By Gary Lookadoo Staff Writer // garyl@nwanews.com

Posted on Friday, February 24, 2006

BENTON COUNTY — Even as the U.S. Supreme Court prepared to decline to become involved in a lawsuit brought by Oklahoma against poultry companies and the state of Arkansas, U.S. Rep. John Boozman, Arkansas,  anticipated legislation to deal with an issue in the legal action.

On Feb. 21, the U.S. Supreme Court turned down a bid by the state of Arkansas to get the high court involved in the poultry dispute between Oklahoma and Arkansas.

Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson sued poultry companies — Cargill Inc. of Minneapolis; Cobb-Vantress Inc. and Simmons Foods Inc., both of Siloam Springs; George’s Inc. and Tyson Foods Inc., both of Springdale; Peterson Farms Inc. of Decatur; Willow Brook Foods of Springfield, Mo.; and Cal-Maine Foods Inc. of Jackson, Miss. — in U.S. District Court in Tulsa. The lawsuit claims the companies polluted the Illinois River watershed, which includes 1,671 square miles and drains large sections of Benton and Washington counties before flowing into Oklahoma south of Siloam Springs.

Farmers spread poultry litter on pastures to fertilize hay crops. The litter can be carried by runoff and degrade water quality in streams. At high levels, the litter spurs algae growth, depletes oxygen and harms fish and other aquatic life.

Ed Brocksmith, president of Tahlequah, Okla.-based Save The Illinois River Inc., said the river watchdog organization is "gratified that the court decided not to intervene." He hopes the issue can now be resolved, Brocksmith said.

Before the high court’s decision, Rep. Boozman, RArk., said legislation he is sponsoring would clarify the situation. "The attorney general of Oklahoma is basically saying that chicken manure is hazardous waste and should be covered under the federal statutes concerning hazardous waste," Boozman said. "You can imagine … those of us that visit farms throughout the area and have friends that are in the poultry business — we never realized they were sitting on a hazardous waste dump. Well, that’s what the attorney general of Oklahoma would have us believe." So a bill’s being introduced that specifically says that when the statute was written and talks about hazardous waste, that was in no way intended to infer that animal manure would be considered hazardous waste, "he said." Common sense would dictate that that’s certainly not what (the authors of the legislation) meant. "It’s not clear when the legislation will be taken up for consideration by the House, the congressman said not long before the Supreme Court action." It’s still in the Transportation and Infrastructure, and Energy and Commerce committees. It’s not moving right away, but … he’ll be pushing to get that through, " he said.