Private land, public interest : small town meets big dairy

Abstract

This paper examines a grassroots effort undertaken by local residents of the communities of Nora and Warren in northwest Illinois in their attempt to prohibit the construction of a Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation (CAFO) in their county. In particular, it is an attempt to understand and document the process by which a sparsely-populated rural community organizes itself in an attempt to disallow this type of facility from being sited in their area. Like poor urban communities, poor rural communities have found themselves the recipients of the wastes that are unwanted by larger, wealthier, politically powerful communities. Unique to rural communities, however, are the environmental and social impacts which transpire as a result of agricultural industrialization and specifically the siting of CAFOs. The objective of this research is to: 1) identify various members of the community who are working to oppose or support the dairy, 2) determine in what way these individuals have responded to this proposal, 3) construct a narrative of their individual viewpoints and concerns pertaining to the dairy, 4) explore their motivation for supporting or opposing the facility, and 5) investigate the political underpinnings and the state and federal agricultural regulations which despite successful community organizing to oppose the dairy, disallow any meaningful political voice for these residents.