Florida ordered to compensate pig farmer

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Florida, the first state to ban sow stalls following a ballot initiative back in 2002, is also the first to be forced by law to compensate a farmer who shut down his operation following the vote.

In midsummer, a state appeals court ruled that the state must pay farmer Stephen Basford more than US$500,000, plus interest, for depriving him of "all economically viable and reasonable use of his business for a public purpose." (Basford sued the state in 2010 for nearly three times that amount.) The U.S. Constitution's Fifth Amendment prohibits the taking of private property for a public use without just compensation, the so-called "taking clause."

Slightly different bans are in place in eight other states, according to Feedstuffs magazine, and each will have to be tried on its own merits.

Two judges agreed the law took away Basford's right to use improvements to his land, such as barns, a feed mill, an equipment shed, an artificial insemination lab, four water wells and the manure lagoon. A dissenting judge claimed Basford didn't deserve compensation because the sow operation made up only four acres of a 318-acre farm and the "taking clause" didn't apply. BP