By CHARLES TWEED
It’s going to be a landmark decision for the residents of the Chain Lakes district — one way or the other.
The Natural Resources Conservation Board’s (NRCB) review of its approval of the Zealand Farms Ltd. application to build a confined feeding operation (CFO) was a well-orchestrated chess game held at the Ponoka Golf Club on March 23.
The review was limited to two questions, although limit may be too well defined as none of the involved parties stuck to the two topics. The questions were whether the approved application is consistent with the Ponoka County Municipal Development Plan (MDP) and if not consistent with the MDP, whether the board should exercise its authority to have regard for but not be bound by the MDP.
Ponoka County and eight ‘directly affected parties’ were there in opposition to the application.
CAO Charlie Cutforth spoke on behalf of the county after being sworn in.
“The applicants are excellent people, excellent operators, and good neighbours there is no issue with anything personal,” said Cutforth about owners Henk and Gerrie Krijger before speaking about how the county supports agriculture and CFOs at various levels throughout the area. “Obviously our legal documents weren’t written by lawyers, nor do we intend them to be.”
He found it curious that the Alberta Environment wasn’t a “referral agent” considering the CFO is going to built so close to a body of water.
“Regardless of what we dream up for wording — for the life of me I can’t understand why anybody would want to locate a confined feeding operation of this magnitude close to where people want to congregate — these lakes are a huge attraction to people,” said Cutforth. He continued, suggesting it was this very reason the county in 2008, “specifically identified some of our major lakes,” including Chain Lakes.
Cutforth was referring to the portion of the MDP that states: The County requests the NRCB not to allow new or expanded CFOs in the following areas: land within one mile of the Chain Lakes.
“I’m no lawyer but that seems pretty clear to me,” said Cutforth.
Cutforth said at least 90 per cent of the county is ideal for operations such as this but didn’t want to see the CFO built so closely to the lakes believing it would create “incompatibility issues.”
From there, Zealand Farms’ lawyer, Keith Wilson, who has been involved in several NRCB reviews, cross-examined Cutforth.
Wilson questioned the ability to build residential subdivisions due to the topography around the lakes. He wondered what kinds of impacts the CFO would have that would be incompatible with the lakes.
Cutforth felt “manure management and nuisance complaints” would be the major issues with the CFO and also mentioned road use.
Wilson addressed the roads first, suggesting that poultry barns in the realm of CFOs were on the low end of the scale as far as traffic was concerned. Cutforth agreed.
Wilson then paused, “I’m always hesitant to go down the road I’m about to go down,” he said. “Would you agree with me that it’s fair to say dry poultry manure is on the lower scale or end of the fence relative to perhaps other liquid manures, whether it be hog manure or dairy manure.”
“My personal opinion is yes,” replied Cutforth.
Then Wilson asked Cutforth if he was aware that Reeve Gordon Svenningsen and a Ponoka County public works employee met with the Krijgers on the land prior to filing the application for the CFO. At that point there was no mention of setbacks.
Cutforth was unaware of such a meeting.
Jill Owen represented Marrion Owen in opposition to the CFO and spoke on the subject and at times had the lawyers answering her questions instead of the other way around.
She was unsure how the county’s bylaw could be misinterpreted. “These laws are written for the people of the county,” she said. She felt lawyers were abusing the language used to write the laws, that they were finding loopholes in the ‘plain English language’ that is so important for the laws to be accessible by all in the county.
During Wilson’s questioning of Owen, he focused on manure spreading. Wilson asked if the manure were managed in a way where it couldn’t get into the water if it would reduce Owen’s concern.
She replied, ‘Absolutely, if you know of a way to absolutely guarantee that — do you have that knowledge? Does anyone have that knowledge?”
“One of the beauties of cross examination is that I get to ask the questions,” said Wilson.
He then tried to draw comparisons between manure and fertilizer, suggesting there is really no difference other than public perception.
Owen responded by saying that fertilizer was a value-added product that farmers use to increase outputs and revenue whereas manure from a CFO is an unwanted by-product of the operation itself.
After the parties opposed to the CFO were done speaking and answering questions it was the Krijgers’ turn to answer questions regarding their application and why they should be allowed to build the barn on the proposed site.
The Krijgers said they originally purchased the property to break the land for crop use but after the land became flooded this past spring thought a poultry operation might be better suited for the land.
They spoke at length about their manure spreading techniques. Mrs. Krijger said if it helped the neighbors they have no problem hauling the manure back to their home farm to avoid spreading but she did also mention they would follow the rules set out by the NRCB and if the board allowed them to spread on the land, then they would spread on the land.
She said it ‘aches our heart’ that people would think they would handle manure improperly and that they come from Holland which that has tighter restrictions on manure spreading than Canada.
During Cutforth’s cross-examination of the Krijgers he wondered if they contacted anyone at the county before they bought if about specific rules for the land.
Mr. Krijger answered, ‘no’ and his wife said they bought it privately.
Cutforth then asked if the Krijgers thought there should be a limit as to how many CFOs could be built around the lake.
“If yours is approved then what is stopping every other landowner?” asked Cutforth.
Mrs. Krijger didn’t feel the question was fair.
Mr. Krijger addressed Cutforth, “Charlie,” with a smile, and explained he understood the game of politics that they were involved in. He felt the plans by the county needed to be more well defined between agriculture and country residential.
“It is up to the county and the NRCB to play fair,” said Mr. Krijger.
He thought there was a compromise to made and the two sides needed to “meet in the middle — It’s planning and I like not to go, I cannot plan. I plan for my own farm and for our sons.”
Cutforth summarized what the entire opposition is all about, the slippery slope argument — in this case the slope is on Chain Lakes and it’s slippery with manure.
The opposition isn’t that the Krijgers are bad farmers, quite the opposite, those who opposed the application praised their farm techniques.
It’s the argument if you set the ‘precedent’ as word that was used repeatedly by all who opposed the barns then what is to stop the next producer from building a 300-cow dairy barn?
The parties in opposition are trying to clearly define, now, while there are not CFOs within a mile radius of Chain Lakes that the operations are not permissible.
“I fear that if this decision is passed it will be setting a precedent for the whole province of Alberta, we will be opening a can of worms that will be very hard to close,” said Ken Henkelman, who lives on Chain Lakes and opposes the CFO.
Wilson felt the slippery slope argument didn’t belong in the discussion.
“The rules are clearly designed to prevent that. The rules force the approval officer to deny it where there is an inconsistency… the slippery slope argument simply isn’t true… I think it is a fear and I don’t think it is valid,” said Wilson.
He also called the one mile exclusion in Ponoka County’s MDP ‘arbitrary’ and a ‘blunt tool.’
For their part, the Krijgers said after the hearing “that everything went well.” They were trying to mend fences on both sides, admitting that the whole process has been tough on the family.
“We also love the Chain Lakes and we have to follow the NRCB rules,” said Mrs. Krijger.
“The power is in the NRCB and now Ponoka County wants to overrule them,” added Mr. Krijger.
They both mentioned they felt like they were part of a political game.
“It’s stressful and no fun but we survive,” said Mr. Krijger.
A decision from the NRCB is expected in the next five to six weeks.