Coffeeville FSA Could Be Shuttered
Staff Report
COFFEEVILLE — The Farm Service Agency in Coffeeville is one of 259 offices, labs and other facilities nationwide targeted for closure by the U.S. Agricultural Department.
The USDA announced the potential closure Monday, as Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack reports the agency’s goal is to save $150 million annually. The agency’s total budget is $145 billion.
Other proposed closures across the state include the Animal Plant Health Inspection Service in Gulfport; the Farm Service Agency offices in Ashland, Ackerman, Hernando, Fulton, Monticello, Raleigh and Purvis; the Food and Nutrition Service office in Jackson; and the Rural Development office in Hernando.
That Farm Service Agency handles disaster assistance, farm loans and crop subsidies, among other programs.
Monday’s announcement was not a surprise reported Daryl Burney, who has served as the Chairman of the county’s Soil and Water Conser-vation District since the late 1980’s. The county’s soil conservation office shares space in the Coffeeville FSA office.
“Closing some of the smaller offices has been a recurring theme for a number of years and they have been looking at this office,” Burney told the Herald. If the closure becomes final, it could affect three or four jobs, according to Burney, but an even larger concern is the landowners across the county.
“It will be a disadvantage to the local land owner, this county has a high number of elderly land owners, minority land owners and small tract land owners,” Burney noted.
Currently there are 671 caucasian land-owners and 170 minority and other landowners in Yalobusha County served by the county’s FSA office. Services provided by the Coffeeville office would be moved to the Grenada office.
Vilsack said public hearings will be held in counties where Farm Service Agency offices are to be closed.
Nationally the USDA plans to shut 131 FSA offices in 32 states, with largest number of closures in Arkansas, Tennessee and Texas.
Vilsack added the closures and other cost-cutting measures will allow the agency to keep investing in programs that make agriculture more productive, including maintaining credit to farmers, providing aid to beginning farmers and scientific research.
Vilsack said he didn’t anticipate widespread layoffs, in part because 7,000 USDA employees took early retirements over the past year. He said the agency is trying to do more with less in light of federal cutbacks, and many of the offices to be closed had few employees or were near other offices.
