When the last grocery store in Shoals, Indiana, closed, locals pitched in to start their own

In many rural communities, the only grocery mainstay is a Dollar General. Shoals, Indiana, has been on that list for a year since its last remaining grocery store, JayC, closed. Its 670 residents had begun to "fill the gaps" with limited Dollar General inventory, reported Laura Lane for The Daily Yonder. But one resident aims to change that by opening a locally-owned and operated grocery store in the near future.

Lane reports that Kroger, the parent company of JayC, cited a desire to operate more efficiently as the reason for closing the store, but residents say they were not given notice about the closure until “the last minute.”

Ever since, some residents had to “travel 25 miles to Washington or Bedford, cities with big grocery stores and Walmart Supercenters.” Others cannot drive or order a driving service because those don’t exist in Shoals. 

The Dollar General half a mile east of town carries “processed meats like hot dogs, frozen items, milk and cheese, canned goods, and they have limited produce,” a Shoals resident told Lane. “You can get by, but it’s kind of pricey.”

To combat Shoal’s new food desert, Todd Baker, owner of Bo-Mac’s drive-in restaurant on the town’s eastern edge, set up a “Grocery Grab” in the parking lot of his restaurant every Tuesday evening for 12 weeks. 

"Vendors sold Amish-grown produce, local meats, Prairie Farms dairy products and fresh-baked sourdough bread. People came and stocked up." With the popularity of the parking-lot grocery, Baker and local officials are now collaborating to discuss the possibility of opening a small grocery store.

Indiana creates nation’s first utility to provide electricity only to data centers; reaction is mixed among stakeholders

   

Power grids across rural America are facing the challenge
of serving data centers. (Andrew Metelev via Unsplash)

Rural Northwest Indiana has given the nod to what some think may be a solution to the power generation problem associated with data centers — a dedicated utility provider. Circle of Blue reports via RuralNewsNetwork.org that the idea is to “simultaneously protect ratepayers while continuing to embrace the industry’s growth.”

Christian Thorsberg writes about the boom of data centers in the region, “where nearly a dozen hyperscale data centers are planned, under construction or already operating.” Reaction to the first-of-its-kind utility has been mixed.

The region’s largest power producer, and the one with the highest rates, announced two years ago that because of inquiries from data center projects its power load was likely to quadruple over the next decade. That led to the company’s idea of creating a subsidiary to serve only data centers. Thorsberg explains that the proposal “was drawn up to shield regular ratepayers from extra costs of adding mega-users … to [the] network.” The subsidiary “would generate and sell electricity” wholesale to the parent company, “its only customer,” which would then sell it to data centers. “The buffer for resident’s rates would come from the mathematical accounting of these transactions, which in theory would remain separate from household bills.”

The plan received unanimous regulatory commission approval last fall, and it included exemptions for the subsidiary that speeds up the process. For example, the regulatory commission “does not need to approve all aspects of financing for projects,” and the subsidiary can “pick and choose” its customers.

The region appears to be bracing itself for the impact of this plan. Critics and experts are expressing concern about the effect on the environment, the grid’s efficiency, and whether the network can support the volume of electricity expected. “I’m not against the business model,” Jaoa Ferreira, acting director of the Center for Economic and Policy Studies at the University of Virginia, told Thorsberg. “One important thing for me is that this actually results in adding production to the grid, and not just splitting electricity from everyone else to just satisfy data centers.”

 

Early antiwar activist dies in obscurity, and the national paper of record runs an obit 7 years later

Don Duncan made this liberal magazine's cover.

The obituary in The Madison Courier in Southern Indiana about a 79-year-old man who had died in a local nursing home was nothing special, other than noting his sister (actually a stepsister) was Mitzi Gaynor, not otherwise identified. It also did not mention that he had returned from a tour as a Green Beret sergeant in Vietnam and quit the Army to become "one of the war's fiercest critics, well before the antiwar movement had gathered steam," reports William McDonald of The New York Times.

McDonald is the Times obituary editor. His story ran last week. The obituary of Donald W. Duncan had appeared in 2009, unbeknownst to the Times, which a few years later started to prepare an obit on him because he "made an appreciable impact on the national discussion of the war," McDonald wrote.

