By Charlie Elrod, NEAFA President
Hitting two of our three pillars in one day seems like a good day’s work. On May 14th, representatives from NEAFA, Northeast Dairy Producers Association (NEDPA) and NY Farm Bureau (NYFB) met in Albany for a day of lobbying around transportation issues which have been central to our advocacy and education initiatives over the last few years. This lobby day was the culmination of several months of planning between the aforementioned groups and the Trucking Association of NY (TANY). Joining me from NEAFA were our Vice-President Bonne Bagstedt and Blake Lutz of Lutz Feeds. We had three lobby teams, each with a member from each of the organizations, which we feel offered some compelling perspective on the transportation topics we were highlighting. In all we had 22 meetings with legislators and/or their staff members.
While there are many issues touching on transportation around which we might lobby, we took the lead of the Council of Ag Organizations and required that the topics and positions we were advocating for had to be unanimously supported by each group. With that framework, we ended up with four specific bills which were the topics of discussion for our meetings. You can view the talking points which we prepared and shared with legislators.
The first bill we were supporting was a delay in the implementation of the Advanced Clean Truck Rules. As we’ve discussed in our transportation summits and panel discussions, electrification of our truck fleet is a worthwhile goal, however the technology, equipment and infrastructure just aren’t there to support it. Just the night before, Kevin Kouri had shared that the VT governor vetoed Vermont’s version of the ACT Rules. This added momentum to our position supporting the delay. And, as seeming proof that advocacy can make a difference, just a week later New York State announced a two-year delay on any enforcement actions related to the ACT Rules.
The next bill we were supporting was an issue that Blake Lutz first brought to our attention last year. Blake’s concern was with the financing of litigation by hedge funds as an investment opportunity, but which has the effect to prolong accident-related litigation and often leading to huge settlements. The knock-on effect is that insurance premiums are sky-rocketing to help insurers cover these enormous payouts. The bill we support is just a first step in bringing some transparency to litigation financing by forcing the disclosure of any third-party financing of lawsuits and capping the amount of any settlement that could be paid back to the financiers.
The last two bills we supported were both focused on clean energy. The Clean Fuel Standard would help build a market for renewable natural gas such as that which is produced in anaerobic digesters on dairy farms. At present, any gas produced by NY dairies is sold into the market, but because NY does not have a clean fuel standard, the carbon credits are actually captured by California, one of the first states to adopt a clean fuel standard. The second bill would assist in the further development of on-farm renewable natural gas production by providing financial and environmental incentives for adoption of this technology. From our lobbying, NEAFA, NEDPA and NYFB were all invited back to participate in a press conference hosted by Senator Harckham in support of the clean fuel standards. We all feel that these efforts provide a reasonable bridge between the realities of today’s technology and the future with increased electrification.
We were assisted in our collaborative advocacy by the great work of Corning-Place Communications and Ostroff Associates who represent NEDPA, the government affairs group at NYFB and our colleagues at Hinman-Straub. Julie Marlette and her team did an incredible job setting up the appointments, schedule and herding us all over the capital that day. Thanks to all of them for their outstanding support.