The Iowa Attorney General is suing a hog farmer over a list of violations. A-G spokesman Bob Brammer the lawsuit names Lawrence Handlos, a livestock confinement operator in AUdubun County with 9 facilities, that according to the petition contain a total of almost 50,000 hogs. Brammer says over time the Department of Natural Resources came to the state’s consumer-protection office to report a number of violations by the feedlots. The A-G’s alleging violations at eight of the nine sites, ranging from a seven-thousand-gallon manure spill to a series of “administrative requirements,” things like lacking manure-management plans and construction permits. Brammer says the suit seeks penalties against the farmer. They could be up to five-thousand dollars per offense, as determined by the court, and the attorney general’s asking for “injunctive relief,” asking Handlos to fix the violations — or the animals will be removed. It’s a serious matter with a major animal-confinement operation, and most of the violations were referred to the AG’s office by the DNR. Among the requirements of the Audubon County farmer are tiling to ensure groundwater’s isolated from manure storage, getting construction permits the farmer never obtained when expanding three of the facilities. The 7-thousand-gallon spill happened last December fifth when some of the waste went into a tributary of the East Branch of the Nishnabotna River.
