Morning In Maryland? Not For farmers

The State of Maryland has gone too far with regulations imposed on farmers. The phosphorus regulations that the special interests and their state apparatus would now like to force on the farming community are only the latest on a long list. These new regulations will make it illegal for farmers to apply almost all organic fertilizers, compost, manures and many other natural products to the land if the soil contains above certain level phosphorus. The law will mandate farmers to surrender the self-sufficiency of traditional organic practices and become entirely dependent on much greater quantities of the highly soluble chemical fertilizers (environmentalists, think "run off" when you hear highly soluble) of the petrochemical industry. As an organic farmer, I will have to stop dealing with my local organic fertilizer provider and ship in expensive products from other regions. My family will lose a substantial portion of the income that we rely upon as this will more than double our fertilizer costs. It will force me to waste much money and entire days of my time driving to Lancaster, Pennsylvania in dangerous and heavy summer traffic to bring back fertilizer. All of this at precisely the time of year that I need to be on my farm with a watchful eye 24hrs a day and 7 days a week. Also, I will no longer be legally allowed to use compost, one of the main engines of fertility on almost all organic farms. 

Our small region here on the lower peninsula is particularly vulnerable because of the natural characteristics of our soil, and the outdated manure application practices that were at one time encouraged by the same class of society that now seeks to abolish the modern improved ones. The chemistry of phosphorus in our soil is such that it's quantity is abundant but it is not available as plant food. For instance, last year I performed a tissue nutrient analysis and a soil nutrient analysis in my vegetable fields. The results were that the soil phosphorus levels were high, yet the tissue analysis showed that the plant was starving for phosphorus. If the phosphorus is not available to the plant, it must be applied in small quantities to grow a marketable crop. 

As hard as the new regulations will be on me and many others, I hesitate to even imagine the hardship that will be imposed upon the most vulnerable farmers and agricultural businesses. What right does the state's ruling class think that they have to be able to take these actions and inflict these hardships on those who provide the people's sustenance? Are the few of us in the agricultural community merely expendable political bargaining chips in Annapolis so that politicians can get the environmental vote? Does a person still maintain enough property rights to be self-sufficient on the land? The answer is no we do not. Those who rule us, whether directly or indirectly, claim to know what is best for us. They claim to know what is impossible for them to know.

In the October 9th Daily Times, there is an op-ed titled "Morning in Maryland, if not America". I know the individual who penned it, and he has always seemed to be a well-meaning fellow, and certainly polite. However, as a "sustainable" farmer myself, I can readily identify that the author has no idea of the devastation that the regulations he is cheerleading will have on sustainable farming, and the local food economy. He praises "savvy environmental measures", "innovative storm water management system", and "progressive land-use legislation" that will "promote sustainable agriculture". Yet it is exactly these policies to which he refers that will crush the small independent farmers, beginning farmers, and the other vulnerable agricultural businesses. I know from experience. I am a "sustainable farmer" and the "progressive land-use legislation" has destroyed my families' opportunities in the state of Maryland.

My wife and I own and operate a growing farm business that produces organically grown vegetables, pasture-raised beef and poultry, and free-range pork. We sell almost everything we grow locally in our CSA, farmers' markets, and our on-site farm-stand. We also buy all of the products for our stand from local farmers, and like ourselves, most of those farmers rely on our farm stand sales as a significant source of revenue. The stand we have now is not on a main road, we do not advertise, yet we do good amount business. If we were on a main road, and were able to custom build a new stand exactly to our needs, we would do much better amount of business, and that would be good for numerous local farmers and farm businesses. 

A little over a year ago, my wife and I were given a once in a life time opportunity to purchase the adjoining farm. The neighboring farm is located on a busy road and my wife and I were very excited about being able to plant more acreage and build a new produce stand there. Ringed by giant walnut and pecan trees, along with old barn and sheds, there is a site that is perfect for a new stand to sell our produce. We wouldn't even have to disturb new ground or pave over farmland because we could just build in the same place the old farm house used to be. 

When I first applied for the building permits that I knew would be required, I was dealt with setback after setback from the officials. After jumping through hoops for nearly 3 months of repeated trips to the government office buildings, I was made aware of several new regulations. In the short time since we had built our first produce stand, codes affecting farm buildings, stormwater management, and all septic systems had been changed dramatically. Not even 4 years ago were there special requirements for stormwater catchment, septic systems were affordable, and agricultural buildings did not even need a building permit. The cost of the building was basically the cost of construction. Now, young farmers just starting out will have to pay at least $50,000 beyond the cost of construction to comply with Maryland codes if he or she would like to try to sell their produce from their own farm in a weatherproof and secure facility. Others I have spoken with have calculated the costs to be over $90,000. Most of that cost is from forcing farmers to comply with stormwater regulations and in the cost of the new mandatory yet marginally effective septic systems. If these laws had been in place when we started farming, we would never have even considered a career in farming, it would have cost too much to start.
Needless to say, my wife and I could not justify the squandering of at least $50,000 to address stormwater and septic problems that do not even exist on our farm. Our hopes were crushed; the prospects for the local farmers who supply us were crushed as well. This was a huge blow, especially since we had already spent several thousand dollars and countless hours planning out the project and now we had a mortgage to pay with hardly any way left to increase income. We will not even be able to increase the acreage we plant because in order to do so we would have to upgrade to a larger packing facility with more refrigeration capacity, and the stormwater regulations will apply to that as well, making it cost prohibitive. We hope to be able to hold onto the new farm, but we are uncertain at this time.

I have sat and thought hard about this, and I have calculated that it would be far less expensive to move our entire farming operation to another state and start over again rather than pay for the ridiculous fees, taxes, licenses, permits and mitigations now required by the state of Maryland for our farm-stand. We are now wondering if we will ever be able to save enough money to retire on, or if selling our small farm will even provide enough money for retirement. When one touts the new phosphorus regulations, or stormwater regulations, or new septic regulations "savvy, innovative, and progressive", it is insulting. We can no longer build weatherproof and secure retail facilities on the farm, we can no longer construct farm infrastructure beyond the small amount that the state will allow, and we are now forced to squander significant sums of money on septic technologies that have will yield little improvement if any to the Chesapeake Bay. These newly implemented policies of the special interests and their state apparatus, especially the cheer leading professional "environmentalists", have severely damaged the future of small farming and local distribution in the state of Maryland.

Like myself, I imagine that all farmers take offense to being grouped into a collective labeled "polluters". Never has anyone been to my farm and done any testing to see if I am in fact contributing to pollution, so how do they get away with the accusation? I test my soil at least every year, and I know that I am not over applying nutrients by a wide margin. There are no surface waters near my farm for rain water to run-off into. They try to tell me the phosphorus is seeping down into the aquifer, yet I have tested the deeper soil for phosphorus and there is hardly any phosphorus deeper than 12 inches down. I have left buffers around my entire field to catch any loss of nutrient. I planted cover crops before Maryland had a cover crop program. Like many farmers I have taken these steps because I want to leave my small piece of earth a better place than I found it, and they make good common sense. Yet the special interests and their state apparatus do not care about us as individuals, in their eyes individuals do not have rights. To them individuals do not matter; everyone must obey regardless of whether or not one is actually a polluter, no matter what hardship it may cause. They self-impose no limits, and they will bring even more economic destruction in the future. Even with massive political action, it may be too late defend ourselves from their recklessness.

Sincerely,

Ted Wycall
Greenbranch Farm
Salisbury, Maryland.