"Significant Deficiencies" Found

Copyright 2008 Congressional Quarterly, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Congressional Press Releases

October 22, 2008 Wednesday

PRESS RELEASE

967 words

GAO REPORT AGAIN FINDS "SIGNIFICANT DEFICIENCIES" IN CIVIL RIGHTS AT USDA

CHARLES GRASSLEY, SENATOR, SENATE

For Immediate Release

GAO Report Again Finds "Significant Deficiencies" In Civil Rights At USDA

Contact: Jennifer Mullin 202-224-3254

October 22, 2008

WASHINGTON, D.C. - A report released today by the independent investigative arm of Congress, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), says that the civil rights efforts overseen by Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are marked by "significant deficiencies" and recommends new accountability structures to correct ongoing failures.

Specifically, GAO found that USDA fails to track and adjudicate civil rights complaints, fails to provide accurate data regarding minority participation in USDA programs, and fails to adequately undertake strategic planning with respect to civil rights. The report was conducted at the request of U.S. Senators Tom Harkin (D-IA), Richard Lugar (R-IN) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and U.S. Representatives Joe Baca (D-CA) and Edolphus Towns (D-NY). The lawmakers asked the GAO to focus especially on the performance of the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, a position created in the 2002 Farm Security and Rural Investment Act and tasked with directing civil rights efforts across USDA.

Earlier this year, the lawmakers protested directly to USDA when reports surfaced that the Department obstructed and temporarily shut down the GAO investigation. According to GAO, USDA officials delayed providing information and, in some cases, instructed USDA employees not to comply with GAO.

"I am disheartened to learn that, despite Congressional direction, USDA continues to fail in its civil rights performance," said Harkin. "And even more disappointed by USDA's rejection of key recommendations offered by GAO. It's time for a new approach on this issue, and I'm grateful to GAO for providing a set of specific recommendations for the consideration of the committee."

"More of the same from USDA in the area of civil rights is not acceptable," Grassley said. "The new report from GAO validates and even expands what other assessments have found about decades- long problems. The leadership of the Department of Agriculture needs to make the GAO recommendations a priority and do everything in the agency's power to make measureable improvements to the way it handles civil rights issues."

"After we held hearings on this matter in the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, Congress created the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the USDA and tasked that position with resolving long standing discrimination concerns. In 2006 we asked the GAO to provide us with an objective analysis. The findings of this report are troubling. After six years, improvements still have not been good enough," Lugar said.

USDA has a long history of failing to enforce civil rights laws and to ensure that minority farmers and ranchers are able to access assistance and benefits under USDA programs. In the 2002 farm bill, Congress included several initiatives to strengthen civil rights enforcement and to assist minority farmers and ranchers. First, to create new accountability for civil rights compliance across USDA programs and offices, Congress created the position of Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, tasked by statute with "ensuring compliance with all civil rights and related laws....coordinating administration of civil rights laws within the Department....and ensuring that necessary and appropriate civil rights components are properly integrated into all strategic initiatives of the Department and agencies of the Department (7 U.S.C. 6918(d))." Second, to track progress over time, Congress also required the Department of Agriculture to report annually on the participation rate of minority farmers and ranchers in Department of Agriculture Programs.

To determine whether, as a result of this legislation, the Department of Agriculture has improved its civil rights performance, Senators Harkin, Lugar, and Grassley, as well as Representatives Baca and Towns, asked GAO to investigate USDA civil rights actions since the 2002 farm bill, including the actions of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights in 1) resolving discrimination complaints, 2) reporting on minority participation in USDA programs and, 3) strategic planning for ensuring USDA's services and benefits are provided fairly and equitably.

A copy of the GAO report is available by clicking here <http://harkin.senate.gov/documents/pdf/GAOReportUSDA.pdf> .

Key GAO Findings

-- The Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights has not achieved its goal of preventing backlogs of pending civil rights complaints, with some complaints still pending from the early 2000s. In addition, GAO found that progress report from the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights regarding the extent of and resolution of complaints have been inconsistent.

-- The reports published by the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, required by law, regarding minority participation in USDA programs are unreliable and of limited usefulness. Furthermore, USDA has not taken the steps necessary to improve the reliability of the data.

-- The strategic planning of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights has not included the necessary steps to "provide fair and equitable services to all customers and uphold the civil rights of its employees."

To remedy the lack of civil rights compliance at USDA, GAO recommended three possible actions.

-- A statutory performance agreement containing measurable goals and expectations in key performance areas.

-- An independent and empowered civil rights oversight board tasked with approving, monitoring, and evaluating USDA civil rights activities.

-- An effective ombudsperson, "independent, impartial, and fully capable of conducting
meaningful investigations of USDA actions."

October 22, 2008

Somebody else is blogging

Somebody else out there is blogging about the USDA's history of ignoring civil rights complaints of Black farmers.

Check out this link.

And, read further on this blog as a variety of writers write about concerns for rural America. I'm living in rural America and am beginning to hear more of what worries people in small-town USA.

