2A | SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 5, 2023
Chicken
Continued from Page 1A
According to plans filed with the
state, the facility on Ehlen Road is dou-
bling in size and could grow to triple its
current capacity.
It could become the largest concen-
trated animal feeding operation for
chickens in the state. And it’s all being
done without public input.
Opponents of the plan are upset
about the expansion because of the lack
of input, concerns about what it will do
to the water in the area and an increase
in traffic.
An expansion of this type requires
inspections during and after construc-
tion, but the expansion can be done un-
der the farm’s current permit, according
to a spokesperson for the state.
Expansion plans filed with the state
show the site would initially have eight
new 60-foot-by-652-foot buildings −
more than twice the size of the current
six buildings. That would allow them to
expand to hold an estimated 315,000
chickens at a time, something the state
allows it to do.
“They can essentially double the
number of birds without having to do
anything with their permit,” said Ben
Williams, the president of Friends of
French Prairie, a land use group in the
Aurora area.
The existing buildings would then be
knocked down and replaced by four of
the larger ones. That would give the site
12 barns with capacity for an estimated
552,000 chickens at a time.
There are 23 confined chicken feed-
ing operations in Oregon, according to
state records.
Applications for two more have been
made by contract growers in the Scio
area that would be bigger than the one
Foster Farms is expanding in Aurora.
The proposed sites in Linn County have
met with opposition, and prompted the
bills in the Legislature.
The Statesman Journal emailed Fos-
ter Farms seeking comment about the
expansion at the Aurora site. Bill Mattos
of the Northwest Chicken Council sent a
reply.
“This Aurora farm has raised locally-
grown chicken for more than 40 years.
The expansion of the farm will not rep-
resent an overall increase in capacity for
Oregon but a partial replacement of lost
capacity due to retired farms,” Mattos
wrote.
Mattos said farmers who represent
500,000 square feet of chicken housing
have retired in the past five years with
no replacements built during that time.
He said he expects another 1.2 million
square feet of chicken housing to be re-
tired in the next five years in Oregon,

  
| STATESMAN JOURNAL
“Moving it up to 315,000
birds at a time, they don’t
have to have a public
process.”
Christina Eastman
from Farmers Against Foster Farms
“Moving it up to 315,000 birds at a
time, they don’t have to have a public
process,” said Christina Eastman of
Farmers Against Foster Farms, who
lives next to a proposed chicken grow
facility between Jefferson and Scio.
The Aurora site is allowed to expand
to handle 349,999 chickens per flock un-
der its current permit, according to a
state spokesperson.
If it grows any more, say to the capac-
Construction on the site of four large poultry houses at a Foster Farms facility in ity of 552,000 chickens at a time with
Aurora. PHOTOS BY BRIAN HAYES/STATESMAN JOURNAL the new buildings, it would need a new
permit and trigger a public process.
“By law, ODA conducts a public proc-
Washington and Alaska. ess if the CAFO (Concentrated Animal
Feeding Operations) expansion in-
Decades of Foster Farms cludes moving the existing facility to a
connections defined large operation,” Oregon De-
partment of Agriculture spokesperson
The chicken facility in Aurora is on Andrea Cantu-Schomus said in an
Ehlen Road, about a half mile west of the email.
Donald-Aurora Interchange with Inter- Activists say the system is failing the
state 5, and is located on the Portland public.
and Western Railroad line. Signs opposing a factory Chicken Farm “Local and state permits are sup-
Before Foster Farms purchased the were posted last year along a road in posed to protect our rights to be free
property, it was owned by a contract Scio. from pollution,” said Elisabeth Holmes,
grower for the company. The site also an attorney with Socially Responsible
houses a Foster Farms feed mill. Agriculture Project. “Allowing this facil-
According to Marion County proper- The original applications to the state ity to skirt public notice and review
ty tax records, Del Mesa Farms has in 2003 said the site was to have 161,000 processes would take an antiquated and
owned the property since 1994. or 180,000 chickens per year. According backwards approach to democratic
The president of Del Mesa Farms, ac- to a spreadsheet from the state, the site rights. That’s not what Oregon is about.”
cording to the filing with the Oregon now has up to 200,000 at a time. Under
Secretary of State records, is George its current Large Tier 1 permit, it is al- Growing traffic concerns
Foster, former president of Foster lowed to have up to 349,999 chickens at
Farms. Del Mesa Farms merged with a time. The area around the chicken opera-
Foster Farms in 2011, according to state Foster Farms was purchased by ven- tion has developed significantly in the
records. ture capital firm Atlas Holdings of Con- past few decades with the arrival of
Property tax bills for the farm are necticut in June 2022. At that time, it Pape Machinery and businesses related
sent to Foster Farms, according to tax said Foster Farms had revenues of about to the Interstate 5 interchange, and
records, and the Foster Farms name is $3 billion each year. farmland has been converted for busi-
on the gate of the property. nesses.
Justin Kosta is listed by the state’s No public process The roads around the Foster Farms
agriculture department as applying for property have become heavily used. The
a permit to have the confined feeding In the past two years, contractors for Donald-Aurora Interchange is undergo-
operation in 2003. Kosta was the direc- Foster Farms have proposed building ing an estimated $28 million rebuild.
tor of environmental affairs and sus- concentrated feeding operations for And Ehlen Road has become one of the
tainability for Foster Farms from 2019 to 580,000 and 750,000 birds per flock most dangerous roads in the state since
2022, according to his LinkedIn page. near Scio. Both of those proposals are the Newberg-Dundee Bypass opened in
Also listed on the initial application larger than any current concentrated 2018.
were Jason Gentemann, who is now animal feeding operation in the state. Marion County in 2021 designated
complex manager for the northwest re- The applications for both of those Ehlen Road as a safety corridor, the first
gion for Foster Farms, and James Mar- proposed facilities already have or will county designation of a road in the
natti, the director of environmental af- go through a lengthy public process. state. That means it gets more emphasis
fairs for Foster Farms. They have met opposition from local by law enforcement and is a priority for
The current site was built with seven residents and environmental watchdog construction funds. Someone dies on
45-foot-by-380-foot buildings to grow groups. the road about once a year.
chickens. One of those burnt down One of the Scio sites, J-S Ranch, was Opponents said the planned farm ex-
years ago. Six remain. approved by the state, but has yet to pansion could cause a 200% increase in
start construction. The permit for the truck traffic on Ehlen Road from an esti-
other is still under review. mated 50 truck to 150 truck trips as
The public didn’t know about the ex- chickens are brought in and out of the
pansion of the Aurora facility until Wil- facility.
 
 liams spotted the construction and
alerted others. That’s because Oregon
does not require a public process and
“The scary thing there if you live up
this way is that A, is there a safety prob-
lem? Yes. B, does the safety problem
notification for expansion of an existing need to be addressed? Yes. C, when will
facility. the safety problem be addressed?” Wil-
Foster Farms submitted its proposal liams said.
to the state in August to expand the fa- Because the new buildings are for ag-
cility. In the waste management appli- riculture, Marion County doesn’t re-
cation for the expansion, the site was quire a traffic analysis.
proposed to have 315,000 chickens at a Bill Poehler covers Marion County for
time and estimated to produce 720,000 the Statesman Journal. Contact him at
pounds of manure, which will be stored bpoehler@StatesmanJournal.com
onsite and then shipped out.
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