prc or llc payment. this might be a good government amendment for operatives is partes pating in either the plc or rlc and will probably save taxpayer money. so i encourage your support. i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. the chair recognizes the gentleman. for what purpose does the gentleman of texas seek recognition. >> mr. chairman, it is not often i disagree with my good friend from iowa and we have the ranking member of the sub committee and i would urge opposition to the -- under the revenue program is because the revenue program protects against the county's crop revenue, not a farmer's crop revenue. without this provision of the bill a county would have a loss revenue, but the farmer if he was forced to be in the part of the county would have rain and is still collecting payment and that would make a bad news story

and why does the price loss coverage need the same language? because the price loss coverage compares to the national average market price for the crop and the coverage is triggered. there's no distinction between the county and the producer. this kind of language is not appropriate and i urge the amendment be rejected. i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. ranking member's recognized to strike the last word. >> chairman, move to strike the last word. >> the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. >> i am reluctantly arised to oppose this amendment of my good friend mr. bosswell. and, you know, there's a difference of opinion between different regions of the count rry and i don't know what the best safety net is. in my part of the world, you know, they're not too hot on this average crop revenue idea

a and, you know, i think it will be inadequate to take care of the inevitable situation which is going to happen and that is when these prices go down. we heard back in 1996 when we were on the farm that the prices would never go down again and we were in a new paradigm and we had all these export markets and we had all of this stuff going and so we didn't have to worry about prices going down and we could get the government out of agriculture and phase out the programs and as i said earlier, two years later the prices collapsed and we spent four or five times as much as we say we're bailing everybody out. these prices will go down again. these target prices that we've put in, we've updated them and so they're more realistic and they're not at a level where

anybody will make any money. you know, this isn't even up to the cost of product when we put in there for these target prices, but when these prices collapse it is a floor that will get people through, but if we got through a situation where we didn't have target prices and we had $1.95 load on corn, the price got down to $1.95 there won't be corn grown at $1.95 a bushel. so what we're doing here is realistic, understanding that high prices make low prices and low prices make high prices. so i oppose this amendment. i understand where mr. boswell is coming from, but some places in the country would have a different opinion. >> gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the chair strikes the last word to recognize himself for five

minutes. i share the perspective of my ranking member. this amendment would upset a very carefully, balanced and what i think is a fair proposal that tries to achieve the goal of giving producers choice. whatever commodity, in whatever region they can make the right choices based on their own analysis. i know my colleague is a tire little advocate of the state's farmers and a wonderful friend, but i respectfully urge my colleagues to reject this amendment and with that i yield back saying no other request for recognition, we'll proceed to a vote. all of those in favor of amendment number 69 by the gentleman from iowa. mr. boswell signify so by saying aye. >> all those opposed signifying by no. the noes appear to have it. the noes do, indeed have it and amendment number 69 is defeated. are there any additional amendments to title one. the commodity title?

>> we'll come back to this side and we'll go with the gentleman, mr. gibbs. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> at the desk number 76. >> the clerk will distribute number 76. the gentleman will proceed

whenever he is ready. >> thank you, mr. chairman. you can almost call it technical in nature, but i think it's a relatively simple amendment. under this proposed bill the land owners would make the distinction for the next five years that they wouldn't be in the price loss coverage or revenue coverage and the way it stated in the bill it says the majority of the land owners and i think it's easier to see a quick employ xael. we have a lot of farms that have been passed on from generation to generation and you have a lot of farms where you can have siblings that are the owners of an individual farm and without this amendment one sibling in this example could have veto power over the rest of the siblings and what this amendment simply states is the majority of the land owners would make this selection because under the bill if one land owner is an example i'm using, one sibling vetoes it they would automatically go to the price loss coverage and this

is the majority of the land owners that own that farm. yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. the chair recognizes himself to strike the last word and recognizes himself for five minutes. do we have someone from usda potentially who could respond to the nature of this, the implementation? would you please stand and state your name and give us the discussion of the implementation process? >> have you had time to look at this language and, number two, how would it affect your ability to perform your responsibilities at usda. >> yes, mr. chairman, i've had a chance to look at it. my name is david grom, i'm the