When the Times discovered that Duncan's death had been reported, it had a decision to make. "If another news organization, particularly one with national reach, had run an obituary in 2009, we would have stood down, acknowledging that we had been napping back then and that it was way too late now to make up for the lapse," McDonald wrote. "A competitive daily newspaper isn’t keen on reporting something that happened seven years ago. Unless, of course, virtually no one else had reported it. We decided to pursue the obituary, the seven years notwithstanding. The thinking was, we would have written about Mr. Duncan immediately after he died had we known, so we should apply the same standard now. His death, in a sense, was still news, and his story still deserved to be told. What’s more, in an odd way, the very obscurity of his death added an unexpected, even poignant, element."

The Times obit by Robert McFadden said Duncan "died in the obscurity of a small Midwestern town seven years ago, an all-but-forgotten soldier. He was 79. In an age of seeming information ubiquity, the news media will generally recall the lives of noteworthy people when they die. But Mr. Duncan’s death went largely unnoticed outside of Madison, Ind., the Ohio River town where he lived."

Indiana might eliminate energy-efficiency program

As governor of Indiana, Mitch Daniels initiated a clean-energy program that environmentalists saw as a method to reduce costs and clean the air, but yesterday the state House passed a bill to end the program. The program forced electricity customers to pay a fee each month to fund energy-efficiency programs. "Since 2012, the state has used the funds to conduct energy audits and weatherization programs and to provide energy-saving light bulbs and other energy-saving programs," John Russell writes for The Indianapolis Star. The bill would also prevent the state from making utilities achieve particular efficiency goals.

Environmentalists said the program conserved enough energy every year to provide power for 64,000 homes, but critics called it executive overreach because the legislature didn't approve it and because it costs several extra dollars per month for homeowners but even more for big companies that use a lot of energy. The measure to end the program was an amendment to a Senate bill, which will go back to the Senate for consideration. (Read more)

Data show each county's number of uninsured, how many would benefit from Medicaid expansion

The U.S. Census Bureau released data this week showing 2010 estimates of health insurance coverage for all 50 states and each of the nation’s counties. The data are exactly what journalists need to do their own stories about the problem of the uninsured and the potential impact of Medicaid expansion under federal health reform.

The Census Bureau press release has a link to the map above and to a list of every U.S. county with estimates of the number of people who would be covered if Medicaid were expanded to 138 percent of the poverty level.

Laura Ungar of The Courier-Journal in Louisville used the data to show what parts of Kentucky and Indiana have the most uninsured and which would benefit most from Medicaid expansion. The greatest area of need in Kentucky was in the state's south-central region which is part of Appalachia but has no coal. Ronald Wright, judge-executive in Casey County told Ungar that his hilly county depends largely on industries such as timbering and farming, and many residents don’t have employer-sponsored health coverage. “I don’t know how we correct it,” Wright said. “Most people just can’t afford (insurance). It’s getting so expensive.” He said the uninsured often seek care in emergency rooms that can’t turn them away or at the local health department, which “is always busy.” (Read more)

Shooting of dog in rural Indiana puts neighbor against neighbor

Two neighbors in rural Indiana are reacting to the shooting death of a champion labrador retriever. They agree what happened -- Tony Williams shot the dog -- but the fallout for the two men is very different.

Nick Werner reports for The Star Press that since the shooting, Williams has received death threats and hate mail. Williams told police that the dog, named Moose, was behaving agressively. The owner of the dog, Jimmy Jessie, said the dog accidentally got out of their yard and wandered to his neighbor's farm. Williams and his wife, Pam, told Werner that the reaction to the shooting has left them prisoners in their own farmhouse. Users of the online social media website Facebook created at least three related pages, including "Tony Williams of Spiceland is a JERK!!!!!," which has 320 members. The Williamses disconnected their old phone number after they said they received 30 threatening calls, and the couple showed The Star Press hate mail from St. Paul, Minn., advocating that Tony Williams suffer the same fate as the dog did.

