Virginia Farm Bureau News Lead: Extension ‘on the rebound,’ farmers told

This story appeared in the June 7th edition of News Leads, the week's top ag stories sent out by the VFB Communications Department to media across the state.

The director of Virginia Cooperative Extension said that agency is steadily rebuilding its presence in county offices across Virginia after staffing cuts in recent years.

“I think we’re on the rebound, and good things are starting to happen,” Dr. Edwin Jones, an associate dean at Virginia Tech’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, told the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation board of directors at their May 24 meeting.

Farm Bureau has for some time maintained that localities in Virginia need at minimum one agriculture Extension agent, one 4-H agent and one administrative employee. The 2012 Virginia General Assembly appropriated an additional $500,000 for Extension funding for each of the fiscal years in the biennium, for a total of $1 million.

“It was good to hear that vacant Extension positions are being filled,” said VFBF President Wayne F. Pryor. “Having someone local who can address questions ranging from crop and livestock production to business planning to natural resource management is critical to maintaining a sustainable food production system in Virginia.”

Virginia Farm Bureau achieves nine out of 11 budget successes

The General Assembly passed a budget on Wednesday, April 18. The next step is for the Governor to review the budget report and offer any amendments or veto the bill. If he signs the bill with no changes then the bill will become law on July 1, 2012.

Virginia Farm Bureau policy was achieved on nine out of 11 on the budget amendments. This brings our final total of successful issues for the General Assembly to 43 out of 51 policy issues.

Where Farm Bureau Policy Prevailed in the State Budget

Coyote Program: $40,000 was added each year of the biennium to bring the funding to a minimum amount of $120,000.

Reforestation of Timberlands Program; Computer Program Needed to Operate RT Program: $130,000 was added each year of the biennium to increase the amount of state matching fund to a total of $557,570. In addition, the General Assembly provided $120,000 each year of the biennium to replace the dysfunctional computer program used to distribute the funds to landowners. This was necessary to keep a functional RT Program.

Farm Bureau has 34 successes at General Assembly

Martha Moore
Vice President, Governmental Relations

As the General Assembly concluded without a budget, Farm Bureau policy positions prevailed on 34 out of 40 issues. This number will change once we know the outcome on the state budget.

A big thank you goes out to those of you who made legislative contacts when we asked you as well as those of you who participated in Legislative Day. We can't emphasize enough how crucial it is for legislators to hear the issues and how they affect agriculture straight from Virginia farmers like you. Your contacts made all the difference this year, and we can attribute our success to you.

If you are a producer member and would like to receive our action alerts, please email Kelly.Pruitt@vafb.com.

Below are some highlights from this year's session:

Animal Care

• Successful in defeating all legislation that place arbitrary and unscientific animal husbandry practice restrictions on farmers and prevented giving human rights to animals

Game Laws

• Made coyotes and feral hogs nuisance species so that this would allow some permanency beyond regulations for an open season on these nuisance species

• Defeated all bills that would have allowed Sunday hunting

Property Rights

• Passed a resolution placing a proposed constitutional amendment on the ballot in November 2012 to permanently protect property owners from eminent domain takings for private benefit

• Ensured that landowners are fairly compensated for factors that impact the fair market value as “lost profits” and “lost access”

Please stay tuned on this issue as we are working on developing a statewide campaign on getting the ballot initiative passed. Look for more information on how your county Farm Bureau can help ensure that are successful in a major final piece of achieving our policy position on protecting your property rights from eminent domain abuse.

Virginia Cooperative Extension/ Agriculture Experiment Station

• Passed a commending resolution on the Agriculture Experiment Station’s 125th Anniversary to highlight the programs that have helped support farm profitability

Strengthening Virginia Cooperative Extension at Local Level

Virginia Farm Bureau believes very strongly that every locality needs at a minimum of one agriculture agent, one 4-H agent and one administrative staff person. Senators Edwards and Hanger and Delegate Sherwood carried budget amendments to help VCE get one step closer towards meeting this goal. The amendments were partially accepted in the proposed versions of the House and Senate budgets that were released this week. Both the House and Senate included $500,000 in each year of the biennium for additional extension agents. This will be part of the ongoing discussions regarding the budget this will be passed by the General Assembly over the next few weeks.

In July 2011, VCE had 179 agents across Virginia. By January 2012, with the funding provided, Virginia Cooperative Extension is projecting to have over 210 agents across Virginia. While this is a huge improvement, there are still vacant positions across Virginia and every locality fails to have at least one agriculture and 4-H agent and one administrative staff person. While the budget amendment will not completely meet Virginia Farm Bureau members’ wishes, we are pleased that the General Assembly’s intentions are clear that they are still willing to continue to work towards this goal by filling a few critical vacancies in many localities across Virginia.

As the front door to the land-grant university system, VCE uses objective, research-based educational programs to lead to more productive lives, families, communities, farms, and forests while enhancing and preserving the quality of the commonwealth's natural resources. VCE provides every citizen of the state local access to the wealth of knowledge available through our two land-grant universities, Virginia Tech and Virginia State University. Recognizing that knowledge is power, Extension uses the resources of the land-grant university system to deliver educational programs through a network of 106 local, county, and city offices; six 4-H Educational Centers; and 11 Agricultural Research and Extension Centers. Extension is funded through the cooperative efforts of local, state and federal governments. In addition, over 40,000 citizen volunteers contribute millions of hours every year helping identify and deliver needs-driven educational programs.

Secretary of Education releases Virginia Cooperative Extension study

The Virginia Secretary of Education released the “Analysis of the Virginia Cooperative Extension (VCE) Structure, Funding Trends, and Research” report in late November. The Secretary of Education presented the study recommendations to the House Appropriations Special Subcommittee on Extension on Monday, December 19, 2011. She also presented the study recommendations to the State Extension Leadership Council on Wednesday, December 22, 2011.

The full study can be found at http://www.ext.vt.edu/files/vsoe-report-complete.pdf. Director of Extension Ed Jones reported to the State Extension Leadership Council that they plan to have regular updates on these recommendations on their websites as well as adding the ability for stakeholders to ask questions regarding the study.