Home > News & Media > Farm Bill Passes With Perks Targeting Florida
Farm Bill Passes With Perks Targeting Florida
TBO.com – May 16, 2008
By BILLY HOUSE
The Tampa Tribune
WASHINGTON – Florida’s sugar, fruit and vegetable producers and Tampa Bay’s tropical fish industry would benefit under a nearly $300 billion farm bill given final passage Thursday by the Senate and sent to the White House.
The Senate’s 81 to 15 vote, along with the House’s overwhelming 318 to 106 passage of the measure on Wednesday, indicate Congress has well above the two-thirds majority necessary to override a promised veto by President Bush.
The White House says Bush won’t sign the new five-year farm bill into law – even if Congress can render it law without him.
Bush opposes the measure because, he says, it does not cut payments to wealthy corporate farmers enough at a time of high commodity prices and global demand for grain.
He also criticizes various special-interest items and protectionists provisions, including what he says is “an egregious new sugar subsidy program” that could worsen trade relations.
Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer adds that the bill sends “a wrong message” to the rest of the country not experiencing “the boom of the agriculture sector.”
Congress Has Other Ideas
Not much sympathy was reflected for those arguments in votes cast in Congress by most of Bush’s fellow Republicans. Both of Florida’s senators supported the bill, including Republican Mel Martinez.
“This is by far the best farm bill we’ve seen for the farmers of Florida,” Martinez said Thursday.
Martinez and Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson followed four of the five Tampa Bay area House members who also supported the bill.
They included three Republicans, Reps. Adam Putnam of Bartow, Gus Bilirakis of Palm Harbor, and Ginny Brown-Waite of Brooksville, and Democratic Rep. Kathy Castor of Tampa.
Among area lawmakers, only Rep. C.W. Bill Young of Indian Shores voted against the measure. He opposes the subsidies that he says go to “multimillion dollar farms,” or conglomerates, as well as the sugar subsidies.
In fact, the bill still would allow married farmers whose net income is up to $1.5 million to collect subsidies. However, it would end “indirect” payments that allow the children of farmers or other third parties to get those subsidies, as well.
Young said the subsidy should have been limited to farmers whose net income is less than $200,000.
Bush also objected to raising theraw cane sugar loan rate, which serves as a government-guaranteed price, from 18 cents a pound to 18.75 cents a pound, phased-in from 2009 to 2011.
The move is intended to help domestic sugar farmers who have been hit with slumping sugar prices. The Florida sugar industry has a $3.1 billion economic footprint on the state and provides more than 25,000 direct jobs.
Hefty Campaign Contributions
The sugar cane and sugar beet industries have contributed more than $2.5 million in campaign donations to members of Congress since the start of the current two-year election cycle in January 2007, according to monitoring by the Center for Responsive Politics. They gave $3.2 million in 2005 and 2006.
The American Sugar Alliance, including the Florida Sugar Cane League, praised the bill’s passage Thursday, saying sugar producers are struggling with low prices and “unneeded sugar imports.”
Young said he’s worried about consumers, and that this “increases the government intervention in such a way that it would drive up sugar prices.”
The bill also authorizes more than $1.4 billion in mandatory spending for programs that benefit fruit and vegetable growers and provides more money for research, marketing and export.
Florida is the nation’s second-largest producer of fruit and vegetables and it is the largest producer of citrus fruit, a $9.3 billion industry that provides more than 76,000 jobs.
The farm bill also would increase food stamp benefits and send more money to nutrition programs for the poor and senior citizens.
Putnam, a citrus grower and rancher, noted that for the first time, a farm bill directs resources toward researching and controlling the spread of diseases and pests that threaten Florida agriculture.
The measure also increases money to protect water quality and wildlife habitats.
“This is good for Florida farmers and the state’s natural resources,” Nelson said.
The per-gallon ethanol tax credit for refiners would be cut from 51 cents to 45 cents. The bill encourages alternatives to fuel ethanol made from corn, such as cellulosic-based bio-fuels made from agricultural and forestry crops and associated waste materials.
The bill also would create permanent assistance for farmers hurt by weather disasters. That includes tropical fish farms. There are as many as 133 such farms in the state, and about three-fourths of them are in Hillsborough and Polk counties.
Sales of “ornamental” fish from state breeders amounted to $33.2 million in 2005.
“This bill codifies an insurance policy which will sustain the industry in the event of a disaster,” Bilirakis said.
So far, Congress has overridden one Bush veto during his two terms in the White House.
Click Here To View This Article