Sheriff Butch Baker said these kinds of shootings are not unusual. "We have these all the time," he said. "They are not uncommon occurrences." Baker's own St. Bernard, which had a history of leaving the sheriff's property, was shot by a neighbor two years ago, writes Werner. In the three weeks since Moose died, two other dogs in Henry County have been shot and killed by a neighbor with no fanfare. The sheriff could not recall a case in which anyone had been prosecuted for shooting a dog on his property. (Read more)

Hoosier cougars are spotted in the Indiana hills

The Indiana Department of Natural Resources office at Prophetstown State Park, near Battle Ground, Ind., has been adding to its database of cougar sightings, reports Bob Scott for the Journal and Courier. One hundred seventeen sightings have been reported since the database began last year. Only one of those cats was photographed, last May near rural Bloomfield in southern Indiana. (Photo above,  Indiana Department of Natural Resources)

 Rick Peercy, a DNR wildlife biologist, said the cougars are probably former pets who escaped or were intentionally released. Citizens can own cougars, a protected species in Indiana, if they get the proper permits. "A big cat is a lot of work. There is a big veterinary bill," he said. Scott Johnson, a DNR nongame mammal biologist, said to Scott, "There certainly is evidence that the (mountain) lions are expanding their range from the western areas into the Plains. ... They are young males that can travel a great distance." (Read more)

Ministers flout law that requires non-profit groups to avoid supporting candidates to stay tax-exempt

At least implicitly, a reported 32 ministers across the country backed Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona for president yesterday, "hoping to generate a legal battle that will prompt federal courts to throw out a 54-year-old ban on political endorsements by tax-exempt houses of worship," reports Peter Slevin of the Midwest Bureau of The Washington Post. "The ministers contend they have a constitutional right to advise their worshipers how to vote."

In Crown Point, Ind., the Rev. Ron Johnson Jr., left, showed slides giving some positions of McCain and Sen. Barack Obama and said members choosing the Illinois Democrat would have "severe moral schizophrenia," but he "stopped short of endorsing" McCain, Slevin reports. The Arizona-based Alliance Defense Fund, which organized the effort, said 31 other pastors participated. (Photo by Peter Slevin)

"Their opponents contend that the tax laws are essential to protect the separation of church and state," Slevin writes. "They say political speech should not be supported by a tax break for the churches or the worshipers who are contributing to a political cause." The 1954 law says that to remain exempt from federal income taxes, non-profit organizations may not "participate in, or intervene in . . . any political campaign on behalf of any candidate for public office."

For our Saturday posting on this, click here.

UPDATE, Sept. 30: Conservative syndicated columnist Cal Thomas responded to the effort, saying that politicized sermons are a poor substitute for what worship is intended to be. He writes, "Churches and ministers would do better to keep their attention focused on things above, rather than the things below, because politics can be the ultimate temptation and pollute a far superior and life-changing message."

Movie about small-town teens keeps getting buzz

A documentary about five high-school seniors in a small Indiana town, which created a stir at the Sundance Film Festival last winter, is again getting favorable attention. The Web site of Mother Jones magazine has a review of "American Teen," produced in Warsaw, a town of 12,000 in Kosciusko County, pop. 50,000, between Fort Wayne and South Bend.

"Though they fill somewhat stereotypical roles, the teens most likely weren’t exaggerating for the camera—film crews followed about 15 kids for the whole year, and the chosen five didn’t know they were the stars until the night before the premiere," write Kiera Butler, Casey Miner and Gary Moskowitz, who attended a sneak preview last night and "couldn't shut up about it." David Slone of the Times-Union in Warsaw wrote in January that four students were featured, but the final "cut" apparently added one; the movie poster (above) shows five.

Miner writes that director Nanette Burstein appeared to give the students "a lot of personal attention. None of their parents seemed really emotionally supportive. Often their friends were unavailable, and the teachers and counselors at school were horrifying. To have a sympathetic adult who's literally made it her job to care about every tiny event that happens in your life—that has to make a difference." (Read more) The movie is scheduled for release early next month.

Indiana village's dream of energy self-sufficient BioTown founders on lack of private capital

In 2005, Reynolds, Ind., set out to become BioTown USA, a community powered solely by renewable energy. The big project drew plenty of attention — Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young even came to perform — as well as early support from BP, General Motors, and VeraSun Energy, but a lack of private capital is stalling progress, reports Tom Murphy of The Associated Press. "Money problems, leadership changes and other obstacles have fed skepticism about whether Reynolds will ever succeed at moving the state, much less the nation, toward homegrown energy and away from foreign oil," he writes.

