News

Federation director praises Vilsackfor Civil Rights plans

The head of the farm group organized to assist minority farmers in the south and elsewhere says he’s never seen an administration like thisone. Ralph Paige, executive director of the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund, based in Georgia, says the initiatives put forth to address the USDA’s civil right problems have been a long time in coming, “I’ve been around for the last five administrations, working forover 40 years with black farmers in rural communities and this is the first real change we have seen.”

Secretary Vilsack released a civil rights memorandum last week, detailing his plans to address unresolved civil rights issues at USDA, including the remaining casespending in federal court under the Pigford litigation in which black farmers sued the USDA for discrimination. Paige praises Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack for talking with the Justice Department about those cases. And for placing a 90-day moratorium on all loan foreclosures until the USDA can look intothem, “That is unprecedented, to give farmers an opportunity to have the complaints and other kinds of things, have those particular loans looked at.”

And the promise within the first 100 days of the Obama administration to look into the more than 14,000discrimination complaints against USDA is unprecedented, “I think I’m more encouraged now than I’ve ever been that we finally have a Secretary that would pay more than lip service to this.”

Another group, the National Black Farmers Association, held a protestoutside USDA on Tuesday, saying USDA is not moving quickly enough to resolve remaining civil rights claims.