Steve Atkinson Decides That When It Comes to Raw Milk, If You Can't Beat 'Em, Join 'Em
Tuesday, October 23, 2007 at 09:50AM
Last seek, Steve Atkinson, owner of Greenwood Farms in Newburg, MO, received a letter from the Missouri State Milk Board. It stated, he says, that “it was illegal to sell raw milk” from his four cows without a permit, as he had been doing for a few years, and in order to receive a permit, he’d need to have his milk inspected and build an automated bottling plant.
The letter wasn’t a complete surprise, since Atkinson had heard of other sellers of raw milk receiving similar letters. So Atkinson (who is a contributor to this blog) had been doing some investigating, and discovered:
- Setting up a bottling plant “is expensive,” costing on the order of $100,000 or more.
- No other dairy has been licensed to sell raw milk in Missouri, apparently because of a dearth of applications.
- The bacteria criteria for raw milk appear very doable, based on his own private tests of his dairy’s milk.
Steve’s reaction was different from the reaction of some farmers I have reported on previously who have been hit with government interference. “What everyone is doing in fighting the regulations is good, but that is not the tack we like to take.”
His approach is to try to comply with the regulations. He has informed his approximately 25 raw milk customers that he is shutting down raw milk sales, probably until early 2008, when he will have the bottling plant completed. (The photo above shows milking at his farm.) He'll likely have to borrow the money to complete the plant.
“I have to keep my eye on my primary goal. If it takes me years to do that (because of tied up in fights with the local agriculture officials), I may defeat my goal.”
His primary goal is to make his farm self-sufficient for his family, which includes two adult children who have moved back to the farm in recent years. And because he is 63 years old, he figures he doesn’t have a huge amount of time.
To achieve self-sufficiency, he has calculated that he needs to increase the size of his dairy herd to 12 or 14 cows from the current four. “It’s a huge opportunity,” he says. “Being in a community with your adult children all living together is a unique thing.”
Beyond self-sufficiency, he sees a clear business opportunity: to be Missouri’s only licensed raw milk seller, making milk available to customers coming to his farm, as well as hopefully via farmers markets.
Until now, he’s had to support his farming habit by working as a dentist. He recalls during the 1980s, when the AIDS epidemic grabbed public attention, there were calls for dentists to take aggressive steps to guard against patient infection, such as by repeatedly sterilizing all tools and wearing plastic gloves. Many dentists fought the push for new rules, but he decided to embrace them, and alert patients to his AIDS-fighting techniques. “My practice became one of the most successful in Missouri,” he says.
He’s hoping to apply the same principle to raw milk.
How will he guard against regulators who, once he has a permit, decide to make life difficult for him for whatever reason? Well, for one thing, “When they come to take samples for testing, we’ll do split samples and send ours to our own lab.” And if they harass him further, "I'll fight back," he says.
While Steve is optimistic about his new path, his 25 customers aren’t. “They are angry at the government. Some of them want us to do a cowshare, so we won’t be subject to inspection. But I think they might come after us for that. Besides, all the paperwork seems more than I want to get into.”
So his customers will have to find other milk, or just wait a few months.
Is Steve being pragmatic, or naïve? Only time will tell for sure. Some of the New York farmers who have gotten into trouble over highly questionable listeria findings in their milk would probably think he’s being naïve.
One thing that is clear, though, is that regulators around the country are clamping down, coming after smaller farms, rule books in hand, demanding compliance with all regulations, whether it be for pasteurization or slaughtering meat or registering under the National Animal Identification System (NAIS). The days of informal arrangements between farmers and customers may be gradually drawing to a close.
***
I’d just like to add something to the discussion on my previous posting about the comparison between laws regulating seat belts and food.
A lawyer once explained to me that in the legal scheme of things, driving is “a privilege.” There is no constitutional or other legal guarantee of a right to drive a car. Thus, the government can issue or withdraw the privilege at its whim. From that perspective, seat belt laws become just another condition of receiving the privilege (in addition to maintaining inspection standards, driving safely, etc.)
I don’t think the “promote the general welfare” clause of the Constitution’s preamble is meant to supersede the subsequent contract clause I discussed. More likely “public safety” will be a key factor in the coming legal tests. As the “buy-direct” movement gathers steam, the argument for safety may unofrtunately carry more weight in the minds of legislators and judges, ever mindful of being blamed for not doing enough, despite what consumers themselves want.
Reader Comments (12)
But food is different—it’s a flash point for concerns about freedom, causing them to draw a line in the sand over government dictates and business bullying. (Why else would Steve Atkinson’s customers be angry despite the fact that Steve’s plan still provides them with the product they want?) I have high hopes that food freedom will become a lever that the grass roots uses to turn this trend around. I appreciate Steve’s position, and in fact believe that, at least in the short run, compliance is the safest route for him and his family. But it’s just that sort of compliance that feeds the bureaucrats, and strengthens the devil of third-party control of our lives.
A friend yesterday shook his head over the avalanche of civil lawsuits that have become an identifying mark of American life. “What happened to just apologizing?” He asked. Well, the answer is that systems cannot provide real human relationships, so their apologies cannot be trusted—they will never be more than paper (as is true, for that matter, of everything a system “says”). We must restore relationships if we are to become human again. Reinstituting local economies, local control, and face-to-face meetings with consumers and producers is a great way to get there. Promoting farmer-consumer relationships is a great way to get started. Relying on, or God help us, encouraging, distant third parties to certify, direct, and control, is 180 degrees in the wrong direction.
Anna…..I hope you and your family are O.K.
Mary
And my heart goes out to all the people in San Diego County that have lost their homes, or been evacuated. I lived in Poway for 10 years, and we never had any fires remotely as bad as the ones that are now raging.
