Combs urges rural counties to unite

By LYNN MONTGOMERY | East Texas Edition

Oct. 7, 2004 - "Act together, county with county, on issues," stressed Texas Agriculture Commissioner Susan Combs during a Sept. 27 public meeting in Pittsburg, the last of her 15-city "town hall meeting" stops across the state.

"If you assume you're going to get run over, you're going to get run over," she added.

These statements were made after an audience member stated rural Texas was losing their clout, especially in regards to the proposed Marvin Nichols Reservoir.

"We know Dallas has more political clout than we do," was one statement made during the meeting. But Combs was quick to say not everyone in the metroplex was for building a new reservoir.

To keep rural issues prominent to policymakers, Combs noted she is one of 65 members of a rural legislative caucus; as well is Rep. Bryan Hughes, who was in attendance at the TDA town hall meeting. This caucus meets to discuss daily legislation which effects rural Texas.

"We meet every day during the (legislative) session," Combs said.

The commissioner pointed out session topics that will be of interest to rural citizens during the next legislative session - water and school finance.

"Pay attention to water," she began, and "school finance is going to be a monster," she added.

Combs informed the audience about her developments in her office, including economic development, which "is doing a lot in rural Texas," and ag diversification, in which, "there will be an ag diversification workshop in Nacogdoches on Oct. 13."

According to a Texas Department of Agriculture (TDA) brochure, the workshop's objective is to provide technical assistance, educational programs and applied research results to rural business. The program emphasizes development of natural resource based businesses and rural communities. The goals are to identify ag diversification and rural business opportunities for rural Texans and to provide tools, education and support to all rural Texans. (See this week's Country Calendar for more details.)

Another TDA program is "Texas Yes!" which follows on the heels of Go Texan. The motto of this program is "Saying Yes to Rural Texas."

Audience members at the meeting in Pittsburg also asked Combs about the feral hog problem.

"Feral hogs; don't we just lo-o-ove those guys," Combs stated sarcastically.

The commissioner said she has proposed a pilot project for East Texas counties, in regards to feral hogs, that would implement $500,000. The project will more than likely be implemented by the animal damage control service, which now falls under the Texas A&M Extension Services.

"It will mostly be for cropland which has the most rapid loss of dollars overnight," she said about the hogs' destruction capacity.

During one of the other town hall meeting stops, Combs stated she learned in West Texas, a farmer was importing feral hogs from East Texas. "His neighbors are not happy."

The topic receiving the most attention during the meeting was public school nutrition, in which Combs stated, "I am the one taking soft drinks out of elementary schools."

To help with the alarming trend of childhood obesity, in 2003 the U.S. Department of Agriculture transferred the $1.8 billion Child Nutrition Programs to the TDA.

Statistics state hat at the current pace, it is estimated by the year 2040, the number of overweight Texas adults will increase by 94 percent and the number of obese adults will increase by 174 percent. Obese children have a 50 percent chance of becoming obese adults. And, according to recent statistics, about 35 percent of Texas school-age children are currently overweight or obese.

Combs said, "Food service does a fabulous job with limited resources. Children are eating 60 percent of foods at school."

But one of the big problems, Combs is facing, is parents are not monitoring what their children eat. Another problem is insufficient physical activity.

Combs, who feels strongly about the program, said, "We are killing our kids."

(For more information about the school nutrition policy, go online to www.squaremeals.org.)

In regards to imports and exports, the commissioner told the audience, "Japan, I believe, will open up (imports) to cattle. Animals under 24 months do not have a problem with BSE (mad cow disease). I'm told it will open by Christmas."

In regards to the animal identification program, Combs said, "You need to really think about how you want your premise." Giving an example, she said if you have cattle in two locations, do you want the cattle to be under one number, such as Jones, or have each location separate as Jones A and Jones B.

She concluded by stating she didn't think an electronic id tag would be required, but tagging of some kind would be.