Concerned Citizens Against Industrial Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) represents the most successful environmental justice movement in Wicomico County, serving as a symbol of hope for present as well as future movements on the Eastern Shore. This community led group was founded in an effort to halt the production of 13 industrial chicken houses near their rural neighborhoods in Wicomico County.
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Background of Trailblazers
This is Gabby Ross, formerly known as Gabby Cammarata. At the beginning of this movement, Ross was a recent graduate of Salisbury University's Envrironmental Studies program. When Ross learned of a proposed development of 13 industrial sized poultry houses within her community she immediately took action.
She recounts speaking to her partner that Friday evening, stating "We have to do something about this! I don't want my well being impacted, I don't want anybody else's well being impacted!" (Ross, 2022). She raised a valid and worrisome point - the proposed development would have been placed directly on top of the Paleo Channel aquifer. This underground aquifer "supplies all of the drinking water for the city of Salisbury as well as the majority of Wicomico County, Hebron, and Delmar. And it honestly is one of the oldest and most best kept resources that Wicomico has," (Ross, 2022). Ross remembers sitting down the same evening of learning about the proposal and typing around 75 letters to fellow neighbors, alerting them of the proposed poultry houses as well as the risks this development would pose to their water supply and quality of life. While interviewing Ross, she shared that her substantial involvement within the movement led to various forms of backlash such as hateful attacks online, termination from employment, property damage (her house was egged on many occasions), and being followed by some who opposed her position on the development. Although worrisome, backlash wasn't the only thing that Ross received from her work in CCAIC. In 2020, Ross received the Water Warrior Award from Waterkeepers' Chesapeake due to her dedication to environmental protection and advocacy. In addition to this recognition, Ross was appointed as the Assateague Coastkeeper in October of 2021 following the retirement of the previous Keeper.
This is Monica Brooks, someone who has always been known as an active member of her community. This facet of Brooks's character was quite prevalent when she joined forces with Gabby Ross to defend their homes from yet another environmental burden on the Eastern Shore.
In 2020, Brooks provided testimony in support of HB 1312. This Bill's purpose was to prohibit the MDE from issuing particular discharge permits for new industrial developments as well as expanding existing ones. In her testimony, Brooks detailed her daughter and granddaughter's battle with asthma - a health complication that had not been apparent within the family until they moved to the Eastern Shore, also noting that "In Wicomico county where we live, 1 in 4 Middle School children have asthma!," (Brooks, 2020). She concluded her statement with a call to action: "Families of the Eastern Shore need your help to obtain protection and justice for all. I'm here as a voice for the thousands of cries that have fallen on the deaf ears of our locally elected officials. Why so much opposition, I ask, to regulating polluters? Is industry more important than people? Excess manure is a problem and the more factory farms there are, the more opportunities there are to make our air more toxic than it already is. As a concerned citizen and Mother of the Eastern Shore, I am asking that you show your support for the citizens of the region and not just an industry by passing a favorable vote for House Bill 131," (Brooks, 2020). The Bill was deemed unfavorable in 2020 and has yet to be revisited nor passed in May of 2022.
Ross and Brooks were the main trailblazers of the movement, but had called upon experts, Kathy Phillips and Maria Payan, for resources and guidance.
During the movement, Phillips held the positon of Assateague Coastkeeper. Payan held (and holds currently) the position of Senior Regional Representative with Socially Responsible Agriculture Project (SRAP), an organization based in Salem, Oregon. Both women served as valuable advisors/mentors to CCAIC throughout the movement.
When asked about her main takeaways from the movement, Payan stated that "Gabby and Monica's unapologetic determination to protect their community shows that the voice of community is very relevant in the decision making processes. Your voices matter and the community members are stakeholders in the decisions that impact their communities. The fact that the project did not move forward is proof of this."
Zulfiqar Ahmed and Mian Iftikhar Hussain of Ashburn, Virginia purchased the land with the intention of fulfilling their contract with Tyson Foods to build 13 industrial CAFOs on their new property. After the initial backlash they faced from community members, the pair reduced their projected number of CAFOs to 10. This backlash continued for nearly years until the land was sold to the Holloway family.
