Food Safety Bill Update (Vote Will Be Tomorrow)

Moving quickly does not make good law! (4.00 / 3)

The reason a 2/3 vote was required was because they tried passing the bill under a "suspension" of the rules.  This meant (1) NO amendments on the floor and (2) 40 minutes of debate.  Suspension votes are not intended for complex, controversial bills.  It was an attempt to ramrod the bill through without proper consideration.  

Not to mention that the actual version of the bill that they were voting on was only finalized at 10:30 am, a couple of hours before the debate began.  

This is NOT the way to pass  a law that will impact our entire food supply.

The bill did NOT incorporate the provisions that had been sought by many sustainable agriculture groups to lessen the impacts on farmers and local producers.  (And, in my opinion, even those changes would not have been enough to truly address the problems with the bill)  As it's written, this bill could be devastating to the local foods movement.

Good for the Democrats who voted against it!  Let's have a real debate over food safety, with the opportunity for amendments to ensure that local food producers are not driven out of business, leaving consumers with no choice but Industrial Agribusiness "food" (I'm not sure it's accurate to call it food, really)

Protect our farms - Stop NAIS!  Go to http://FarmAndRanchFreedom.org for more information.

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by: JudithM @ Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 02:23:21 AM UTC

This is ridiculous (4.00 / 3)

if you can change the rules all the time then you can change the outcome. Totally bogus. I mean, if they've got control over what passes and how it passes by controlling the rules, then why do we bother pretending to have a democracy at all? Skip the freaking votes and just let House leadership decide which bills they want to pass.

"I can understand someone from Iowa promoting corn and soy, but we are not feeding the world, we are feeding animals and soft drink companies." - Jim Goodman

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by: Jill Richardson @ Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 02:26:56 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Here's what the Center for Rural Affairs (4.00 / 3)

has to say about today's happenings on this bill: http://www.cfra.org/blog/2009/...

"I can understand someone from Iowa promoting corn and soy, but we are not feeding the world, we are feeding animals and soft drink companies." - Jim Goodman

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by: Jill Richardson @ Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 02:24:22 AM UTC

Nice post from CRA (4.00 / 3)

Steph summed up the procedural issue nicely:

However, as we saw in the Farm Bill, the Rules Committee is frequently used by the leadership in the House to ram legislation through quickly without pesky amendments that hold up the process.

Except "pesky" amendments can frequently make a bad bill better.

Now the same thing is happening with the Food Safety Enhancement Act - H.R. 2749. We at the Center aren't working actively on the bill, but we're weighing in because we get really irritated when either the House or the Senate use rule tricks to deny a vote on anything.

Protect our farms - Stop NAIS!  Go to http://FarmAndRanchFreedom.org for more information.

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by: JudithM @ Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 02:27:36 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

taking a page out of California's playbook... (4.00 / 2)

the dysfunction government syndrome is spreading like a virus or a cancer. Effing Democrats are going to manage to lose control of Congress in a single election cycle. Better they keep their baby powder dry, I guess.

Yankee Frugality: use it up, wear it out, make it last, or do without.

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by: Anonymous Bosch @ Thu Jul 30, 2009 at 03:06:50 AM UTC

Food safety and health care (0.00 / 0)

As a farmer whose farm was destroyed by Salmonella and E. coli contaminated runoff from a sludge site, I can say that new food safety laws will not solve the problem. There are some who think this is a simply issue of sludge dumped on agricultural land as a fertilizer without the science to prove it is safe. Yet, over 60 organizations have petitioned EPA (2003) and Congress (2008) to stop sludge dumping to no avail.  This is not just a farmers problem or their neighbors. This is a political issue that effects everyone who eats food or drinks water. A 1982 EPA study shows antibiotic resistant bacteria are created in wastewater treatment plants and dumped on agricultural land. Runoff from agricultural land is picked up by drinking water treatment plants where more antibiotic resistant bacteria are created. This has been confirmed by more recent studies. EPA does not require testing for E. coli 0157:H7, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and antibiotic resistance genes or Vancomycin resistant enterococci (VRE) that have been found in sewage sludge. These are not part of the fecal coliform test which only looks for one type of thermotolerant E. coli. Thermotolerant E. coli are mutants that grow at elevated temperatures of 112.1 degrees F. Most pathogenic bacteria and viruses grow best at 97-98 degree F. These are the ones that get into our food and drinking water. These are also implicated in the top 15 causes of death. Asks your friends to sign the petition.

