As part of the commentary on the column published August 29th, I quoted verbatim the email I received from the Department of Ecology when I asked them for comment and provided my reaction. That email is also posted; read it for yourself and decide if the quote pulled for the column was a fair representation of their position.
And as always, reference links are included at the bottom of the Substack. Here’s the column:
And here’s the commentary, with reference links and the Dept of Ecology email below.
The good news, a week after filing I got a notice that our application was accepted and we’re getting our money back. Not the state’s money, our money.
My first draft of the column did not include a quote from the Department of Ecology, but my editor insisted that I needed to reach out. In my opinion (and this did after all appear on the Opinion page), Ecology messed up in not putting a workable system for the ag exemption in place as they were originally tasked to do, and I didn’t see what I needed to ask. But my editor was right, it was the right thing to do. I called and chatted with a nice woman in Ecology’s Communications department, and we had an exchange by email (copy posted to the Substack). Briefly, it went like this:
Ecology said: “It’s not accurate to say that there is no exemption in place. The recent ruling out of Thurston County made it clear that the Department of Ecology is implementing the law within our authority as an agency.”
In rebuttal, that ruling out of a Thurston CountySuperior Court known to rubber stamp agency decisions has already been appealed to the Washington State Supreme Court, so it is inaccurate to imply that it’s settled.
Next, Ecology said:
“It’s up to fuel suppliers to claim exemptions provided in the Climate Commitment Act and sell fuel to farmers without surcharges--they have an economic incentive to do so. Ecology cannot force suppliers to change their prices, but what we can and have done is provide guidance and one-on-one support on how to track and report exempt fuel sales accurately.”
To that I say . . . Ecology was told from the beginning that this was not going to work. Asking wholesale suppliers to figure out what an end user was buying fuel for was like asking potato growers to figure out if the guy buying potatoes at Yokes was making French fries or mashing them as a base for gravy. It didn’t work, and it became so clear that it wasn’t working that the legislature had to step in to push a rebate program.
And the last statement from Ecology was this: “We understand that challenges remain, but there has been a lot of progress on this issue. There are now fuel suppliers in nearly every part of the state claiming the exemption. We also support the $30 million that the Legislature approved to help farmers who have paid CCA surcharges as suppliers develop their systems for claiming the exemption. We appreciate the agricultural community’s engagement on this new climate policy, and we’ll continue to be responsive to concerns.”
Which is basically a way of saying thank you to the legislature for bailing them out. “Nearly every” means not statewide. I also noticed this statement still puts the onus on “suppliers to develop their systems for claiming the exemption.” While major agri-business near the Idaho and Oregon borders can just buy fuel outside the state by the tanker load or make trackable bulk purchases, small farm and ranch operations buying retail will still be left collecting those little slips of curly paper printed in disappearing ink, at least when the gas station pump isn’t out of paper. The rebate program covered 2023. What’s the plan for 2024?
As always, reference links are included on the Substack post to this week’s background reading. You are invited to subscribe for notifications of new content on a variety of regional topics, with or without a pledge. For paid Subscribers, I’m planning a new series with more national commentary as the election unfolds. Stay tuned, as the old radio shows used to say.
Thank you for listening.
REFERENCE LINKS:
Original column: https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2024/aug/28/sue-lani-madsen-ecology-dropped-the-ball-dol-picke/
DOL website and FAQs: https://dol.wa.gov/agricu.../faq-agriculture-support-program
DOL form to file for rebate to cover ag exemption: https://agsupport-wa.zendesk.com/hc/en-us
Department of Ecology statement:
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