IATP Hog Report - Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Section 5
Seaboard Farms left Albert Lea, Minnesota to come to
Guymon and began buying land and building a packing
plant. They bought land at inflated prices sometimes
double what it was going for. They were given tax
abatements, zero percent loans, and recently were given a
$10 million tax revenue sharing bond.
Is this economic development? Our tax dollars are going
to pay for a new jail, a new hospital, a new school, more
patrolmen, and new judges because the social services
have definitely increased along with crime and especially
domestic violence. Land prices have escalated to the point
where it is impossible for young farmers to get started and
others to expand. Our ad valorem taxes are increasing but
property values next to a hog site are lowered.
Smalts described a situation that citizens of other states know all too
well: 96 Up until 1991 we had an anti-corporate farming law that
was changed in the twinkling of an eye. Our regulatory
agencies changed rules and regulations without people
even being aware of what was happening to the point
where we have no county regulations, no local government
control.
Carla Smalts passed away in 1998, but her words still speak for many
communities reeling from the impact of corporate hog factories.
In 1999, the North Central Regional Center for Rural Development
(NCRCD) at Iowa State University published a report for the Kerr Center
for Sustainable Agriculture on the economic and social impacts of the
"industrial recruitment strategy" for rural development. The NCRCD used
Seaboard Corporation's move to Guymon, Texas County, Oklahoma as a
case study. 97
The federal, state, and local public sectors have a direct investment of over
$60 million in the Seaboard Corporation operations in Texas County,
provided through publicly repaid bonds, taxes foregone, interest subsidies,
and grants. 98
The state also provided employee training in breeding, farrowing, nursery,
growing and finishing for Seaboard's pork production facilities as well as
company orientation, safety, management training, quality assurance,
maintenance, butchering, boning, equipment and tools handling, Spanish,
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