Thanks for reporting on Cooks debacle

Dear Mr. Loftis, Thank you for finally sharing with the public, a bit about what has been going on ‘behind the scenes’ in Carroll and adjacent counties — specifically about what sounds like a TRAVESTY in so many ways (referring to the cover story entitled: “Feathers fly at legislative meeting” in the Tuesday Feb. 13, 2024, issue of the Carroll County News, and State Senator Bryan King’s followup article entitled “Agriculture officials should resign”).

While we are not in the poultry business, we are well aware of its importance in this region. When we first heard the rumor (late in November 2023) that a poultry business had ceased operations and their healthy and growing birds needed to be killed because the parent company lacked the ability to provide their contract growers the means to feed the birds, we thought that was impossible! With so many entities living without adequate food, surely SOMEONE could humanely “harvest” the birds so that they could be used as a food source and distributed where it was needed!

“Heavens,” my husband and I said to one another, “we could have” bought some of the birds ourselves, had we known there was an issue before the situation had become so dire. We only keep a small flock to provide eggs for personal use, but we always need to add to the flock every year or so. Perhaps, had the situation been made known to the public earlier, some humane compromises could have been developed and put into operation. What a waste of potential food, to say the least! But it was also extremely difficult for the growers to watch their future livelihoods destroyed and, to make matters worse, to THEN be left with so many dead birds to dispose of!!

Your article, Mr. Loftis, indicates that OUR STATE MONIES paid for the “euthanization” (to quote you) of “...about 1.5 million birds…” (quoting Senator King in the subsequent article, p. 4A). The source of some of those monies was ALL OF US — taxpayer citizens!! Did we get a chance to have a say in this terribly irresponsible decision? No, of course not! It must have been an expensive endeavor to kill so many birds when one considers the state workers involved, equipment, and product used when the flocks were “foamed.” Couldn’t SOMEONE have devised an alternative plan using some of the state funds?

I realize that this is a ‘done deal’ and I appreciate Senator King asking for the resignation of agriculture officials Ward and Fisk, both of whom Senator King suggests (and I concur) failed miserably with their part in this very sad scenario. I hope that his endeavors will be successful, but more importantly I hope that if a similar default (affecting so many human as well as animal lives) occurs in the future, someone will have learned from this debacle and devised a compromise solution, which can be put it into operation quickly before another TRAVESTY like this happens.

Once again, thank you for bringing this situation to our attention.

Signed, a concerned citizen, grateful subscriber, and rural neighbor, — Susan E. Bearden