The original plans to transform the town of 550 have been delayed, since the private capital state officials were counting on has failed to materialize. A lack of investors has halted startup firm Rose Energy Discovery's plans for building a facility to convert biomass into energy. At the same time, VeraSun has stopped construction of its ethanol plant as a result of rising corn prices and falling ethanol prices. The AP photo shows a symbol of the stalled plans: some of the 5,000 bales of corn stover which have sat unused for months, since the gasifier they were meant to feed has never been installed.

Despite the setbacks, officials have hope for Reynolds. After all, Juhnde, Germany, the model for BioTown USA, needed eight years to produce its own energy. A new technology developer, Energy Systems Group, has pledged to spend $10 million on a digester, and hopes to be producing power by the end of the year. "What we try to remind folks all the time is that this project, there's no manual that you pull out and say, 'How do you do a BioTown?' " Indiana Agriculture Director Andy Miller told Murphy. "We're kind of inventing it as we go."(Read more)

Clinton, Obama even in Indiana, a 30% rural state

Two weeks ago we reported that Hillary and Bill Clinton were turning Indiana, which many pundits had presumed to be a Barack Obama state, into a pivotal battleground in the Democratic race for president. Now a poll confirms it: Clinton 49 percent, Obama 46 percent, with an error margin of 5 percentage points for each result.

The May 6 Indiana primary "is anybody’s ball game right now, said Del Ali of the Rockville, Md.-based Research 2000, which conducted the poll," writes Ed Ronco of the South Bend Tribune, a poll sponsor. "The winner, Ali said, will depend on a variety of factors, including the candidates’ abilities to hold on to certain demographic groups."

Stories on the poll offered no intelligence on Indiana's rural voters, who comprise about 30 percent of the state's electorate. But rural voters tend to be older, and among those over 60, Clinton led 60 percent to 34 percent. She had marginal, single-digit leads among those aged 30 to 59, while Obama led among younger voters, 63 percent to 36 percent.

"Some 39 percent of respondents said a candidate’s stand on the economy or job creation would most determine their vote," Ronco reports. "That’s followed by 22 percent who said they were most concerned about pulling troops out of Iraq," but Ali cautioned, “That Iraq number is so volatile.” He also questioned the result showing 22 percent of Clinton voters would support Republican John McCain if Obama were nominated, and 16 percent of Obama backers would choose McCain over Clinton. “I would be shocked if it was over 5 percent either way,” Ali said. “Those numbers display the passion that voters have for their candidate.” (Read more)

A Survey USA poll in Indiana, taken March 29-31, showed Clinton leading 52 percent to 43 percent, with an error margin of 4.3 percentage points for each result. Survey USA uses automated, recorded questions and telephone-pushbutton responses. (Read more)

Indiana looking more pivotal in primaries, perhaps latest signal of increasing rural influence

We reported last week that Hillary and Bill Clinton were turning Indiana into a presidential battleground with Barack Obama, and today Anne Kornblut of The Washington Post takes note. We think that is the latest signal that the role of rural voters in deciding the Democratic nominee will increase. But one major commentator thinks it's all but over.

"Wedged between Illinois, which is Sen. Barack Obama's home state, and Ohio, which Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton dominated on March 4, Indiana may be the one state remaining on the primary calendar where both candidates begin with a roughly equal chance of coming out ahead," Kornblut writes. "Obama has a home-field advantage, while Clinton has the backing of the popular Sen. Evan Bayh and may have an edge on the kind of economic issues that are likely to dominate the discussion before the state's Democrats vote on May 6."

Here's evidence that Indiana may be a pivotal state: "While both campaigns grudgingly admit that the race here is competitive, each is seeking to portray the other as starting with a lead in pursuit of Indiana's 72 pledged delegates," Kornblut writes. Then she make a tentative call: "But demographics and some of the state's similarities to Ohio, where Clinton won big on March 4, suggest that the senator from New York has a leg up. ... Clinton's alliance with Bayh, son of Indiana legend Birch Bayh, is already paying off." See our item from last week.

Indiana is "uniquely important," Kornblut writes, because it votes the same day as North Carolina, "where Obama is widely considered to have the advantage. If Clinton wins Pennsylvania, as expected, she hopes to ride that momentum into the remaining contests, including those in Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky and Puerto Rico. Losses in Indiana and North Carolina would quickly blunt any claim to momentum for her." Kornblut quotes chief Obama strategist David Axelrod, speaking Friday: "Pennsylvania is an uphill battle for us. West Virginia is an uphill battle for us. Kentucky is an uphill battle for us." But he added: "Indiana is going to be a real fight." (Read more) West Virginia votes May 13, Kentucky May 20.

