Page 4/The Battalion/Wednesday, January 11,
High Plains farmers to face
bad harvests with decision
United Press International
LUBBOCK — High Plains
farmers, hurt by recent bad-
crop years, face a critical deci
sion as they consider whether to
participate in the 1984 farm
program, said Texas Agricultu-
ral Extension Service
spokesmen.
Grain marketing economist
Ed Smith of College Station said
Tuesday he believed more far
mers would participate in the
program than some people have
predicted. Management eco
nomist Kenneth Stokes of a Dal-
las-area research office agreed.
But both said the total partici-
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pation in the 1984 farm prog
ram would be less than the 1983
participation levels. They visited
with West Texas reporters as
part of a statewide effort by the
extension service to distribute
information.
“The decision on this farm
program may be a life or death
matter,” for some farmers,
Smith said, urging producers to
consider the merits of the prog
ram based upon their individual
farming needs.
He said general public opin
ion was that the upcoming farm
program was bad because it did
not offer as many incentives as
last year’s program, which in
cluded the Payment-In-Kind
program.
PIK payments are to be con
tinued only on wheal during the
upcoming crop year.
Extensionservice calculations
indicate that it would be to the
advantage of theverage High
Plains farmer to participate in
the 1984 program. Smith said,
urging producers to attend a
Jan. 24 seminar in Lubbock on
the farm program.
“This area’s hurting,” Stokes
said of producers whose cotton
fields have been pounded by
hail and thunderstorms for the
past few years. “This area needs
a little more flexibility” in farm
program rules, he said.
The 1984 cotton acreage re
duction program has been criti
cized by High Plains farm
groups because it eliminated a
previous option farmers had
allowing them to withdraw from
the program by July 15 based
upon weather factors.
Valley citrus workers
get more food stamps
United Press International
AUSTIN — Citrus workers
in the Rio Grande Valley,
knocked out of a job because
of crop-destroying freeze in
December, will receive addi
tional food stamp allotments,
the state welfare chief said
Tuesday.
Marlin W. Johnston, com
missioner of the Texas De
partment of Human Re
sources, said a mass feeding
facility has been established in
San Juan to provide one hot
meal per day.
As many as 20,000 people,
most of them poor Mexican-
American field hands and
packing shed workers, lost
their jobs because of the freez
ing weather that destroyed cit
rus crops and shut down juice
plants in South Texas.
Johnston announced that
the U.S. Department of Agri
culture has ordered a waiver
of some eligibility rules that
will permit many victims of
the freeze to receive addition
al food stamps.
The principal beneficiaries
of the rules waiver, he said,
will be citrus workers who
were already enrolled in the
food stamp program.
Families who already had
their food stamp allotments
determined for January may
reapply at food stamp offices
for additional benefits under
the rule waiver, Johnston said.
The relaxed eligibility rules
will apply to residents of
Hidalgo, Willacy, Starr and
Cameron counties, which
were declared disaster areas
by President Reagan.
Gov. Mark White requesiei
the declaration because 17.
degree temperatures ruined
the orange and grapefruit
crop, destroyed much of tht
winter vegetable crop and
sugar cane crops, and froze
thousands of fish along the
Gulf coast.
Johnston said his agencyit
looking for additional sites in
the Valley to establish feedinc
areas to dispense the food
being trucked in by the Texas
National Guard from govern
ment warehouses in San
Antonio.
The Guard has already
transported 312 cases of egj
mix, 500 cases of grapefrjuice,
50 bags of dried milk, 273
cases of pru nes and 80 casesot
raisins, he said.
Ex-EPA worker testifies against
burning of toxic wastes in Gulf
ul ^
SSfs ,
•' 7\,' ’'
United Press International
HARLINGEN — An En
vironmental Protection Agency
“whistle-blower,” shunned by
his cohorts at a scientific debate
Tuesday, said he has reserva
tions about the EPA’s tentative
approval of the burning of high
ly toxic chemical wastes in the
Gulf of Mexico.