associate general counsel responsible for the legal issues involving title one of the farm bill. i have had a chance to take a look at it. under the current provision as it sits in the chairman's mark all of the owners would have to agree. in the case of the majority of the owners there is a question as to what that exactly means. we don't know if that means the majority in terms of number or ownership interest, so we're a little bit confused as to exactly the intent, what happens if the ownership changes during the course of the year, and how that would play to subsequent years because at that point we would be essentially having to look at it year by year whereas if you have all of the owners then we would know that all of the owners are pretty well locked in for a particular period of time. mr. chairman, does that answer your question? >> that does, indeed. i would say to my colleague, while understand where he's

coming from i believe this is an issue that has to be thought out to a greater degree about what the potential consequences are and that i think he's brought it to our attention, but i would oppose at this time this amendment because i just don't believe i understand or the committee has had a chance to look at what all of the ramifications are and would yield to the gentleman from iowa. i thank the chairman on this point. >> i thank the chairman for yielding and as i look at this i agree with the settlement that the gentleman from ohio has brought before this committee and regular siblings it comes home to roost for me and i think about it in those terms and i would suggest that the gentleman from ohio would consider withdrawing his amendment and allow us to look at this and we should come to an agreeable solution. the gentleman would yield back.

>> i withdraw the amendment on the intent that we will make it work. >> we will absolutely work together. are there additional amendments to title one, the commodity title. >> we'll bounce back and forth. the gentleman wallace. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to -- >> seek recognition. >> in the interest of time, i'm going -- we'll withdraw this one, mr. chairman, and i just wanted to make note of it, and the work of the dairy program is very thoughtful and the sentiment of listening to the producers is absolutely correct. i ask you to take it into consideration and as we transition off the current program to the new program that that transition phase would allow farmers or producers to continue with the milc program until the new program was up and running because implementation was, of course, the key, and i know this is a concern of both of yours are going to work on

it. before i withdraw on this i would like to yield to my friend and neighbor from the dairy state for his comments. >> i thank the gentleman for yielding. >> we're moving from a program milc into the new insurance program. it's going to take some time to manage the transfer and transition of this and this amendment simply did that. it allowed for the time necessary to make the adjustment and mr. wallace, i commend you for the work on this. thank you. i yield back. >> i thank the gentleman, and i, too, yield back and note that it took 57 seconds for two of us. >> i would say the gentlemen will go far in the legislative process. thank you very much and we will, indeed, work together. the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from arkansas seeks recognition. >> mr. chairman, i hava, amendment number 71. >> the gentleman may proceed when he's prepared. first of all, i thank the

gentleman from iowa for working with me to grab in memo. i would like to think that the 12 other co-sponsors for joining the gentleman and myself. when the usda announced plans in january to close farm service agencies for stronger service, my constituents and i were troubled because they closed it in the first of arkansas when they determined which offices to close. the county offices had among the highest workload and the least amount of employees. in times of tight budgets when we should be doing more with less, an office with higher productivity and fewer personnel is while this is a plain, common sense solution to my constituents, it's a foreign concept in washington. all they're asking is to make decisions in an economical way and with that, i yield back.

the gentleman yields back. does anyone else seek recognition on this subject? and the gentleman seeks recognition and strikes the last word. >> the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. i'm sure i got called out of the room and i appreciate very much -- i want to be clear. and it will be made logically by assessing the workload of the fsa office and which offices should be closed. in the 2008 farm bill we gave the usda tw criteria for closing offices and it could implement it in the five-year span of that bill. however, for whatever reason,

usd awaited to close fsa offices until after an early retirement plan and while s.a. offices were under a hiring freeze. this practice has many offices across the nation in my home state and service diversified to abnormally low staffing levels and together they created an unfair misrepresentation of two or fewer full-time employee criteria for selected closures. to resolve this issue and close offices based on fairness and actual workload, congressman crawford and i have introduced legislation which we cared about and would require a workload assessment that's included and provided by the public for any further county offices take place and require that the two-employee provision would be required as of june 16, 2008, to

reflect normal staffing levels and require the same commitment and reporting to counties take place to any closure and relocation that happens after the workload assessment is completed. i'm sure all offices including those undergoing closure would receive an assessment. i'll just make this comment. in our state, we have and i'm all supportive of it, mr. king would affirm that for me and then there are other parts of the state where they're down where i come from and diversification and lots of livestock and so on and the fsa offices are working all of the time and i'm talking about some of the comparisons in our state and this idea of coming out there, even though we gave them