Rural voters are becoming more important. Pennsylvania, which votes April 22, is about as rural as the nation -- 21 percent in the 2000 census. The states that follow are more rural: North Carolina, 40 percent (and the most rural residents of any state, 3.2 million); Indana, 29 percent (1.78 million); West Virginia, 54 percent (975,000); and Kentucky, 44 percent (1.79 million). Oregon, which also votes May 20, had 727,000 ruralites, 21 percent of its total.

It's logical to think the controversy over Obama's former pastor will make it harder for him to connect with rural voters (though we've seen no polling to show that), but David Books notes in The New York Times today that Obama has rebounded to the same slim lead he had over Clinton in national polls before the controversy exploded 10 days ago. Playing on the title of Obama's book, he says Clinton "possesses the audacity of hopelessness," has only a 5 percent chance of winning and should "cruise along at a lower register until North Carolina, then use that as an occasion to withdraw." (Read more) Brooks presumes Obama will maintain his lead in North Carolina; there have been no public polls in that state since his March 18 speech on race; one taken March 17 showed his lead down to 1 percentage point, statistically insignificant.

UPDATE, March 26: Conservative columnist Robert Novak sees hope for Clinton in the remaining schedule. He says Indiana is "leaning Clinton," and "The media presentation of this as a fair-fight, 50-50 state helps Clinton spin this." (Read more)

Bill Clinton dubs himself 'designated rural hit man'

After former President Bill Clinton wandered off the reservation with some inopportune comments in South Carolina, the presidential campaign of his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, started scheduling him more heavily in rural areas, where she usually does well and there is less national media attention. Yesterday, in Indiana's southeastern corner, he acknowledged his new role.

"I'm the designated rural hit man," the would-be First Gentleman told a crowd in Lawrenceburg, a town of 4,700 in the Cincinnati metro area, reports Pat Crowley of The Cincinnati Enquirer, who writes:

"I like to go to small-town America," said Clinton, who left here early Tuesday afternoon for campaign events in Richmond and Fort Wayne.

"I like to go out to the heartland of the country campaigning.

"It is places like this that are going to propel her to the Democratic nomination and ultimately to the presidency," he said, followed by a loud cheer.

Many in the crowd of 400 "waited 90 minutes in the rain to hear Clinton deliver a 40-minute stump speech for his wife," Crowley reports. (Read more) Crowd estimates are tricky. Bill Ruthhart of The Indianapolis Star, a sister Gannett Co. Inc. paper, pegged the crowd this way: "About 375 people packed a small room in the center to listen to Clinton, and 125 listened in an adjacent room. About 150 students and 50 adults listened to the speech in a nearby firehouse."

Ruthhart reports, "Much of Clinton’s 40-minute speech focused on the economy. He said Hillary Clinton would turn the economy around by solving the subprime-mortage crisis and generating new jobs through an aggressive energy policy." (Read more) "He said his wife appreciated the support she had won in rural areas on her way to primary victories in Ohio, Texas and Missouri," The Associated Press reported. (Read more) For more details on the speech, see Crowley's blog. (AP photo by David Kohl)

Kentucky's rural demographics and history give Clinton an advantage in state's May 20 primary

As the Democratic presidential primaries roll on, white men could be the key to the contest. Dan Balz of The Washington Post examines this crucial bloc of voters in light of Ohio's results, which he says raise the "question of whether racial prejudice would be a barrier to (Obama's) candidacy in some of the major industrial battlegrounds in the general election if he becomes the Democratic nominee."

Given the demographics and history of Kentucky, that question will be a key one in the state's May 20 primary, a fact that likely gives Clinton an advantage, writes Al Cross in his Sunday column for The Courier-Journal of Louisville. Cross focuses on Kentucky's voters — about 40 percent of whom are rural — but it's a similar look at the intersection of race and politics in this campaign.