Hugh Kaufman, assistant to
the director of the EPA’s hazar
dous sight control division,
made a surprise appearance on
a panel arranged by the' Gulf
Coast Coalition for Public
Health, an environmental
group opposing the ocean in
cineration permits.
Kaufman went to Congress
with allegations about Rita
Lavelle, who was sentenced
Monday to six months in jail for
perjuring herself before Con
gress, and his statements Tues
day strongly supported environ
mentalists’ claims that the EPA
has been trying to ramrod
through the offshore burning of
toxic wastes without sufficient
safeguards.
The EPA already has given
tentative approval for Chemical
Waste Management, Inc., to
burn 300,000 metric tons of
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jf A UNIFORM KEEPING YOU
OUT OF THE CORPS?
*
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There’s nothing wrong with it. But an Aggie
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Take the opportunity to both finance and
enrich your education.
FOR DETAILS CONTACT:
MAJOR MICHAEL R.HARDIN
845-2814 or 845-1022
IT*S NOT TOO LATE
JOIN THE CORPS NOW!
polychlorinated biphenyls
(PCBs) and other highly toxic
substances in two Vulcanus in
cinerations ships 150 miles off
the Texas Coast.
Public comment on the prop
osal ends Jan. 31, after which
Jack Ravan, head of the EPA’s
water division, will make a final
decision. Ravan sat in on Tues
day’s debate, but did not speak.
The ocean incineration pro
ject was begun during the te
nure of Lavelle and former EPA
administrator Anne Gorsuch
Burford.
Kaufman maintained Tues
day, in response to questions,
that the EPA has “waived” strict
standards applied to land-based
incineration projects, has not
considered what measures could
be taken in the event of a catasto-
phy on one of the incineration
ships, and that there are legal
questions whether Chemical
Waste Management’s required
$150 million insurance coverage
would be sufficient in the event
of a spill.
The EPA, which supplied sci
entists for panels discussing the
pros and cons of the ocean in
cineration project, refused to
seat a panel opposite the one
Kaufman sat on because a
spokesman said the discussion
dealt with “policy issues and not
science.”
Kaufman said he was appear
ing as a “private citizen” without
taking sides on the issue of the
proposal which has drawn he
ated resistance in the Lower Rio
Grande Valley. But then he pro
ceeded to describe — in careful
ly worded terms — his views on
methods used by the EPA to
ward approving the necessary
permits.
Kaufman helped start the
EPA’s waste dispoal program in
the early 1970s, worked in the
controversial Super fund
cleanup program, and served
five years as the chief investiga
tor of hazardous waste sites.
He said under the London
Dumping Convention, of which
EPA is a member, that an over
riding need for ocean incinera
tion must be demonstrated but,
“I have not seen any detailed
technical data showing that
need.”
Discussing “risks and be
nefits,” Kaufman said, “In this
case I believe anybody who has
done a risk assessment will con
clude there are risks.”
“The benefit,” he said,‘iii
quarter billion dollars ofrt
venue for Chemical WasteMai>
agement.”
He added that noonehasaj;
accurate data on how muchi
would cost to clean up toxic
stances in the Gulf of Mexicoim
“worst case scenario,” and toll
about 100 people attending tht
debate that there was a ‘‘certaa
loophole” in the Superfunl
legislation “that may removed
bility (from Chemical Was#
Management) and transfer ittt
the taxpayers.”
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Kaufman said, also, that ins
because the burns will takeplatt
150 miles from any people doe
not mean that people wouldtta
be affected by the burns.
"Just because there may not
be a problem with respiratiot
because of the distnce does not
mean people wi II not bt
affected. Your’re dealing wiili
the food chain. You need a b
ter definition of what thost
effects can be. That type of wot!
has not been put together. Its
not just the respiratory impact,
it’s also the impact on the
chain.”
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