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| 316 Hart Senate |
| Office Building |
| Washington, D.C. 20510 |
| P: 202-224-4343 |
| F: 202-228-1373 |
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Agriculture
Since Daniel Boone began leading settlers through the Cumberland gap, Kentucky has been a land of family farms and small, close-knit communities. Agriculture has always provided the economic and cultural backbone for our Commonwealth.
As we consider the future of farming in Kentucky, there’s a lot that needs to be done. We need tax relief for farm families by eliminating the death tax and providing tax reform that is friendly to rural communities. We also need to give tax incentives that will help make health care more affordable. Lately, it’s been getting harder and harder for rural hospitals and clinics to make ends meet. And Congress must do its part to help create better rural health care facilities.
Congress also needs to take a hard look at some of the federal regulations affecting Kentucky farmers, such as environmental run-off requirements, labor laws, and immigration problems.
Then there is the issue of a tobacco buyout and what’s coming for tobacco farmers. The big questions are obvious – how much is it going to cost, and where is the money going to come from. The federal government is running a deficit again. Plus we’re at war, and wars are expensive. So when we talk about a tobacco buyout in Congress, the anti-tobacco forces are going to say: “Show us the money.”
This means we are going to have to find more revenue or cut spending in other areas. Since spending is already under the knife because of the war and the deficit, it means we have to find more money.
In the meantime, I’ve also asked the federal government’s General Accounting Office to study how Phase I and Phase II money is being spent, and we’re supposed to get the report soon. Budgets are tight everywhere, and it’s going to be too tempting for some people not to grab that money and spend it on other programs. That would be wrong. We need to make sure that the money that is supposed to be going to farmers now, under the Master Settlement Agreement, actually gets there.
Family farms and small towns across our Commonwealth have made us strong. It’s a legacy that we must continue to nurture. We need make sure that in the years to come the farming way of life always remains part of Kentucky’s character. |
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