Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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http://www.denverpost.com/nationworld/ci_8569534

Closing arguments made in poultry case
By JUSTIN JUOZAPAVICIUS Associated Press Writer
Article Last Updated: 03/14/2008 02:16:23 AM MDT

TULSA, Okla.—Bacteria from the waste of more than 140 million chickens raised 
each year in the Illinois River watershed has polluted the land and poses a 
serious health threat, Oklahoma's attorney general told a federal judge.

"Have we indeed poisoned the river?" Drew Edmondson asked U.S. District Judge 
Gregory Frizzell. "The EPA says yes."

The closing remarks Wednesday followed eight days of testimony spanning three 
weeks in the preliminary injunction case, in which Oklahoma is seeking to 
prevent 13 Arkansas poultry companies from disposing bird waste in the river 
valley.

Poultry attorney Robert George told the judge that Oklahoma was relying on 
claims of "ghost pathogens" and "hypothetically sick" people to make its 
case, and that bacterial levels in the watershed have been the same for the 
past 20 years.

George, an attorney for Tyson Foods Inc., the world's largest meat producer, 
also said the state was unable to produce one person who became sick as a 
result of coming into contact with the area.

"Before you can have a tip of an iceberg, you must have an iceberg," he said.

A ruling on the injunction could come within days.

At stake is a practice thousands of farmers have employed for decades in the 
1 million-acre watershed, which occupies parts of Arkansas and Oklahoma: 
taking the ammonia-reeking chicken waste—clumped bird droppings, bedding and 
feathers—and spreading it on their land as cheap fertilizer.

If Frizzell orders an end to disposing the waste here, the ruling could lead 
to similar environmental lawsuits nationwide against the industry, which 
produced more than 48 billion pounds of chicken in 2006.

In his closing argument, Edmondson estimated more than 1,000 people are 
sickened each year by the bacteria, either through body contact or ingestion 
of waters in the region.

He said the 345,000 tons of poultry waste produced annually are spread on 
fields often within a few miles of a poultry operation, oversaturating the 
soil with phosphorous. Bacteria from the waste then leeches into the 
groundwater, springs and wells, Edmondson said.

George said Oklahoma's case could be summed up as "generalizations, paranoia 
and speculation." He said the state could not pinpoint a single site in the 
watershed that posed a health risk.

"The water in this watershed is no different than anywhere else" in Oklahoma, 
he told the judge.

George also said some of the state's expert witnesses had "an agenda against 
the poultry industry," and that an injunction could negatively impact the 
regional economy, costing farmers and growers in watershed counties up to $77 
million during the first year it would take effect.

State and environmental officials contend that years of illegal spreading of 
the poultry waste, which could contain bacteria, antibiotics and harmful 
metals, is killing Oklahoma's scenic lakes.

The injunction request is part of Oklahoma's ongoing lawsuit against the 
poultry companies for polluting the watershed with chicken litter.

Edmondson sued the companies in 2005, saying litter pollution rendered Lake 
Tenkiller in northeastern Oklahoma 70 percent oxygen dead and accused the 
companies of treating Oklahoma's rivers like open sewers.

The Oklahoma-Arkansas region supplies roughly 2 percent of the nation's 
poultry, and is one of several areas nationally where the industry is most 
concentrated.

More than 1,800 poultry houses are in the watershed, most of them in Arkansas.

Companies named in the 2005 complaint include Tyson Foods Inc., Tyson Poultry 
Inc., Tyson Chicken Inc., Cobb-Vantress Inc., Cal-Maine Foods Inc., Cargill 
Inc., Cargill Turkey Production L.L.C., George's Inc., George's Farms Inc., 
Peterson Farms Inc., Simmons Foods Inc., Cal-Maine Farms Inc. and Willow 
Brook Foods Inc.