Nonprofit's report cites lack of slaughterhouses in New York

A recent report by Washington D.C. based consumer watchdog group Food and Water Watch finds a lack of slaughterhouses in New York state is affecting small farmers and blames federal policies that, it says, favors larger operations.

The demand for locally produced meat and poultry has grown dramatically over the last five years, due in part, to the farm to table movement with its focus on where and how far the food on your plate is coming from. New York farmers have been stepping up production to meet demand, but without enough United States Department of Agriculture certified slaughterhouses in the state they have had to either travel long distances or wait and possibly lose money.

Ilene Stark, one of the owners of Grazin’ Angus Acres in Ghent, said they drive their cattle two hours to E and L Meats in Richfield Springs, costing them about $100 per trip in expenses.

“It’s definitely an issue,” she said of a lack of USDA certified slaughterhouses in Columbia County.

The art of making maple syrup

Hudson-Catskill Newspapers

NEW LEBANON - The snow was almost completely melted and the daytime temperature was reaching the mid-fifties. The sap was beginning to flow and inside the Hand Hollow Sugar Shack in New Lebanon, Larry Benson, his face reddened by the heat, was stoking the fire that was helping produce the sweet smelling steam rising upward.

Outside near Benson's sugar bush, Bonner McAllester and Susan Cerny, of the Columbia Land Conservancy, were discussing the history and process of turning sap into maple syrup.

The event was sponsored by the CLC, a nonprofit land trust that works in partnership with landowners and communities in the county to protect wildlife habitat, farmland, and rural open space.

"We educate the public on the environment and the importance of preserving it," said Cerny.

Cerny said that the CLC had done similar events to this one in the past.

Behind the two women and the crowd of people there for the event, five miles of plastic tubing snaked from tree to tree and down to the sugar shack.

Inside, Christine Dreyfus, Benson's neighbor and partner in the operation, worked steadily as she explained the process.