PBCCG (Peach Bottom Concerned Citizens Group) of Peach Bottom Township, Pennsylvania, wishes to firstly say thank you for this fabulous website. I hope our testimonial will encourage another community being threatened by the introduction of a factory farm to contact you for help.
Three years ago, someone in our community applied for a permit for a 4400 head swine CAFO. Three thousand residents live within a mile of the proposed factory. I didn’t know what a confined animal feeding operation was. I went to a meeting. I did some research and was horrified. What I learned changed my life forever.
Agribusiness is a wealthy powerful corporate machine with political clout that outweigh the money as well as the political experience of small rural communities. The scales are tipped in their favor by well lobbied politicians and the failure of state agencies whose job it is to protect us.
In communities, often the people elected to protect us have ties with agribusiness or the applicant. In our case, the applicant is lifelong friends with all three of our supervisors and the solicitor. They even voted to forgive thousands of dollars of fees for the applicant against our Municipal Planning Code. The supervisors voted to pass them on to us the taxpayers.
The citizens are often portrayed as move-ins who are against farming. This is not the case. We are against industry destroying our health, environment, property values, and quality of life. We want family farmers that are good stewards and care about the communities they live in and their neighbors.
The battle is overwhelming. Your normal life is now a kitchen table with stacks of studies and endless hours researching. Then naively you attend a zoning meeting thinking this will be over tonight as soon as the zoning hearing board sees the research . . . the incredible threats to health, water, air, property values, and quality of life . . . especially after the board hears the testimony of the medical expert. WRONG!!!
I will never forget lying on my bed exhausted from despair and emotionally drained. We needed help in this David and Goliath battle. After three years, our fate rested on one ordinance change. It would be voted on by our “Good Old Boy “supervisors that night. That would decide our community’s fate. We were aware that facts and common sense don’t count for much in this unjust battle. We needed a room full of media, opposed citizens and the dreaded stories of communities already impacted by CAFOs. We had to force our “all too willing” supervisors’ hand to protect us.
This is where Speer Law Firm came in. Charlie Speer drafted a letter for us to present to our supervisors. It was a letter of intent to sue our township by the citizenry. The letter was powerful and direct and advised our supervisors in no uncertain terms that if they weakened or changed our ordinance to allow this CAFO to be constructed, Speer Law Firm would bring suit against our township. The letter Charlie Speer had provided would be handed to our supervisors that night, giving them no time to strategize. The supervisors would have to make an immediate decision.
I will never forget when our supervisors left the room for a private discussion with the township solicitor to decide our fate. When they got up from the table, one of our supervisors had Charlie Speer’s letter in hand. I knew it would be the deciding factor. The letter was an important instrument which forced our supervisors to make the proper decision to protect our community. Bottom line, I am convinced that without the letter that was drawn up by Speer Law Firm, our new neighbors would now be a 4400 head swine CAFO. I have learned that if
one CAFO comes in, ten more will follow.
Our community is forever grateful to Charlie Speer for keeping the floodgate closed. We could not have done it without you.
I wish I could say, it is finally all over. The applicant has now dropped his animal numbers below what the state considers a CAFO and is applying for 2450 head swine factory. We are still fighting. We are also helping educate others. We know though we are in a much better situation now, that the 4400 head swine CAFO was denied.
Charlie Speer we may be calling Speer Law Firm again. Thank you for your dedication.
Eternally grateful,
maria payan
PBCCG
