 Lucas represents approximately half the state of Oklahoma,
with a constituent population of approximately 700,000. He is a
fifth-generation rancher and farmer, and while he serves his state
in Washington, D.C., his wife manages the cattle ranch in Oklahoma.
Lucas was elected to Congress in 1994. Today he serves as the
chairman of the House Ag Committee and also is a member of the
Financial Services Committee.
Lucas began by drawing a laugh from the audience when he noted
that the states of Illinois and Oklahoma share a common thread in
that they have to deal with foreign policy and international
relations.
"In Oklahoma I have to deal with the Republic of Texas; here in
Illinois you have to deal with the Republic of Chicago," he said.
"But in the end we have to do what is in their best interest
whether they realize it or not," he added.
The focus of Lucas' discussion fell to the passing of a new
five-year farm bill. The current farm bill is set to begin its
expiration in September.
Lucas said that even if the bill falls to the wayside, the
current farm bill will assist with drought crop assistance through
this harvest. The exception to this is the livestock drought
assistance. He said that without a new bill, there will be nothing
in the way of relief funding for livestock producers.
Lucas said also if the farm bill does not pass, then farm
governance will fall back to a program that was passed in 1949. He
said this is a program that no longer fits the American farmer, and
if the government goes back to that bill, the American farmer will
not be well served by it.
Lucas told the group that part of what he has faced with
designing this new bill is the tremendous turnover of congressmen on
his committee. He said one third of the Congress members in office
today were not in office when the last farm bill was passed in 2008.
He said the freshmen and sophomore congressmen on his committee
present their own set of challenges. He said 23 of his 46 committee
members are ‘puppies" who have not been through the process of
creating a farm bill.
Another challenge, he said, was the national debt and the annual
operating budget. He said the federal government is now $16 trillion
in debt and is going on its fifth year of $1 trillion annual
deficits.
"And throw on top of that the drought, and we have an amazing
mess," he concluded.
He said the committee has developed a bill and it has been passed
by the Senate. The House is following behind and has not yet passed
the bill.
Lucas said the Senate had trimmed approximately $23 billion in
their reforms. They knocked about $4 billion out of the nutrition
program, which is 80 percent of the bill. They took approximately $6
billion out of the conservation title and about $14 billion out of
the commodity title.
On the House side, in what has passed out of committee, Lucas
said the savings were basically the same on the $14 billion on the
commodity side and $6 billion on conservation. Where it differs is
in the area of nutrition, where the House committee trimmed out
approximately $16.5 billion from the nutrition program.
Lucas said the nutrition title is one of the areas where there is
controversy. He said the House committee takes the stand that if
someone wants food stamps, they have to prove they are eligible. He
said the committee wanted no more "broad category eligibility."
To explain with an example: In states such as Illinois, where the
Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, is in place,
those who qualify for LIHEAP automatically qualify for the full
benefit of food stamps regardless of income or assets. He said even
if the LIHEAP payment is only $1, they still get the food stamps.
He said this is very controversial because many of his
counterparts want automatic eligibility.
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He said another area they have cut back on is in the conservation
title. He said they have cut the Conservation Reserve Program from
32 million acres to 25 million acres. Lucas said that because of
grain prices, many of the CRP acres coming out of the program are
not being re-signed but instead are going into grain production.
In the commodity title the House committee picked up the language
from the Senate on revenue protection and added to it language for
price protection. If this is passed, farmers will have the choice of
revenue or price. The farmer would be committing to this for the
full five-year term of the bill.
Price protection would be set based on price records over the
year and set substantially lower than the current market price. If
the commodity prices fall to a certain level, then the price
protection would kick in and farms would receive a benefit based on
the difference.
Lucas said that of course if commodity prices remain high, then
there would be no payout in this type of program. On the revenue
side of the benefit, there still could be a payout. The revenue side
would pay out based on what the revenues of the harvest should be
compared with what they actually are.
Lucas said the greatest controversy in the House was with the cut
to the nutrition program. He said he lost four Republicans and seven
Democrats who were opposed to cutting the food stamps. He said no
one seemed concerned about the cuts to the commodity benefits.
At the end of his talk, a member of the audience asked about the
food stamp program even being a part of the farm bill.
Lucas explained that the farm bill became a part of government in
1933, and until the 1960s it passed with relative ease.
In the 1960s, Congress began to realize that urban districts were
growing and rural populations were shrinking. There were several
movements in the works regarding equality and reform, which included
community service programs that catered to those who were struggling
in urban settings.
While more attention was being given to those areas, it was
becoming more difficult to get anything for a farm bill. In the end,
the food stamp program was incorporated into the farm bill to get
the farm bill passed.
The food stamp program started out small, but it kept growing and
the ag committee needed it to pass the farm bill each time. Over
time, the food stamp program as part of the nutrition title became
the larger part of the whole bill.
"I understand how important producing food is," he said. "And I
try to explain to my friends back East that it doesn't matter how
much money you give people if there is nothing on the shelf to buy
because you forgot about production."
Lucas said he would be happy to have a farm bill that addressed
farm needs, but he doesn't have the following for it. He has to keep
the food stamp program in his bill to get it passed. However, he
said that didn't mean he couldn't work to make those drawing food
stamps more accountable.
[By NILA SMITH]
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