{"id":5702,"date":"2018-09-19T11:28:21","date_gmt":"2018-09-19T15:28:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncjolt.org\/?p=5702"},"modified":"2020-06-04T20:52:30","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T20:52:30","slug":"hurricane-florence-lays-waste-north-carolina-hog-farms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/blogs\/hurricane-florence-lays-waste-north-carolina-hog-farms\/","title":{"rendered":"Hurricane Florence Lays Waste to North Carolina Hog Farms"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Hurricane Florence was first predicted to make landfall in Eastern North Carolina earlier this month, Governor Roy Cooper <\/span>issued the unprecedented action of ordering state-mandated evacuations for many ENC residents<\/a>. But in one county alone, <\/span>2.9 million<\/a> residents stayed put: the hogs of Duplin County, N.C. Riding out the storm with them? Their waste.<\/span><\/span>
\nHurricane aside, the Duplin County hogs have had a stormy year. Inundated with high-profile nuisance <\/span>lawsuits<\/a>, neighbors of the county\u2019s industrial hog plants have sought damages for the hassle of living next to the pork producers. These nuisance claims have focused on the industry\u2019s use of \u201c<\/span>anaerobic lagoons<\/a>,\u201d a process of storing hog waste in controlled pools, liquefying the feces, and spraying it on fields as fertilizer. The neighbor-plaintiffs argue anaerobic lagoons bring with them hordes of flies, an overpowering stench, and other negative externalities that severely reduce the quality of life of anyone living next to the hog farms. What\u2019s more, the juries \u2013 themselves selected from a <\/span>region<\/a> whose economy is heavily dependent on agriculture \u2013 have sided with the neighbors. <\/span>Awards topping $473.5 million<\/a> have been awarded to plaintiffs (though later reduced by a judge to comply with North Carolina\u2019s restriction on punitive damages in farm-nuisance claims). <\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Hurricane aside, the Duplin County hogs have had a stormy year. Inundated with high-profile nuisance lawsuits<\/a>, neighbors of the county\u2019s industrial hog plants have sought damages for the hassle of living next to the pork producers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

These jury awards have the North Carolina Legislature concerned. In the midst of these trials, the North Carolina State <\/span>Senate passed Senate Bill 711<\/a> \u2013 in opposition to Governor Cooper \u2013strengthening \u00a0the state\u2019s \u201cRight to Farm\u201d laws. <\/span>All 50 states<\/a> have some iteration of a Right to Farm law, which partially shields farmers from nuisance claims brought by neighbors. Senate Bill 711 amended already existent Right to Farm statutes in North Carolina, providing, in pertinent part, that a plaintiff must show a \u201cfundamental change\u201d in an agricultural operation in order to collect damages. The legislature left very little room for interpretation of \u201cfundamental change,\u201d <\/span>stating that neither<\/a>: \u201c<\/span><\/span>(1) change in ownership or size, (2) an interruption of farming for a period of no more than three years, (3) participation in a government-sponsored agricultural program, (4) employment of new technology, [nor] (5) a change in the type of agricultural or forestry product produced\u201d can prove a fundamental change. But what\u2019s not covered under the newly-widened liability umbrella passed by the legislature? Hurricanes. <\/span><\/span>
\nIn 1999, Hurricane Floyd caused such catastrophic flooding in Eastern North Carolina that the <\/span>anaerobic lagoons harboring hog waste were breached<\/a>, spreading fecal matter across large areas of land and contributing to toxic algae blooms. Hurricane Matthew brought <\/span>the same problems<\/a> of flooding in 2016, and now the state seems doomed to repeat history with <\/span>Hurricane Florence<\/a>. Little has changed since these past hurricane seasons, save perhaps the North Carolina Right to Farm laws. For the first time since Senate Bill 711 was passed, pig waste is projected to <\/span>flood communities surrounding industrial hog farms<\/a>. With the bill\u2019s heightened restrictions on neighbors suing for nuisance, many might be barred from recovering damages. <\/span><\/span>
\n\u201cThe provisions of [<\/span>Senate Bill 711<\/a>] shall not affect or defeat the right… to recover damages for any injuries or damages sustained by him on account of… any overflow of lands.\u201d In this regard, a plaintiff should be able to collect damages in the event of flooding if she can prove a fundamental change in the agriculture operation, though the bill stops short of identifying if flooding itself is a fundamental change. In the weeks and months to come, it will be up to the courts to decide whether Senate Bill 711 will allow neighbors of hog farms to claim nuisance in the event of flooding due to natural disaster. Depending on the outcome, the legal landscape for those affected one way or another by North Carolina\u2019s hog industry may look different come next hurricane season.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Hurricane Florence was first predicted to make landfall in Eastern North Carolina earlier this month, Governor Roy Cooper issued the unprecedented action of ordering state-mandated evacuations for many ENC residents. But in one county alone, 2.9 million residents stayed put: the hogs of Duplin County, N.C. Riding out the storm with them? Their waste. …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5703,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5702"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5702"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5702\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6924,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5702\/revisions\/6924"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}