Letter to the Honorable Tom Vilsack, Secretary U.S. Department of Agriculture

Letter

Honorable Tom Vilsack

Secretary of Agriculture

U.S. Department of Agriculture

1400 Independence Avenue, SW

Washington, DC 20250

Dear Mr. Secretary,

I am writing to you today to urge you to not close a critical FSA office in Sullivan County. Farmers across New York State have suffered from multiple natural disasters in the last year, from winter blizzards to catastrophic late summer flooding, the worst of which you saw when you visited New York State with me in September.

Currently, the criteria for deciding which office to close is based on a 20 mile limit to the nearest FSA office, measured in air mileage. Air mileage is an impractical criterion, as farmers will have to travel as much as double the distance if proposed offices were to close, and I recommend that USDA use road mileage instead. I believe an efficient and economical solution would be to collocate existing USDA offices so that farmers are better able to access their federal and state farm programs in one location.

The extreme flooding New York farmers suffered due to Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee wiped out entire farms. These farms were facing challenging economic times and in some cases barely surviving before these catastrophic weather events. These farms desperately need the expertise and support of USDA within their communities in order to benefit from agricultural programs such as loans, conservation support, and disaster services, especially during these extraordinarily difficult times.

For Sullivan County farmers, that will mean going to Middletown, NY in Orange County, an additional hour of traveling time for most local farmers, or to Walton, NY in Delaware County, a longer distance, depending on the location of the farms. Agriculture is growing in the county like never before. The closing of the Liberty FSA office contradicts and undermines two ongoing USDA initiatives, the Sullivan--Wawarsing REAP Zone designation and Rural Development's recent funding of the Liberty Agriculture Business Park, both of which support and expand the agriculture sector of Sullivan County. Furthermore, closing the Sullivan County office contradicts the USDA Rural Development agency's goal to develop and construct an Agriculture Business Park.

The closure of this office would unfortunately result in decreased access to agricultural credit for farmers. The four disaster declarations and the two emergency declarations that FEMA made in New York State this year disproportionately impacted our farmers. The support that USDA provides has never been more critical. I urge you to keep the FSA office open for farmers in Sullivan County.

Please strongly consider the needs of New York farmers and halt the closing of this critical FSA office. This is not the time to abandon communities within Sullivan County while they have been hurt by difficult economic times and catastrophic weather events. I look forward to working together on this priority for New York State.

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