Vote NO on Issue 2, the Livestock Care Standards Board...

I am opposed to Issue 2.

First of all, it's a Constitutional Amendment to create a Board -- and no one seems to be sure what this Board's powers will be, or what limits will be set.

Secondly and more importantly to me, this Amendment is supported by the Farm Bureau -- which means that it is in the best interests of Agra-giants like ADM, Tyson, Cargill and other food manufacturers and buyers -- not necessarily the small, LOCO-producer/seller that I prefer to buy stuff I EAT from.

The Farm Bureau is heart-and-soul in the pocket of these big, corporate interests. Seems to me that they don't need help.

They are trying to cast it as an anti-"Peta"/Humane Society legislation, which their lobby hopes is supposed to strike a chord with conservatives, but from what I have heard, it's the big, corporate owned farms that already treat their product badly who are supporting it -- not the small, free-range, organic farmers.

Right now, I think that it is a vaguely worded attempt to put all farms under the same State bureaucratic control -- a bureaucracy that is already owned, lock/stock/barrel by somebody other than the voters/taxpayers.

Because it’s designed to favour large factory farms, not family farmers, Issue 2 is opposed by the Ohio Farmers Union, the Ohio Environmental Stewardship Alliance, and the Ohio Sierra Club. The editorial boards of Ohio’s major newspapers—including the Columbus Dispatch, Cleveland Plain Dealer, Akron Beacon Journal, and Dayton Daily News—all oppose this effort to enshrine the agribusiness lobby’s favoured oversight system in the state’s constitution.

Folks, Issue 2 are more important than people realize.

The proposed oversight board would strip the Ohio Legislature of its ability to act as the defacto oversight agency that represents the people of Ohio and gives that responsibility to a group of 13 individuals that have no accountability to the citizens of Ohio. Based on this observation, I have decided that I do not want another government agency in this state that cannot be held accountable to the wishes of its residents through their vote.

I will be voting NO on Issue 2. Not because I support the Human Society or Peta, as the Pro-2 Lobby would have you believe, BUT because the people behind the Pro-2 Lobby (The Ohio Farm Bureau and large farms backed by industry giants like Cargill, Tyson and ADM) are trying to modify the Constitution to suit their needs, not ours. If this passes expect all kinds of political pressure to stack this board by people who want to put independent co-ops and family farms out of business.

Please vote NO on Issue 2.