a
$94.5 billion compromise
spending
bill for the
Iraq war and
hurricane relief
have eliminated
a provision that
would have provided
$4 billion
in farm disaster
aid.
Midwestern
senators from
both parties
who supported
disaster assistance
blamed
House members
and the Bush administration for
scuttling the aid package during
negotiations Wednesday morning.
“It is extremely frustrating
that the House and the administration
do not view drought as a
significant disaster,” said Sen.
Jim Talent, R-Mo.
Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D.,
was more blunt.
“President Bush and the
House leaders have stiffed family
farmers by rejecting the Senate’s
agriculture disaster package,”
Dorgan said. “They’ve decided to
help only farmers in the Gulf
Coast who were hit by hurricanes
and turn a blind eye to
weather-related farm disasters
that occurred in parts of the
country.”
South Dakota Democratic
Sen. Tim Johnson called the
agreement “a raw deal for our
producers.”
Overall, negotiators trimmed
more than $14 billion from a version
of the emergency measure
the Senate passed last month, as
lawmakers worked under pressure
to keep the bill from breaking
the budget set by the White
House.
The agriculture aid would
have paid farmers and ranchers
around the country for recent
losses due to drought, flooding,
disease and other disasters. It
also would have provided an
increase in current federal subsidy
checks to offset the high
cost of energy, fertilizer and
feed.
Pending continued negotiations,
the bill would include
about $500 million
for farmers
in Gulf Coast
states ravaged
by last year’s
hurricanes.
The Bush
administration
earlier this year
called the proposed
level of
assistance to
farmers “excessive,”
noting
that many
crops had
record or nearrecord
production
last year.
But with
drought losses in Missouri
expected to exceed $289 million,
Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., said
Congress and the White House
should recognize disasters outside
the Gulf Coast.
“Natural disasters in other
parts of the country have created
great financial hardship, which
is why this disaster supplemental
should be comprehensive and
national in scope,” Bond said.
Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan.,
said he was disappointed the conference
committee did not
include disaster assistance for
farmers and ranchers around the
nation, though he backed Bush’s
pledge to veto the measure if it
exceeded the White Houseapproved
limit of $94.5 billion.
Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D.,
said the aid would have helped
struggling farmers stay afloat.
Last year, the U.S. Department
of Agriculture designated every
county in his state a disaster
area, along with nearly 80 percent
of all U.S. counties.
“Almost every time I am
home, I talk to a farmer who
tells me they are getting out of
farming,” Conrad said. “My
bipartisan agriculture disaster
assistance bill could have meant
a great deal to family farmers
and ranchers trying to stay in
business.”
