Trucking in manure irks Indiana residents

Indianapolis-There’s nothing the state can do under current regulations to stop the trucking of manure into eastern Indiana in an effort to save Ohio’s algae-plagued Grand Lake St. Marys from more pollution. The clean-up currently underway at the popular lake has angered some Indiana residents, who fear the federally backed effort is only moving the problem to their region and will harm nearby rivers and streams just like what’s happing to the lake. One resident claims it’s worsening the air quality around his farm, which he says is already thick with ammonia and dust from a nearby dairy. But Indiana state officials responded that there’s nothing presently on the books that will stop the problem. The Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM) acknowledged the complaints, which first came from residents in the area of the staging sites, and indicated there may be some relief in the future. “We’ve received several complaints over the past several months about the staging of chicken manure in Indiana fields, the odor from it, and their concern about potential run-off,” reported IDEM spokesman Barry Sneed. “(But) as long as the manure does not cause a water quality violation, Indiana regulations would not provide us with authority to address it. To date, we have not observed a water quality violation related to the staging of the manure.” Sneed added that the State Chemist’s office is working on a rule that will regulate the land application of manure regardless of the source. Irritated residents in the area claim the manure traffic began growing in July after Ohio offered livestock farmers a new incentive under a U.S. Department of Agriculture subsidy program that partially covers the cost of shipping manure out of the Grand Lake St. Marys watershed. Officials took the action after manure runoff from fields was largely blamed for causing the shallow, 13,000-acre lake to become tainted with toxic blue-green algae, making it virtually off-limits to recreation last summer.