AFTON — Kim Swango breathed a sigh of relief last week when she learned the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture Food and Forestry suspended permits for new and expanding broiler chicken farms in Oklahoma, but her breath was taken away again soon thereafter.
A set of six new houses is going up a quarter-mile from her house south of Miami.
“We’d been trying to figure out what to do and then they announced the suspension and we thought we got lucky. I was thrilled to death,” she said. “Then they posted it a couple days later that it was approved on Oct. 8, the day before the announcement. I couldn’t believe it.”
Swango and several of her neighbors organized a meeting that drew 40 people to the Northeast Technology Afton Campus just about three miles from where the farm will be built. They voiced concerns, learned from others in eastern Oklahoma with similar issues, and agreed to join together and become more “squeaky wheels” telling state and local governments that action is needed.
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Brandy Whaler of Green Country Guardians read a statement from Secretary of Agriculture Jim Reese at the meeting that explained the Ottawa County farm application was one of few on his desk the day before the announcement, that the application was legal and in order, and that he had no option other than to make it one of the last approved before the suspension.
The 80-acre parcel at the focus of the recent meeting is across an unimproved, dead-end section of County Road 170 that fronts historic Route 66 south of Miami just a few miles north of the Interstate 44 intersection.
Residents say it’s a bad place for such a farm because it is on higher ground where heavy rains drain off to neighboring properties — and eventually to the Neosho River and Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees — and that it’s a stone’s throw from the Tar Creek Superfund Site, is on a tourist route, and is within three-quarters of a mile of eight family homes.
The community meeting earlier this month comes as the Guardians, a citizen effort centered primarily in Delaware County, changed its name and continued to broaden its scope, and the state of Oklahoma and Cherokee Nation officials continue to work on a coordinating council — with agencies, poultry industry and residential parties represented — to search for ways to help the industry grow while addressing community concerns about air and water quality, roads and property values.
The 800-member Spring Creek Guardians announced they have a new webpage and Facebook identity as Green Country Guardians to reflect their broader reach.
Mike Shambaugh, a Cherokee Nation councilor and member of the Coordinating Council, gave Ottawa County residents a rundown on efforts underway after a recent influx of poultry houses connected with a new expanded Simmons Foods poultry processing facility planned for nearby Benton County, Arkansas.
“Basically, Arkansas saw this coming and they had rules in place to better control it,” Shambaugh said. “We didn’t see it coming for whatever reason and Oklahoma really doesn’t have that many regulations in place, so that’s where we are.”
He urged the residents to follow the lead of others to become involved and to contact politicians and state agencies with their concerns.
“I’m not against farming or agriculture and I’m not against someone trying to make a living,” Swango said. “I like KFC as well as the next guy, but I don’t like the idea of these farms — and they are commercial operations, even if they say they aren’t — and them just coming in and building right next to people’s homes.”
The people who purchased the parcel plan to live on it as well, and it is just 1.5 miles west from another 10-house poultry farm that has been in place more than 10 years, according to Mike Schulte, who’s home and Rocking S Tack Shop is directly adjacent to the property.
Schulte said the older chicken farm is hidden from view and the nearest residence is more than a half a mile from it, so it was much less of an issue. Now the two houses together with a gravel road between them will cause more problems.
“It’s kind of down in the holler,” he said. “It’s not right on top of people. That’s what we’re talking about, mostly. We’re not against them, but where are you building it?
“People from all over the world stop here when they’re traveling,” Schulte said. “What are we going to do, put chicken houses all up and down a historic tourist destination?”
Heavy equipment is lined up on the next-door property, ready to start leveling ground about 100 yards northwest from his front door.
The Schulte family has owned about 200 acres on the west side of the highway for many years. The dead-end section of County Road 170 next to his home is a two-track that runs about a half mile west. The road ends before it reaches a set of railroad tracks. The family has kept it passable to get their farm trucks and tractors over it to tend crops and cattle.
“When it washes out over the culvert we’ll bring in the front-end loader and patch it up good enough to get across, but I don’t know how they’re going to get trucks for a chicken farm down it. I know I’m not going to be fixing it up,” he said.
Ottawa County commissioners at Tuesday’s meeting said emphatically that the county would not be upgrading the road.
“I heard what they said but they’ll end up doing it, you watch,” Schulte said.
Immediately across Route 66, Krista Oakley walked with her horses in a dew-soaked pasture behind her home where the property has a pond. She pointed uphill to the spot where the chicken houses will be and explained her water concerns.
“All the rain water flows off that hill down here and it can get pretty deep in this pasture,” she said. “I know what they say about how they deal with the litter, but you can’t tell me nothing gets on the ground and that it won’t be washing down here and collecting in my pasture. I’m worried about my horses. I’m worried about my kids coming down to play in the pond.
“We bought our place here 18 years ago and we agreed to certain things we wouldn’t do. When we built our barn we talked to our neighbor about if it would block his view in that spot and if it was OK. We’re just asking for some consideration here,” she said.