Food is power. We use it to change behavior. Some may call it bribery, we do not apologize.
Cathrine Bertini UN World Food Program Executive Director and former US Assistant Ag. Secretary
In a letter to Capt. Bernard Acworth in 1951 C.S. Lewis states, “What inclines me now to think you may be right in regarding [evolution] as the central and radical lie in the whole web of falsehood that now governs our lives is not so much your arguments against it as the fanatical and twisted attitudes of its defenders”.
In research for a letter I wrote two years ago I came upon a website entitled Stormfront.org with its logo “White Pride, World Wide”. On this website they had an article entitled, “The Four Major Values Lacking in Western Governments” with the third value stating in part, “We should practice a Darwinistic philosophy that embraces Quality over equality, fitness over weakness. Inequality is an iron law of nature. We therefore have two enemies – Christianity and egalitarianism...”
The Social Darwinian eugenics movement, especially its crude ‘survival of the fittest’ belief, contradicts the egalitarian ideal that ‘all people are created equal,’ this includes Christianity which holds to the same ideal yet espouses to a higher moral standard.
Are western Governments and the people that elect them indeed lacking in the above mentioned values???
The above website’s logic is not as uncommon as one would think in our increasingly self centered society and is the bases for the growing acceptance of abortion, euthanasia, cloning and mandated vaccination programs where vulnerable children and adults are knowingly sacrificed to permanent disability or death, for the so called “greater good”.
The utilitarian rational is a self righteous ideology that has little respect for individual freedom and is therefore fundamentally and ethically corrupt. Only God is capable of promoting a greater good. Humans due to their innate egocentric nature have a tendency to cause more harm then good and the wisdom required for just and compassionate law making is buried amongst all the petty laws and regulations that serve to enslave mankind.
In 1998 Darwin Day Keynote Address entitled “Evolution: Free will and punishment and meaning in life” William B. Provine ,Professor of Biological Sciences at Cornell University states, "Naturalistic evolution has clear consequences that Charles Darwin understood perfectly. 1) No gods worth having exist; 2) no life after death exists; 3) no ultimate foundation for ethics exists; 4) no ultimate meaning in life exists; and 5) human free will is nonexistent.”
The dignity of a person is grounded in the fact that each individual has been granted a free will. Our failure to respect this fact whether one believes in God or not will allow extreme ideologies (religious and secular) to gradually creep in and what appears extreme today may not be so apparent tomorrow.
With respect to constitutions, they are being legally manipulated into disarray and have become increasingly irrelevant in the minds of many, hence an erosion of faith and a lack of participation in the democratic process. One can only hope that wisdom will prevail.
Ken Conrad
I had a laugh when I spoke to my mother yesterday. She said my aunt figured even in evacuation I had grabbed my organic egg supply on the way out and was serving them up to everyone for breakfast. Yup!!! I even brought the raw milk and butter.
Oh the life in Southern California: fires, earthquakes and droughts.
Missouri Statute # 196.935 guarantees that “a person may buy and have delivered for his own use raw milk or cream from a farm.”
The Atkinson’s are the third family to be told, in 2007, that they should not sell the ungraded raw milk to which MO citizens are entitled, by law. The first family was warned in June 2007, the second in early October 2007, and now, late October 2007.
The Missouri Milk Board’s position is that the raw milk referred to in the statute is actually supposed to be graded milk produced under regulation (rules and directives). Read the law and see for yourself.
www.moga.state.mo.us/statutes/c100-199/1960935.htm
Alternately, the Missouri Milk Board claims that all raw milk which is not graded is considered Manufacturing Grade milk to be sold to processors such as cheese factories. This doesn’t make sense, since the citizens who are entitled to buy – for their own use- their raw milk and cream from the farm, aren’t manufacturers.
www.moga.mo.gov/statutes/C100-199/1960000931.HTM
In addition, the Missouri Milk Board refers to two non-binding Attorney General Opinions in setting it’s policies. Neither of these opinions denies a citizen’s right to buy ungraded raw milk or cream from a farm – in fact one clearly reinforces that right. Neither opinion even implies that “raw milk or cream from a farm” should or must be graded. One opinion states that graded milk must be produced under regulations. Nothing wrong with that. The other opinion holds that although citizens may buy and have delivered raw milk or cream from the farm premises where it originated, the farmer may not distribute from a separate location such as a farmers market.
www.ago.mo.gov/opinions/1973/113-73.htm
www.ago.mo.gov/opinions/1975/114-75.htm
In all cases the basic legal principle is that a statute controls or holds sway over any regulations. If the Missouri Milk Board has promulgated regulations which contradict the statute, the statute is what citizens and enforcement agencies are supposed to follow. The statute is the law, voted on by the elected officials of the legislature and signed by the governor. The Milk Board is overstepping its authority when it tries to obstruct legal commerce and by denying citizens the right to follow their law.
The Missouri Milk Board has no policing power, but can refer a case to the County Prosecutor (via the County Health Department), or to the Attorney General, either of whom may bring charges of misdemeanor.
WE COULD USE a new non-binding Attorney General’s Opinion. This is posed in a question format (which must be asked by someone of significance such as a legislator), and is answered by the Attorney General. The question to be asked should be, “In Statute 196.935, are Missouri citizens entitled to buy and have delivered for their own use, ungraded raw milk and cream directly from a farm?”
The Atkinson’s have worked hard towards obtaining their Grade A standard, and have almost completed the requirements. It is unfortunate indeed that the Missouri Milk Board claims that in the meantime, their customers must be denied their legal supply of ungraded raw milk.