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Money still the biggest farm bill hang-up

The executive director of the South Dakota Corn Growers Association says its clear the leaders of the agriculture committees in Congress aren’t finding agreement on how to fund the new farm bill.    

DaNita Murray tells Brownfield “they need a breakthrough on funding, something that gets them past the disagreements they have or else we won’t see a farm bill anytime soon.”

Murray was the former chief counsel and policy advisor to the House and Senate Agriculture Committees, working on the 2018 and 2014 Farm Bills.

She says last week’s letter from Senate Ag Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow made it clear the chairwoman isn’t willing to use nutrition title funding for the commodities title and “Mr. Boozman has been clear he needs improvements that are expensive in the commodities title of the bill. And there are debates whether any of the conservation money that was originally earmarked for climate change could be used for anything else other than conservation and climate change in the farm bill.”

Murray says there’s been a lot of lines drawn on money and it’s up to lawmakers to work on a breakthrough.