By State Rep. Lundy Kiger
After good faith attempts by local people and state legislators meeting and talking directly with officials of OK Foods, the specific issue is the company approving the concentration of 56 large industrial farm complexes (individual barns approximately 56′ wide x 550′ long) being developed near Cameron, Oklahoma, and a nearby housing addition. OK Foods said they are meeting the state’s setback rules and all regulations and stated they would not make any adjustments in the locations of any of the new mega farms being developed.
The Cameron group is now turning their attention to any and all possible options in stopping the building and concentration of all 56 poultry house near their town. I’ve toured part the part of town that’s closest to the eight existing houses located south of new State Highway 112 on the northwest end of the community. The people I spoke with confirmed strong odors coming from the eight new poultry houses while others talked about their existing health issues and concerns, increased complications, and the difficulties each of them are having from the farms being located so close to town.
With eight additional mega barns being constructed on Red Barn Road and becoming operational near the southeast area of town, people living in that area are now receiving the same results of strong odors from the barns. Strong odors are resulting in many people not able to go outside for family get-togethers or having lunch on their back porches or decks because of the smell. Officials from OK Foods said the new houses don’t smell, but all of the people I talked with, including people associated with the public school, said the odor is terrible and makes it hard to even enjoy watching their kids playing ball and being outside.
With another 40 mega houses scheduled to be built close to Cameron, this will cause more concerns related to odor and health issues from dust entering the population and the local school that will affect more people, especially those with existing breathing issues. In addition to the nuisance of odors, the area is now seeing reductions in their property values and some property sales being ended because so many poultry houses being concentrated in one small area.
Other concerns from county commissioners and many other city leaders are air and water quality changes, health issues from the dust coming from fans in the barns, and existing new road infrastructure being destroyed. A group from Cameron has started meeting with every city council in the county to explain that if it happens in Cameron it can happen near any city. The attempt is to help spread the word to more people in being aware of what’s happening to the people in Cameron.
The group also started a Facebook site with a survey for anyone opposed to the large concentration of barns being built near Cameron for people to add their name. The group now has over 2,000 signatures from people who own houses or property in the area. The Facebook site is Protect Our Homes and Save Our Neighborhood.
We asked OK Foods to work with us to make adjustments in the locations and size of these new farms, and we were basically told, No. OK Foods went on to say that if we want the laws and rules changed then go make the changes.
So, Sen. Mark Allen and I are working with the community of Cameron to do just that. The state has no rules on how many barns or a different setback for poultry farms being located near a community or housing addition. Both of us lawmakers plan to introduce legislation to add new regulations to be considered that would benefit all communities in this type of situation.
The senator and I will continue meeting with the Cameron group as well as with other leaders in the county to try and stop the remaining 40 houses from being built. If OK Foods doesn’t care enough about the concerns and health of this community, then all options will be used in educating the people of their rights and taking action to fight back against OK Foods. We hope at some point soon the company will see that doing the right thing is the best option in this specific situation.
We hate that it’s come to this point, and each of us supports the poultry industry and OK Foods. But we are totally disappointed and against the concentration of so many large barns being built in this community. We hope OK Foods will see what’s right and start acting like the good corporate citizen they should be in our county.
We are going to do exactly what OK Foods told us to do, and until OK Foods makes the decision to do the right thing, we will work with all state and county officials in making the changes necessary to shut down all 56 of these new mega farms and show OK Foods that the people can’t be run over and their lives ruined just so a corporation can make a dollar.
An announcement and schedule will soon be made directly to the people in Cameron as we’ll start collecting individual histories and health issues that people are having due to the new poultry farms. After the documentation is received, we will decide the next steps in trying to kill all 56 of these mega houses near Cameron.
These aren’t the small local family farms that we’ve seen over the past 50 years in the county. Our local farms have helped make OK Foods a bigger company. The new farms being developed are from out of state investors with a lot of cash to build these farms and very little of the money spent and made will impact our local area. But these new larger farms will definitely impact the bottom line of OK Foods.
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