Coming to Town

One of the most difficult things about transitioning from academic life to life in Oklahoma has to do with students. Yesterday I walked across the campus at the university here in town, not as a faculty member, but as a visitor, but it all felt familiar, all of the energy, the passion, the conversations, the ideas, and on and on we could go.

So, it is with much enthusiasm that my wife and I approach this weekend. It's that way because Social Justice Team IV is coming to town. Perhaps that is an odd way of "labeling" these three good people, but, indeed, they do form Team IV: Ruqayyah Samia, Daniel Haile, and Ty Mansfield, all students in the COAMFTE-approved marriage and family therapy program at Abilene Christian University. All such programs do a good job of teaching bright students how to become good marriage and family therapists. ACU is a bit different in that it engages the best and the brightest, not just to become good therapists, but to do so for the sake of the Kingdom. Along the way, several of them over the past four years have allowed their hearts to lead them to join the social justice team work, work that is explained in the header up to your right from this page. I'm proud of those students, present and past, because they are indeed advocating for good in a lot of places around the country these days.

So, this weekend will be a sweet one, and it'll end too quickly. We'll show them around the city, eat some good food, catch up a bit, and then we'll jump into what we'll do in Memphis at AAMFT, and hopefully in Ft. Worth at TAMFT in January, and especially what we'll do as we continue to study white privilege in the area of farming. Is it there? I think it is. We'll see. We'll let you know what we come up with on these pages.

New Farmer Options

The Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service of the USDA is holding one last listening session in Little Rock, Arkansas on October 22 at the Risk Management Agency. The 2008 Farm Bill is making available $18 million in fiscal year 2009 for the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program via a competitive grant process. See this link for details.

The USDA acknowledges that small farms are an "important sector of U.S. agriculture," and that in 2003, "small-scale enterprises make up 91 percent of all farms and ranches in the United States, hold 70 percent of total farm and ranchland, and produce 27 percent of our food and fiber.In addition, more than half the hay and tobacco, and more than 30 percent of cash grains, dairy products and beef cattle come from small farms and ranches." See this link for more details.

This site goes on to say: "Small-scale producers come from a variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds. Some families have been working on the land for generations; others are new to the business. Some families depend on small-scale production as their principal means of economic support; others choose it primarily as a lifestyle. Underlying this diversity, however, small-scale farmers and ranchers share characteristics that make them a valuable resource for the United States over and above to the crops and livestock they produce: a commitment to agriculture, strong links to local communities, and a need to love and care for the land."

Small-scale farmers, especially "socially disadvantaged farmers" are encouraged to pursue these opportunities. This is a small opportunity for adult children of farmers who have struggled to hold on to their land to get back into farming and ranching.

My only regret is that there is so much red tape involved, and it looks like the process is complicated, but those are simply signs of the times in which we live.

So, encourage any small-scale farmer, or family farmer, that you know to look into these options. I can think of some folks I plan to call.

Charlie Wilson and Me

Charlie Wilson and I have a few things in common. No, maybe we have three things in common. We're both from smalltown USA, Trinity, Texas, and graduates of Trinity High School. Yes, we both are even listed as "Tiger Heroes." See this page if you're unconvinced. Yes, a bit ostentatious, but it'll make the point. The book about him was a heavy read, so it was simply a case of wait until the movie comes out to see what he did. Even as a kid growing up in East Texas, he was a larger than life character, but not one whose paths ever crossed with mine.

In the movie, Tom Hanks portrays him in "Charlie Wilson's War" as a complex and passionate man who is moved by what he sees when he goes to Afghanistan and visits with children whose arms have been blown off by the atrocities of the Russian army in their attempt to overtake the land and its people. That was a moving scene in the movie as the two children with the translator talk to Wilson. From that point on, Wilson was committed as long as he had breath in his body and a member of Congress, that he would fight for these people.

In a similar way, I still recall the interviews with farmers in Texas, Louisiana, and Georgia in the mid-90s. As I've said on several occasions, "I was not prepared for what I saw, felt, and heard." On the other hand, when those experiences come up with people of color, their response is typically, "Of course! What did you expect?!" How naive I was, how out of touch I was, with what had been happening on the farms and in the communities where African American farmers came face to face with the racist implications of policies for farming loans, etc. that should have been made for a playing field in which all farmers, every color dark or light, could negotiate.

So, in those days, the images of strokes, kidney failure, loss of life and farm land and farming and family, blindness, and on and on and on, moved me deeply, and they still do today.

The story has not been completely written, that of what will happen to the black farmers of our land. Like the line in the Wilson movie relative to Afghanistan, "the ball keeps bouncing and bouncing," and where will it stop bouncing for farmers. Will the 2008 farm bill and its economics and policies which address the issues for socially disadvantaged farmers work? Will the opportunity for those farmers shoved aside under Pigford actually make a difference, efforts for those 70,000 black farmers left in the dust of red tape as "late filers?"

Anyway, I admire Charlie Wilson's passion for righting wrongs. He saw children with arms blown off. I saw farmers who'd lost much of their health, livelihood, and trust in the system.

I'm just wondering. Did Charlie Wilson ever meet any Black farmers in his district? Maybe

our paths will cross some day and we can talk about that.