Ross, now the Assateague Coastkeeper, regularly monitors the permit processes for developments within the county in order to prevent potential environmental injustices in the future. She explained that after the property was sold to the Holloways, "I never saw their name pop up on another CAFO application ever again" - referring to the former landowners, Ahmed & Hussain.
environmental & Community hazards
From what she can recall, Ross believes that around 80% of residents around the proposed development site were African American. She explained that communities surrounding the proposed development were primarily comprised of working class families and "a lot of African Americans that live on this side of Salisbury just because of the proximity of how the city of Salisbury has developed over the last couple of decades." She later expanded upon this statement, detailing how "the Shore is just riddled with environmental justice stuff and that's all literally just from the very, like colonial ways that all of these cities and towns were developed. I mean, they had you know a bunch of low income, people of color on the outskirts and then all the people that were living in the city wanted to move out! And then they tried to push everybody in and then, of course, now you have some of the most toxic sites right in the downtown city of Salisbury," (Ross, 2022).
The construction would have been placed directly over the Paleo Channel aquifer, which as stated by Ross, is the main source of drinking water for most residents within this area. Members of the group as well as accredited scientists urged that the proposed chicken houses presented a great risk of contaminating the water source. A report written by Environment America details how "Tyson [Foods] discharged over 2 million pounds of toxic pollutants to the nation’s waters in 2014 --- more by volume than even Exxon Mobil or Dupont -- according to data the company reported to the federal Toxics Release Inventory. Most of the company’s toxic discharges are nitrates, which are linked to blue baby syndrome and some forms of cancer," (John Rumpler, 2016). Ross shared that she was also quite concerned with the possibility of ammonia pollution and deposition from poultry houses.
In addition to contaminating an entire city’s water source, the chicken houses would place community health at risk - potentially spreading infectious diseases through flies, air, and water as well as causing respiratory complications and allergic reactions. Aside from the health hazards that come with thirteen chicken houses near one’s neighborhood, resident’s property values would significantly decrease due to the industrial development.
what did they do, exactly?
Concerned Citizens Against Industrial CAFOs, as a group, worked tirelessly for nearly three years to halt this construction. In addition to holding their own meetings weekly, they made a point to attend every County Council meeting. Ross explained that "some of us were taking days off of work to attend because they have one County Council meeting in the morning at like 10a.m. or something and then they have one once a month at like 6p.m.," displaying how dedicated the group was to making their voices heard.
possible solutions
As of May 2022, Senate Bill 773 or the Community Healthy Air Act has not been passed. "CHAA," as Ross and fellow members of CCAIC tagged the act, would "require the Maryland Department of the Environment to conduct a one-time study that identifies air pollutants emitted by industrial animals farms and assesses any potential public health risks," which would inherently "let public health officials and neighboring communities know what exactly is in the air, whether it complies with air quality laws and regulations, and if further action is required," (Fair Farms Maryland, 2018). Ross noted that the Bill was reintroduced in January of 2022, but was disappointed that "all of these people, including myself, worked on the CHAA for so many years - they introduced it this legislative session - nobody said anything to any of us," further explaining that the Bill has been diluted every time it has been brought into session.
The accomplishments of CCAIC are still felt today, as they influenced the County Council to impose stricter regulations for poultry house zoning within the county. Prior to the group's pressure, "there was one line in county's code pertaining to poultry houses" and the only requirement for these houses was an "100 foot setback." After members of CCAIC voiced their opinions at a Wicomico County Council meeting, the Council implemented a series of poultry house regulations including: "a 400 foot setback for poultry houses from any building not on the same property," "a 200 foot setback from all property lines," and "a requirement for any exhaust fan on a poultry house facing away from buildings on another property be at least 500 feet away; 600 feet if that fan is facing neighboring homes or buildings," (WBOC, 2016).
additional resources
- WBOC report Ross referenced during her interview, published after her first time speaking during a County Council Meeting: https://www.wboc.com/archive/group-opposing-wicomico-county-chicken-farm-wants-to-be-heard-by-county-council/article_4d6d01b4-b08a-5e95-aaa6-963afca86acf.html
- The documentary Ross referenced during her interview: https://righttoharm.film/#about
- Monica Brooks's testimony in support of HB 1312: https://mgaleg.maryland.gov/cmte_testimony/2020/ent/3686_03042020_105330-394.pdf
- A report detailing Tyson Foods's history of polluting water sources: https://environmentamerica.org/news/ame/report-tyson-1-water-polluter-among-agribusinesses
- Explanation of Senate Bill 773 from Fair Farms: https://fairfarmsnow.org/marylands-community-healthy-air-act/
- WBOC report on stricter poultry house regulations: https://www.wboc.com/archive/new-poultry-zoning-regs-passed-in-wicomico-county/article_85762982-6d2c-51e2-aaab-2b31b60acab5.htm
Below is an article written by Jeremy Cox for The Daily Times on February 7, 2018. The article explains the story of the scrapped Naylor Mill Chicken Farm project in Wicomico County.
Below is the transcript of the interview conducted with John Cannon, president of the Wicomico County Council.