Wisconsin dairy CAFO (Photo courtesy of Wisconsin DNR)
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources has sent back a factory farming operation’s application to expand a Pierce County farm after local residents raised concerns that properties listed in the application as sites where manure would be spread on fields had never agreed to that arrangement.
The Appleton-based Breeze Dairy Group has requested permission from the DNR to amend its current Wisconsin Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (WPDES) permit at its Ridge Breeze Dairy in Maiden Rock. The dairy currently has a herd of 2,400 animal units, about 1,700 cows, and is asking to expand to more than 9,000 animal units, about 6,500 cows.
Breeze Dairy Group operates six factory farms totalling more than 10,000 cows around Wisconsin. The company has a history of manure spills at several of its properties. At the Pine Breeze in Waushara County, DNR records show nine manure spills in the last 11 years, totalling 150,000 gallons of spilled manure.
Earlier this year, Breeze Dairy Group purchased the Emerald Sky Dairy in the town of Emerald in St. Croix County shortly after the previous owners were granted permission to expand the operation from 1,600 to 3,300 cows. That operation has a history of harmful manure spills causing long term damage to water and fish kills.
People who live near the dairy in Emerald have complained for years about the farm’s long term effects on their water — though county and DNR officials have said the spills have been cleaned up. After the sale to Breeze Dairy, locals expressed concern about a large CAFO operating close to their homes and drinking wells without local ownership.
The company’s CEO, Gregg Wolf, told the Wisconsin Examiner in May that he wants to be a good neighbor. Wisconsin Watch reported earlier this month that the company’s management is working to rehabilitate the St. Croix County dairy’s reputation.
In July, hundreds of residents attended a virtual public hearing on the application to expand the Ridge Breeze Dairy, raising concerns on the livestock operation’s effect on local water quality and pointing to the properties in the application listed as sites for manure spreading that hadn’t even been contacted by the company.
Earlier this month, the DNR required the company to “submit written verification that the dairy operation has permission to land-apply manure and process wastewater to all fields that are not under common ownership of Ridge Breeze Dairy.”
The DNR took similar action on an application for a hog farm in Burnett County. In that case, owners of 11% of the land listed in the application for manure spreading had forbidden the use of their land, Wisconsin Watch reported .
After being sent back by the department, that application expired.
Water quality advocates in the region celebrated the DNR decision as a win for “common sense.”
“It shows they’re listening to the community,” Danny Akenson, a Field Organizer with GrassRoots Organizing Western Wisconsin, said in a statement . “People may not realize, the DNR doesn’t outright deny permits even if they have concerns. They put these more strict requirements on them to see if the applicant is able to fulfill them. We know that Breeze Dairy Group can’t be trusted and we’ve proven that to the DNR. We hope to see further restrictions put on them, such as groundwater monitoring and a cap on animal units. Nobody deserves to live across the street from 6,500 cows.”
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