Another good video that captures the struggle

Important message from the Rural Coalition

URGENT: USDA Sign-On Letter

The Farm and Food Policy Diversity Initiative and the Sustainable Ag Coalition are circulating the following sign-on letter to Agriculture Secretary Schafer regarding the new Office of Advocacy and Outreach created in Section 14013 of the 2008 Farm Bill. The Office of Advocacy and Outreach will be responsible for ensuring that small, beginning, and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers have access to USDA programs. In general, it will also ensure coordination between, monitoring of, and goal-setting for all USDA programs that address small, beginning, and socially disadvantaged producers. USDA has yet to establish the new office and there is concern that they may not place it within executive operations under the Secretary or transfer programs from the Office of Civil Rights, despite the clear statutory directive to do so.

What to do:

The deadline for sign-on is COB this Thursday, September 4. Please email your organization name, city and state and a contact person to Lpicciano@ruralco.org if your organization would like to sign on.

For further information contact: Ferd Hoefner, Sustainable Agriculture Coalition at fhoefner@sustainableagriculturecoalition.org, Traci Bruckner, Center for Rural Affairs, at tracib@cfra.org, or Lorette Picciano, Farm and Food Policy Diversity Initiative atlpicciano@ruralco.org.

The Honorable Ed Schafer
Secretary of Agriculture
200-A Jamie L Whitten Building
Washington, DC 20250

Dear Secretary Schafer,

As you move forward with the implementation of the Food, Conservation and Energy Act of 2008, we the undersigned believe it is critical that the newly created Office of Advocacy and Outreach (section 14013) be implemented in a manner that allows it to best achieve its important mission. In creating this office, Congress identified the clear need to place direct emphasis on small farms and beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers. In order to achieve the mission of assuring access for these emerging sectors of US agriculture to USDA programs, coordination and accountability across all USDA mission areas is critical. It is therefore essential that this office be placed at the Departmental level, as Congress provided, directly reporting to you, the Secretary of Agriculture. In this and other sections of the 2008 Farm Bill, Congress also recognized the need to make special provisions for the often similar needs small, beginning and socially disadvantaged producers face in achieving viability and profitability. As such, two separate but very much related groups were established within the Office, each adding new functions while continuing and expanding previous work of significant but previously unrelated entities:

1. The Socially Disadvantaged Farmers group includes the new Advisory Committee on Minority Farmers established under Section 14009, and the Farmworker Coordinator established in Section 14013. The existing functions of the current Office of Outreach and Diversity which serves socially disadvantaged producers and minority serving institutions are also transferred to the Office of Advocacy and Outreach from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, thereby allowing the ASCR to focus solely on the critical tasks of assuring USDA compliance with civil rights laws and addressing the many unresolved civil rights cases and issues. This transfer allows the functions of the current Office of Outreach and Diversity to be separated from the issues of program and service discrimination and folded into a special group that focuses on building a better present and future in agriculture for socially disadvantaged producers.

2. The Small and Beginning Farmers and Ranchers group is given responsibility for continuing and building upon the functions for the existing Office of Small Farms Coordination, the Small Farms and Beginning Farmer and Rancher Council, and the Advisory Committee for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers, plus a consultative role on the administration of the Beginning Farmer and Ranchers Development Program administered by CSREES.

No less important than providing a new home and enhanced responsibilities for these ongoing programs and functions is the new law's wider vision of the duties of the new office, including establishing departmental goals and objectives, measuring outcomes, and providing input into programmatic and policy decisions. These new functions require office location outside of any agency or mission area. In the 2008 Farm Bill, Congress also adopted a wide variety of special provisions to address the needs of both socially disadvantaged and beginning farmers. Implementation of these provisions also underscores the urgent need for a separate office at the Departmental level that coordinates and monitors outreach and services across all mission areas to assure access to new programs and to measure and report results.

For these reasons, the legislation purposely includes specific language that ensures this office would be created at the Department level. Section 14013 states, "Secretary shall establish within the executive operations of the Department an office to be known as the 'Office of Advocacy and Outreach.'" There can be no other meaning to this language than as to create this office as a separate office directly under and reporting to the Secretary, rather than under or through any other office, mission area, Assistant Secretary, or Under Secretary. We urge you to move forward with this office as a clearly separate office, equal to other Executive Operations offices in a timely manner.

As regulations to establish the Office of Advocacy and Outreach are created, it is essential this office and its two branches be rooted in and enhance relationships to the many agencies of the Department through the existing networks of Outreach and Small Farm Coordinators. The implementation team and the new directors and staff of the office must include Coordinators and others with significant experience working with small farms and with beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers and deep understanding of the current and emerging programs of the Department.

The Department's focus on small farms and beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers as a key sector of agriculture has been sporadic and fractured to the detriment of the producers. The USDA should make full use of this new authority to devote the full front-and-center attention that will allow this sector to flourish to the benefit of rural communities and our food system.

Sincerely,

Rural Coalition/Coalición Rural, Washington, DC
Intertribal Agriculture Council, Billings, MT
And more.

Cc: Sen. Tom Harkin
Rep. Collin Peterson
Sen. Russ Feingold