permission in 2008 and seek efficiencies, we're all for that, and did not take in the workload in my opinion, and i don't -- at this time represent any of those offices and i happen to know quite a bit about them because where i come from and they think i represent them, but actually steve does, nevertheless, they're talking to me about it and they feel like they got a bum deal. a bum deal and so i would hope that you give consideration to this and would yield to questions and yield back at this moment. >> the gentleman yields back. the other gentleman from iowa would strike the last word. the gentleman is recognized for five minutes and i thank the gentleman for bringing this amendment, i do represent the counties that are affected by this and some of mr. boswell's cows as well and when you look at the fsa offices and you

realize that there has not been analysis of the workload and just an analysis and sometimes the distance from county seat to county seat. that's not a business model in my view, and i think good, government management needs to be with the business model and so i've encouraged the secretary to move forward with that kind of an analysis. this is a stronger encouragement to the secretary to do so and i support this amendment and i yield back the balance of my time and the member seeks r recognition and move to strike the last word and i'll reluctantly oppose this amendment because this does not say that we should have them study the workload. it says they're going to prohibit the closure and relocation and people need to understand, you know, we're cutting the budget and i've been there voting to, you know, cut things and get this budget out of control and when you do that

you're going to have impacts, and this is what's going to happen. the secretary's under tremendous pressure. you know, he put together this plan about how they're going to do it and they're closing offices where they're only open one day a week. other offices where they're right next to each other. is it perfect? no, but this doesn't say to study it. it says we're going to stop it which i don't think is fair to the secretary given the fact that we've made him reduce his budget and the other thing that's going on that needs to be taken into consideration at some point is we're finally getting this computer thing under control and we're getting the right stuff put in place and at some point these offices are not going to have the kind of workload they have now once they get this online thing set up and so forth and that's got to be factored into all of this, too.

and i would agree that we need more information and need some kind of plan, but this doesn't say that, and mr. chairman? >> the gentleman yields back. under the rule i would strike the last word and make a comment or two and we'll proceed back to the regular order. the chair strikes a last word and recognizes himself for five minutes and i appreciate the comments and under the leadership of bill sack and done an extensive analysis and this is a tough process, and what's the former governor of iowa. mr.ville sack? >> i have had an office closed in my district, so i understand the impact on the communities, but the ranking member is correct. if we're going to advocate a

government, if we're going to empower the federal government to make these decisions, then alas, we have to abide by the decisions they've madesey so i must reluctantly oppose the amendment offered to the gentleman. thank you, mr. chairman, i respectfully agree with both of you, and i would prohibit until we reassess and take a look at the workload and it's not applicable to the two examples one of you have given here. your situation, i just happen to be aware of it because i don't represent the district and they offered an early retirement program and they had a workload of necessary personnel and maybe five or six and they're bringing people in temporarily so they responded to it and as soon as

they responded to the opportunity of early retirement, oh, my goodness, now you've only got two people working there and it is no longer necessary. it wasn't a one day a week deal there, not at all and i don't quite get the difference of parts of our state and mr. king get to speak to that, i don't object to that, and the workload is heavy in the spring and heavy in the fall and heavy and it's different than the counties we're talking about. it's diversified and a much, much heavier workload and big farms and livestock and conservation practices and on and on it goes. >> this was not done appropriately, simple fact and you referred to the great job the secretaries did. i don't disagree with that and i know it probably better than the rest of it. i'm not too sure he's ever had a hoe in his hand or driven a tractor and bucked a bale of

hay. you've done that. i've done that. both of you. i just feel like -- i don't know, i wasn't there, he did not have good information. and on the mileage factor next door, you know, farmers don't get there by going to the corn flies, they have to drive the road network and there was fallacy that took place there as well. so i don't think this is a prohib tagz. just a common sense approach and let's do the right thing. i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back. >> i yieldback. >> chairman? >> i have next in the car toe strike the next word of mr. conaway. i will yield back and i will go to the gentle lady after that. >> the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. >> these are hard decisions. we're always going to get pushed back.