The campaign's recent storylines and results highlight "the harder fact about race and Obama," that "there are still some white voters for whom his race is a disincentive or even a disqualifier," Cross writes. Exit polling from Ohio's March 4 primary shows Clinton held an advantage among voters who said race was a key factor for their vote, such as in the state's Appalachian 6th Congressional District — known as "Pennsyltucky" since it borders Kentucky and Pennsylvania — where Clinton won 72 percent of the vote. Add that to polls and results from other states that shows Obama's struggle to win over lower-income, lesser-educated whites, and it looks like Clinton should have an advantage in a Southern state like Kentucky.

Six weeks ago, Cross wrote that Obama could win Kentucky thanks to "swing voters over 55 who still feel angst about how they acted during the civil rights struggle of the 1960s and would like to cast a cathartic vote" for an African American. This week, he has a different outlook and writes:

That was wishful thinking -- not in hope of an Obama victory, but in hope of a victory over our racist past, which still lingers. William Faulkner was not just describing the old Confederacy when he said, "The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past." Obama says he is the candidate of the future. If he is to succeed, he must confront the past -- and in some places, the present.

Cross is director of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues and former political writer for The Courier-Journal. Forgive the "cross-promotion" here, but the column is worth checking out since Kentucky — with all its baggage — is entering in the political spotlight. (Read more)

Study says switch to daylight-saving time in Indiana actually led to more use of electricity

Daylight Saving Time starts March 9. For years, most of Indiana refused to join the rest of the country in moving clocks ahead one hour, "in part because farmers resisted the prospect of having to work an extra hour in the morning dark," writes Justin Lahart of The Wall Street Journal. In 2006, Indiana began participating in the annual switch that has long been considered an energy-saver. Now, research using data from before and after the change says "springing forward may actually waste energy."

University of California-Santa Barbara economics professor Matthew Kotchen and Ph.D. student Laura Grant examined more than seven million monthly meter readings from Duke Energy for southern Indiana before 2006, including a control group of neighboring counties that had chosen to join daylight-saving time on their own because they were in the Central Time Zone.

"Their finding: Having the entire state switch to daylight-saving time each year, rather than stay on standard time, costs Indiana households an additional $8.6 million in electricity bills," Lahart writes. "They conclude that the reduced cost of lighting in afternoons during daylight-saving time is more than offset by the higher air-conditioning costs on hot afternoons and increased heating costs on cool mornings."

Other studies, including one last year in Australia, have found that daylight saving time increases energy use — challenging studies done in the 1970s, including the oft-cited 1975 Department of Transportation report that said an expansion of daylight time prompted a 1 percent drop in electricity use. The difference in then and now is the prevalence of air conditioning. (Read more; subscription may be required)

Program offers to fund master's degrees for math and science teachers in rural high schools

Nationwide, schools need more teachers for math and science, and the need is even greater in rural areas. A new program aims to attract some teachers to rural areas with the promise of a money for a master's degree, reports Brian Wallheimer of the Journal and Courier in West Lafayette, Ind.

Funded by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, the program will begin in Indiana and will make master's degrees "available for undergraduates finishing their degrees and thinking about teaching or others in the math and science fields who want to change careers," Wallheimer writes. "They must commit to teaching in a rural school for at least three years."

Four Indiana schools — Ball State University, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, the University of Indianapolis and Purdue University — will work with the fellows on their master's degrees and will continue to guide the fellows after they start teaching. The program's goal is to add 80 fellows each year and possibly reach 400 annually soon. The first fellows would enter rural classrooms in 2010. After Indiana, other states will join the program. (Read more) For the official news release on the program, go here.

End of slaughterhouses in U.S. sends horses to abbatoirs in Canada and Mexico instead

The last horse slaughterhouses in the United States closed in 2007, when state laws and court decisions in Illinois and Texas closed the last three. Now, unwanted animals are auctioned off in the States, only to be sent over the border to slaughterhouses in Canada and Mexico — just one of the "unintended consequences" of the closings, writes Caitrin Einhorn of The New York Times.

"The slaughterhouse closings themselves may have added to the population of the unwanted," Einhorn writes, after describing the "kill pen" (above in a Times photo by Sally Ryan), the area of an Indiana auction site with horses destined for slaughter somewhere else. "In some parts of the country, auctioneers say, the closings have contributed to a drop in the price of horses at the low end of the market, and the added distance in the shipping of horses bound for slaughter, combined with higher fuel costs, means that some small or thin horses are no longer worth the fuel it takes to transport them."

