Poultry Industry: Okla. Didn't Enforce Water Rules

JUSTIN JUOZAPAVICIUS

TULSA, Okla. (AP) — Arkansas poultry companies claimed Wednesday that an Oklahoma agency could have gone to court long ago to enforce water quality standards in a sensitive watershed, but failed to do so until 2005, when it filed a federal lawsuit blaming the companies for pollution there.

That accusation came during poultry company attorneys' questioning of Teena Gunter, the deputy general counsel for the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food & Forestry.

Gunter described a state agency that seemed overwhelmed and understaffed, with only two poultry inspectors responsible for dozens of chicken houses in the 1 million-acre Illinois River watershed, which spans parts of Oklahoma and Arkansas.

Oklahoma is suing 11 companies, accusing them of polluting the river valley with tons of bird waste.

The companies have maintained their contract growers — the farmers who raise the birds — have broken no laws in their handling of the waste because they received permits from Oklahoma and Arkansas to spread the waste as an inexpensive fertilizer on fields or sell it to other farmers.