Please sign petition - click on link
http://www.thepetitionsite.com...

Stop Recycling Sewage Effluents on Food Crops, Etc.

Target: President Obama, EPA, USDA, FDA
Sponsored by: Jim Bynum, VP, Help for Sewage Victims (started almost 20 years ago by farmers)
Click on bold highlighted words for more information.

Click on bold highlighted words for more information.

Help for Sewage Victims was founded by farmers almost 20 years ago to gather factual data on EPA's sewage sludge disposal policy. It has found: 1) Sewage pollutants may be implicated in the 15 leading causes of deaths; and 2) New food protection laws can not alleviate foodborne illnesses or other infectious diseases caused by the use of sewage effluents (sludge and water) on agricultural land.  Congress made it very clear in 1976 that  infectious characteristics of waste which may--
(A) cause, or significantly contribute to an increase in mortality or an increase in serious irreversible, or incapacitating reversible, illness; or
(B) pose a substantial present or potential hazard to human health or the environment when improperly treated, stored, transported, or disposed of, or otherwise managed is a hazardous waste.

Yet, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW), chaired by Senator Barbara Boxer abruptly canceled scheduled Hearings on sludge contamination problems September 11, 2008. The government stopped counting foodborne illnesses after the total reached  81 million case (GAO)in 1997. That was up from 2 million foodborne illnesses in 1986. In 1998 CDC estimated there were 360 million cases of acute diarrhea, most from unknown sources. The most serious documented illness increase was for MRSA hospital stays, 368,300 in 2005 with 19,000 deaths. That was up from 1,900 hospital stays in 1993 when EPA and its partners started promoting the disposal of pathogen contaminated sewage effluents as organic fertilizer on agricultural land, parks, school grounds as well as home lawns and gardens.

Since 1980, EPA, USDA and FDA have promoted a national agency policy to disposed of the chemical and antibiotic resistant disease ladened contaminated sewage effluent (sludge) as a fertilizer and semi-treated sewage effluent as reclaimed water for irrigation. The orginal policy was based on the consensus that "there are not many people out there to be harmed." Current sewage treatment policies do not require testing for or the removal of all pathogens. The results of EPA's 1993 policy (40 CFR 503 ) to dispose of contaminated sewage effluents  on cattle pastureland, land used for food crops, forest land, parks, school grounds, as well as home lawns and gardens have been a dramatic increase in "food" contamination incidents and illnesses such as MRSA with associated deaths as well as other pandemics. This Agency policy is in direct conflict with the laws of our land enacted to protect public health and the environment.

Recycling sewage effluents under the current policies places the national economy and public health at risk from pathogen contaminated food, water and air. The fate of public health and the economy is based on the renamed hundred and five year old Eijkman (fecal coliform) test procedure for one type of gram negative thermotolerant E. coli. The test does not reveal  E. coli 0157 which does not ferment lactose.  Most other enteric gram negative soil, water, and fecal disease causing bacteria (coliform - Salmonella, Shigella, etc.) in humans become dormant at the elevated fecal coliform test temperature. EPA does not require testing for any other pathogens (bacteria - viruses - fungus - parasites - worms) in sewage effluent, food or water.

EPA acknowledges in Part 503.9(t) that other inorganic, synthetic organic and volatile organic compounds in sewage effluents could also cause death, cancer, disease etc. upon exposure through the air, food or water. However, they do not cause pandemics. These chemicals may take up to 20 years or longer to cause illness and death.

For these reasons, recycling sewage effluents on food crops, etc., especially when they are labeled organic soil amendments must be stopped.

More information can be found at:
http://thewatchers.us/
http://deadlydeceit.com/
http://sludgevictims.com/
http://list.web.net/lists/list...
http://www.sludgefacts.org/IJO...
http://sludgefacts.org/
http://sludgenews.org/
http://www.prwatch.org/tsigfy....
http://cwmi.css.cornell.edu/Sl...
http://cwmi.css.cornell.edu/Sl...
http://sewagesludgeactionnetwo...
http://www.centerforfoodsafety...
http://www.organicconsumers.or...
http://www.loudounnats.org/
http://www.iatp.org/foodandhea...
http://www.ejnet.org/sludge/
http://www.olympus.net/communi...
http://www.something-stinks.com/

Please sign petition -- click on link -- Sometimes it is slow to upload your post. Please verify post.
http://www.thepetitionsite.com...

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by: JimBynum @ Sun Aug 02, 2009 at 13:18:34 PM UTC