Their Word is Dirt: State Senate Dems Betray the Farmworkers Again

The Democratic leaders of the state Senate have sold out New York's most powerless and exploited workers, the farmhands who grow and pick crops upstate.

Conference chief John Sampson of Brooklyn promised this would be the year the Senate joined the Assembly in extending basic labor rights to field hands. Sampson broke his word.

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Their Word is Dirt

Finger Lakes Big Truck Ban May be Back on Table

Regulations banning big trucks from Finger Lakes highways may be back on the table, just a week after the state Department of Transportation announced that they had been axed.

Tompkins County Legislator Pam Mackesey said that Dan Young, the Syracuse-based regional director for Gov. David Paterson, announced during a meeting last week that the state would continue to move toward implementing the heavy truck ban in the Finger Lakes...

Peter Gregg, spokesperson for the New York State Farm Bureau, said he hadn't heard anything about the regulations being back on the table, and he would not be pleased if they were.

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Big Truck Ban

Expanding 2010 Milk Production Likely To Limit Price Increases, USDA Says

Although the nation’s dairy herd continues to contract on a year-over-year basis, milk per cow continues to rise incrementally, USDA’s Economic Research Service (ERS) said in its Livestock, Dairy, and Poultry Outlook released Wednesday.
 
USDA’s April Milk Production report indicated that milk per cow was 51 lb. higher in March compared with a year ago.

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2010 Milk Production

Seeds Planted for Agribusiness Park Near Canastota

L-R: Rich Carrier, Mike Snook & Mike Kalet

A Syracuse real estate professional and a pair of farm entrepreneurs want to create a $200 million agricultural industrial park in Madison County that would make its own power, recycle its own waste and create manufacturing jobs in the bargain. If Central New York Agri-Business Park LLC can deliver on that very tall order, it could serve as a template.

“There’s no reason why this model couldn’t be the industrial development model in 100 markets in the United States,” said Michael Kalet, company president.

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Agribusiness Park