A farmer in west-central Iowa’s been hit with a heavy fine for polluting. Lawrence Handlos owns and operates at least nine confinement feeding operations in Audobon County, totaling about fifty-thousand animals. A judge in Audubon County has fined him 50-thousand dollars for water-pollution and manure-handling violations at those farms. Last year, the Iowa Attorney General’s office filed an environmental-protection lawsuit against Handlos, alleging water pollution, storm-water discharge violations, failure to get a construction permit and not ensuring that manure-storage structures were built above the groundwater table. The D-N-R helped investigate the impact of the farms on surrounding land and water. Monday’s decree requires Handlos to do more to fix things up and warns against any more violations.
