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Pulling back the curtains on wage-theft enforcement in MN; Trump's latest attack is on RFK, Jr; NM LGBTQ+ equality group endorses 2024 'Rock Star' candidates; Michigan's youth justice reforms: Expanded diversion, no fees.

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Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg says rebuilding Baltimore's Key Bridge will be challenging and expensive. An Alabama Democrat flips a state legislature seat and former Connecticut senator Joe Lieberman dies at 82.

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Historic wildfires could create housing and health issues for rural Texans, a Kentucky program helps prison parolees start a new life, and descendants of Nicodemus, Kansas celebrate the Black settlers who journeyed across the 1870s plains seeking self-governance.

Farm Bill Progress Still Stalled in Washington

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Friday, March 29, 2013   

YANKTON, S.D. – Progress on a new five year Farm Bill is still stuck in Washington, but a budget bill passed by the Senate last week might help provide a way forward.

The last Farm Bill expired in the fall, but was temporarily extended by Congress.

Chuck Hassebrook, executive director of the Center for Rural Affairs, says with more cuts on the horizon, timing of the Farm Bill is critical.

"One way a Farm Bill can happen is in the context of the budget,” he says. “And in the budget the central issue is this – whether we cut in ways that do the least damage to rural America or perhaps even help rural America, or whether we cut in the most critical investments in the future of rural America."

Hassebrook says investments need to be made in rural development, beginning farmer programs and conservation to help rural areas.

He says too many of the dollars in the Farm Bill are directed to crop insurance for the largest farms.

"We've gone through several rounds of budget cuts already and still Congress is providing unlimited crop insurance premium subsidies to the nation's largest farms,” he says. “If one corporation farmed your entire state, the federal government would pay 60 percent of its crop insurance premiums on every acre, every year."

Hassebrook adds that in a time of tight budgets, it is more important than ever to change the priorities of Farm Bill spending.

"I don't know anybody who believes that it’s more important to provide unlimited premium subsidies to mega farms than it is to invest in our future through beginning farmer programs, through small business development programs and through conservation programs to keep the land and water healthy for future generations."





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