Lawsuit challenges state CAFO law
Boards from two Missouri counties have joined with a group of landowners in asking a judge to put a hold on a state law limiting counties’ power to enact health ordinances regulating large livestock farms.
The law, which the Missouri General Assembly approved in its last session, goes into effect Aug. 28. Senate Bill 391 prohibits local governments from imposing regulations on agricultural operations that are more stringent that state rules.
The Cedar County Commission and the Callaway County Public Health Center board joined with the landowner group Friends of Responsible Agriculture and three individual landowners in filing the suit Monday in Cole County. The lawsuit, which names Gov. Mike Parson and the chairs of the state’s Clean Water and Air Conservation commissions, seeks a temporary restraining order or injunction against the law taking effect.
In the suit they allege the Missouri Constitution gives local governments the power to enact regulations to meet the needs and address concerns of individual counties and that the so-called Right to Farm amendment voters approved in 2014 reinforces those rights.
The group bringing the suit also alleges the new law does not apply because the local ordinances deal with soil type and air emissions standards, which are not part of the state regulatory structure for large livestock operations known as concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs.
Friends of Responsible Agriculture and one of the property owners bringing the lawsuit, Jeff Jones, were part of a failed effort to stop a large hog farm from setting up shop in western Callaway County. The Cooper County health center board approved an ordinance there after news that the Tipton East CAFO would set up in that county. The state law, if allowed to take effect, would effectively kill those regulations.
Two plaintiffs in the current lawsuit own property near the Tipton East farm.
No dates have been set in the case.
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