Congressman-elect Minnick Hears ag concerns, ideas
By Patti Murphy
Friday, January 2, 2009 4:46 PM CST
The week before Christmas, representatives from Idaho’s commodity groups were invited to spend an afternoon with Congressman-elect Walt Minnick discussing a wide range of issues and concerns that affect Idaho’s agricultural industries.
The 32 businessmen and women who packed the small conference room at the Idaho Wheat Commission Building were met by an interested and engaged Minnick who, from time to time, reminded the group to please just call him Walt.
Brent Olmstead, executive director of the Milk Producers of Idaho, organized the meeting and said that “he and others were very pleased with how it went.
“We are very encouraged that Congressman Minnick requested to meet with the agricultural group first, and that he chose the House Agricultural committee as his first committee choice,” said Olmstead, who said that “everything from sugar beets to sheep” had been represented in the meeting with Minnick.
“The most important thing was that we opened the lines of communication with the Congressman,” he said. “Traditionally, the agricultural community has been Republican-based and hasn’t dealt with a lot of Democrats, at least not lately. It was important for him to understand his audience and what their needs are.”
Minnick kept the discussion casual by occasionally dropping witty comments about politics or agriculture, which drew appreciative chuckles from the room. During the two hour meeting, the group discussed issues including biotechnology, earmarks, the economy, and immigration, among others.
Minnick called biotechnology “one of the most fascinating aspects of agriculture that has huge long-term implications for productivity.” He said, “You can’t stop progress, and nobody has any idea whether the ear of corn they get at the supermarket is genetically engineered or not. And if genetic engineering leads to a better ear of corn, they’re going to eat it.
“The issue is how do you shape the approval process in ways that you can be as smart as possible for evaluating unintended consequences?” he added. “We need to do that in the international setting as well, because technology is global.
“It’s a partnership that is evolving, and it needs to be done responsibly so that the benefits outweigh the consequences. I’m not at all sympathetic on outright bans. You can’t stop science.”
A representative from the University of Idaho talked about the schools research funding, and asked Minnick how the university would maintain its level of research when a portion of that funding comes from earmarks.
“Regarding earmarks, I campaigned on that issue,” Minnick said. “I think earmarks in the abstract are a mighty poor way to run a railroad.”
He explained how he thinks earmarks “short circuit” the typical appropriations process and leads to spending more money.
“I’m going to support a rule in Congress to get rid of earmarks. If we could get that passed I’d support it, but if it won’t pass - and I don’t think it’s going to n I at least want the earmarks to be public and not passed in the dead of night, and then we won’t have bridges to nowhere. “
Minnick said that he “will not support earmarks for anything other than a public entity. I won’t do it for private, but I will fight like hell to get our share of earmarks for public entities,” adding that he would work with Congressman Mike Simpson and “go over what earmarks are the most important and how much we think between the two of us we could get on the house side. We’ll do everything we can to make sure Idaho gets its fair share,” he said.
In discussing the recession, Minnick called it “severe” and said the tools that normally would be used to stimulate the economy, such as rebates and taxes, are “too little too late.” He said that the government needs to spend money on “projects that government should be doing anyway, that have important private sector spin-off,” such as highways and transit, broadband and other projects that only government can provide.
“That’s where I think the focus of money ought to be spent,” he said. “Not rebates or bailing out failing businesses. That way, we aren’t wasting money, we’re just spending it a little earlier than we otherwise would to create some jobs and change the psychology.”
Minnick called the immigration issue “a little like wild horses and wolves. It’s not very well understood.” He said, “A sensible immigration policy is not a partisan issue,” and noted that “there are jobs, whether they be manual labor or engineers with PhDs at Micron where the U.S. is not the only talent source and not every job can be filled domestically. It’s part of the global economy. It’s very much in our interest to be able to tap that reservoir of labor as needed, and we should have laws that allow us to do so.”
Olmstead later said that Minnick’s philosophy on immigration “matched ours,” and that it was important to issue enough visas to match the labor demand.
“We’ve formed the Idaho Business Coalition for Immigration Reform to help educate the public and the legislature on the need for immigrant labor,” he said. “We aren’t advocating amnesty or an expedited pathway to citizenship. We just want people to understand the need.”
Toward the end of the meeting, Isaac Squyres, Minnick’s chief of staff, told the group that it was important to keep the lines of communication open so the new congressman could be effective.
“I really encourage you to reach out to us,” he said. “You all have a very large base of knowledge and experience and expertise on issues, and it’s our job to be informed on those issues, so we will be reaching out to you too in a very aggressive way.”
After the meeting, Olmstead said, “Mr. Minnick was very straightforward and didn’t pull any punches. I think all of us are very encouraged by his interest.”
Comments »
Comment on this story
Comments will be approved within 48 hours
|
