THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, December 7, 1994 TAG: 9412070403
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: STAFF AND WIRE REPORT
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
Virginia and three other Southern states that have dramatically lost farm population over half a century will take the biggest cuts when Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy closes 1,070 field offices.
Virginia will lose 57 of its 111 U.S. Department of Agriculture offices. The only South Hampton Roads office to be shuttered is in Virginia Beach, according to a list released Tuesday night by the agriculture department.
An office servicing the Williamsburg, James City County area is also on the department's closure list.
``There probably will be either a closing in Chesapeake or Virginia Beach,'' Randy Jackson, director of Virginia Beach's cooperative extension office, predicted a few hours before the list was released Tuesday. ``But the services would be available for those citizens in the other locality.''
The announcement Tuesday culminates more than two years of wrangling, with Democrats and Republicans prepared to claim credit in the post-election contest to see which party can cut government more.
The plan is part of a larger streamlining effort that could cut the payroll by 11,000 people and save $3.6 billion over five years. The department has 110,000 full-time employees and a 1995 budget of $67 billion.
The department says that farmers will be better served by fewer locations, because service centers for commodity programs, crop insurance, loans and some conservation programs will be put under one roof. A newConsolidated Farm Service Agency will do most of the work.
But many people in farm country were skeptical.
``If this streamlines the situation and doesn't require a lot of sacrifice, we're all for it,'' said Greg Hicks, communications director for the Farm Bureau in Virginia. ``But we have a feeling it's really going to create a difficult situation for some farmers.'
Virginia and the rest of the South will account for more than half of the 1,070 closings, which will drop the number of locations from 3,601 to 2,531. Georgia will be hardest hit, losing 101 of its 193 offices. Texas follows, losing 98 offices. But it also will keep 219 - far more offices than any other state. Tennessee loses 51 of its 123 offices.
It appears from the agriculture department's list that the more rural, farm counties of central and western Virginia will sustain the most losses.
``I think there was some concern in the western counties that if you moved an office, the dislocated folks would have to travel over not-so-good roads,'' Jackson said.
The offices sprouted up because of laws enacted in the Depression era, when 6.8 million farms operated. Today, the nation has fewer than 2 million farms, the fewest since before the Civil War.
In the five decades since the end of World War II, the South has lost 10.5 million farm residents as the area has become increasingly urban and developed, leaving just 1.4 million people on farms. The smaller farms in Appalachia, with older, less-educated owners, have dwindled in particular.
Better highways and telecommunications also have made it easier for farmers to get information and reach government offices.
But as recently as early 1993, agencies that served farmers occupied 3,700 offices in almost every one of the nation's 3,150 counties. Since then, about 100 offices have been closed.
The streamlining push began in earnest in September 1991. The General Accounting Office said then that $90 million could be saved each year by closing the most inefficient offices of the former Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service. The agency handled farm-income and price-support programs that will be taken over by the new farm-service agency.
Tuesday's plan does not affect nearly 7,000 other agency offices of the department that handle everything from forestry to nutrition. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy announced that 1,070 field office
will be closed.
by CNB