01/12/05 Confidentialty and the CAFO permit

Washington Ag January 12, 2005 One of the more controversial issues with the concentrated animal feeding operation or CAFO permit, the state Department of Ecology is implementing on behalf of the EPA, is that of confidentiality of documents that must be filed with the state. All operations that are CAFO's will have to file an annual report with the DOE and while the plan is for an operations' nutrient management plan to stay at the farm, Melodie Selby, a senior policy analyst with Ecology, says if there is an environmental problem that has to be investigated, that plan will have to go the DOE. Selby: "What a producer can do is they can go through and mark what parts they believe are confidential business information and why. Then if someone does ask for it, we haven't had a lot of requests but it is a possibility, if somebody does ask for it, if we decide the producer is right and it is confidential business information we will not release it. If we disagree then we will notify the producer and they can appeal our decision to court before it is released." Ecology is wrapping up a series of public hearings on the proposed CAFO permit but will continue taking written comments until January 28th. Those can be mailed or e-mailed to DOE's Olympia office. I'm Bob Hoff. (Written comments on the permit will be accepted through Jan. 28, 2005, and may be submitted by e-mail to akol461@ecy.wa.gov, by fax to at (360) 407-6426, or mailed to Andrew Kolosseus, Department of Ecology, P.O. Box 47600, Olympia, Wash., 98504-7600. For more information, call Andrew Kolosseus at (360) 407-7543. )