i represent a district that's 400 miles wide and 300 miles north and south and many of them are the farm service agency dwarf many of the other agencies that you talk about and these are hard decisions to make. having one person in an office is inefficient because they get sick and so to come in here and use only one criteria for what you do or don't do is in my view wrong. if it had a full slate. >> would the gentleman wreeyiel? >> i reclaim my time. my experience of the state commitet and exercise they went through, they did, in fact, look at workloads and then the early retirement caused a shift in the workloads and everything else and then they're trying to move whether to fire people in one place and hire new people and they're trying to work out the best way they can among the team

they had in place and these are hard decisions. i don't believe we ought to be micromanaging what they're doing. if a hearing is needed on this issue, but to have one state to come in, and drive this policy this way, i do believe -- i do disagree with it, and i would disagree with the amendment because we have to let the agency cut their budgets and that means cutting offices and it will never be an easy process and we need to have the service agencies. >> would you yield another moment? >> i would, sir. >> you're very kind. i appreciate it. i don't disagree with you. you're making good points, but there are these examples in mr. king's district that it wasn't done in the way it should have been done and it's all for

efficiency in this case. >> reclaiming my time. there will always be disruptions of any right sizing or down sizing, whatever you will do and the system will right itself over time because the farmers will demand it, with the folks being served will demand it and the service agent, and in the near-term when these things happen, don't mind if you had a perfect plan and you move forward with the process and trust that the folks there will do the right thing and right size these offices correctly across our states and our districts, and i had a lot of offices closed in district 11, and i did not push back on that. so with that, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> the gentleman yields back, and for what purpose does the gentle lady seek recognition? >> move to strike the last word. >> she is recognized for five minutes. >> this is near and dear to my heart in south dakota. we've had offices that have been

affected but for different reasons as well. common sense would tell you that you would look at an fsa office and when you determine its value to the farmers. i farmed my entire life and spent some time sitting on the state committee in the state of south dakota and recognized that a lot of times when things are put forward in statute such as they were in the 2008 farm bill that they aren't always necessarily followed when they'ric mag the decision on which offices to close. for instance, in south dakota, in light of the closures that will be happening now we have producers this will be driving 70 to 100 meals to access an office when clearly statute says they need to be closer than that. some of the determine sxaigz some of what mr. boswell was referring to talked about qualifications used as the crow flies when common sense would tell you farmers don't fly. they drive their pickup trucks up and down the roads and it makes no sense to look at this and interpret it as the crow

flies. so the heart of the farm service agency would be to serve the producers and to be accessible and to make sure that they have the paperwork done and have people there that i can visit with and so this -- requiring them to consider workload assessment is something that i can support when we lay out another thing that we need to look at, and put an analysis forward on, and just makes common sense. we are here to serve the producers and we are here to make sure that they can get their work done and accessible to them and it's required of the usda before they can close an office that these producers can depend upon. with that, i would yield back, mr. chairman. >> for what purpose does the gentleman from virginia seek recognition. >> i strike the last word. the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. i'm pleased to yield to the gentleman from iowa, mr. king. i thank the gentleman from

virginia, and i just want to add a couple of points to this. first, we've often been admonished to read a bill. it's a bill we worked on for quite some time. it's something that emerged from a decision that was made by the usda and in defense of the secretary of all of the things the gentleman from iowa does has said he does have a pair of boots and regardless of what kind of work he's done and this is a business decision and i give him credit for being a good business manager and it needs to be reviewed and it came from a bill, as i said and i just remind you that it says prohibition on closure. what it says is unless and until you look at this evaluation and the direct language is if the secretary determines after conducting the evaluation required under the subsection that the office has a high workload volume compared to other county offices in the

state. he's already got the discretion. we just direct him to do a business model and use that discretion. this isn't like a break closing and this is a business decision that's made and i point out also that in this underlying bill, we will see crp be reduced from 25 million acres to $25 million acres and many will come out of crp and into production that are the subject of this amendment and it changes the dynamics and it changes the workload. farmers who don't fly, they drive and the distance is down to the decimal point of a mile as to whether it gets closed and whether it doesn't and even if there is no calculation for the cost of inconvenience when they have an extra 40 miles or 50 miles to drive and i know they mean something in texas and this is discretion to the secretary and i urge the