Schumer meets with Washington County farmers and officials
US - The Battonkill Railroad Tracks that run through Salem are considered an important link between Washington County businesses and farms. Those tracks allow trains to deliver feed to the Cargill Animal Nutrition Plant, and then that feed goes to local farms. But the tracks are in need of repair and Senator Chuck Schumer took a tour to find out just what's needed.
20 December 2006
1 minute read
Cargill's General Manager Rob Sheffer said, "Without having the railroad, we'd have to put those ingredients transported to Albany and then put on tractor trailers and bring them through."
Senator Schumer said, "We're going to try to help obviously. It's important to the dairy community. It's important in terms of employing people."
After touring the train tracks, Senator Schumer had a chance to meet with local dairy farmers and people who work in agriculture in the county to hear what some of their biggest concerns are.
Sheldon Brown is a Dairy Farmer at Woody Hill Farms. He said, "We've been going through about 12 to 16 months of extremely low milk prices, at least to the dairy farmers."
Washington County got a visit from New York State's Senior Senator Charles Schumer, who toured the Battonkill Railroad tracks. These are important to the local dairy farmers. Farmers say it's important the senator knows just what they need from him to keep their farms running.
Farmers also talked to Schumer about the US Farm Bill which could be signed into law next year and would determine dairy policies for the next five years. Schumer said he's always in favor of helping out dairy farmers.
Source: Capital News