A chief concern for animal rights activists is the treatment of horses at slaughterhouses in Mexico, where they say workers use inhumane methods to kill the horses. As a result, some groups are pressing Congress to ban the transportation of horses for human consumption and thus end the exporting. Still, the issue divides the horse industry, and the American Horse Council, the national lobbying group, calls itself neutral on horse slaughter. (Read more)

The number of U.S. horse exports to Mexico jumped 312 percent in 2007 from the 2006 level, report Tom Steever and Dave Russell of the Brownfield Network. As of Dec. 20, 2007, 44,375 horses had been shipped to Mexico for human consumption, compared to 10,783 over the same period in 2006. (Read more) For Monday's item on a similar story from The Wall Street Journal, click here.

Amateur breeding, slow economy, expensive hay, lack of slaughterhouses mean neglect for horses

"Across the U.S., the number of horses whose owners won't or can't properly care for them is mushrooming," Paulo Prada reports for The Wall Street Journal. "Spurred by retiring baby boomers and their penchant for second homes in the country, horse ownership boomed in the U.S. over the past decade," to over 9 million head, up by half in a decade. "Along with the boom came backyard breeding, as owners without the discipline or financial muscle to obtain award-winning genes settled for whatever nature produced."

"As the horse population soared -- and the economy ceased to gallop -- selling the animals became more difficult. Some owners could no longer afford their investment. . . . The price of hay, the main source of horse nutrition, has more than doubled over the past year," but at the same time the last three horse slaughterhouses in the U.S. closed, exacerbating the situation. "Now, some unwanted American horses wind up at Mexican and Canadian slaughterhouses. But others linger and starve, often ending up at rescue homes and other charities."

"You've got all these owners out there who thought it would be easy to keep a horse, and their incomes aren't keeping up with even their own cost of living," says Morgan Silver, founder of the Horse Protection Association of Florida (which provided this photo of her with Princess, a horse she rescued). She works around Ocala, "a hotbed of mateur breeding," Prada writes. The Indiana-based Equine Rescue League, which operates in five states, says it took in 186 horses in 2007, up 232 percent from the previous year. (Read more)

Indiana county considers restrictions on confined and concentrated animal feeding operations

Delaware County, Indiana (county seat: Muncie) is considering tighter controls on confined and concentrated animal feeding operations, both known as CAFOs. The proposed new category, "intense farming," prompted some intense objections from farmers at a local planning commission hearing last night.

“Agriculture is under attack,” said Joe Russell, a farmer and member of the county council. “The confidence and trust in farmers is no longer there. It seems like we’re being attacked quite a bit.” He said the change would amount to Indiana's tightest restrictions on CAFOs and prevent any more from being established in the county, reports Seth Slabaugh of The Star Press.

The story didn't mention any arguments for the proposal, but a photo caption said Marita Fields of Albany, a town of 2,400 near Jay and Randolph counties, was "concerned about the property value of the rental home she owns." (Read more)

Potentially harmful levels of weedkiller atrazine showing up in streams in Missouri and Indiana

"Atrazine, the second most widely used weedkiller in the country, is showing up in some streams and rivers at levels high enough to potentially harm amphibians, fish and aquatic ecosystems, according to the findings of an extensive Environmental Protection Agency database that has not been made public," reports Juliet Eilperin in The Washington Post.

"The analysis -- conducted by the chemical's manufacturer, Syngenta Crop Protection -- suggests that atrazine has entered streams and rivers in the Midwest at a rate that could harm those ecosystems, several scientific experts said. In two Missouri watersheds, the level of atrazine spiked to reach a 'level of concern' in both 2004 and 2005, according to the EPA, and an Indiana watershed exceeded the threshold in 2005."

The watersheds were not named, but those in Missouri are in the northeast part of the state. Sygenta toxicology chief Tim Pastoor said those two monitoring sites were prone to excessive runoff for various reasons, including vegetation clearance by a farmer. "Syngenta sales agents and local corn growers are trying to reform the practices of the farmer," Eilperin reports. EPA won't release the analysis because Sygenta claims some of the data are proprietary. The Post got the records from from the Natural Resources News Service, a Washington-based nonprofit group focused on environmental issues. (Read more)