Dozens of Iowa residents, lawmakers and environmental groups want the state s natural resources director to review a decision to allow a cattle feedlot near an environmentally sensitive creek in northeast Iowa.
Along with 47 state lawmakers, residents and groups representing environmental, fishing, water quality and outdoor interests filed the request Tuesday. They are mostly from Iowa, but also include interests from Kansas, Missouri, Minnesota, Nebraska and Wisconsin.
They want Kayla Lyon, director of the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, to order a departmental evaluation of the Supreme Beef project, an 11,600-head open lot cattle feeding operation near the headwaters of Bloody Run Creek in Clayton County.
The aftermath of a forested area in Linn County from the August 10 derecho.
State lawmakers say they won’t advance a bill that would have rolled back a tax exemption for privately-owned forest reserves, though concerns persist that some landowners are taking advantage of the century-old program.
Chair of the Ways and Means Committee, Sen. Dan Dawson, R-Council Bluffs, said during a subcommittee meeting Monday that he doesn’t want to move the bill forward at this point but had called the meeting in order to gather public input on the issue.
Similar proposals have been introduced in past years, with proponents arguing that the tax exemption unfairly burdens other landowners and that certain bad actors are reaping the tax benefits without adequately protecting their woodlands, and avoiding enforcement.