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Iowa Farm Bureau president reiterates WOTUS concerns

The EPA’s Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS) rule came up for discussion at a recent Senate agriculture subcommittee hearing on rural development.

In response to a question about “burdensome regulations” from subcommittee chair Joni Ernst of Iowa, Iowa Farm Bureau president Craig Hill said the WOTUS rule has created plenty of uncertainty for farmers.

“It has been something that has just stymied and crippled our farmers,” he said. “They don’t understand the rules and when they ask for help—what is the definition of Waters of the U.S. and what features on their land would be permittable,and what is jurisdictional or not—(those questions) are unanswered.”

Confusion over the rule has caused some farmers to hesitate in implementing long-term conservation improvements. Hill says it’s been frustrating for farmers.

“To implement and execute on those new rules—new definitions that have never been created before by EPA, that don’t stand up to court decisions and defy actually what Congress has set out in the Clean Water Act—is just a very, very difficult thing for agriculture to accept.”

WOTUS is currently tied up in the federal court system and implementation of the rule is on hold.