OKAgPolicy Today is a morning email containing the day’s top agriculture and policy headlines. The inclusion of a particular story does not equal an endorsement. Subscribe to the email here.
TOP HEADLINES
Oklahoma officials reveal details of historic water rights agreement:
Oklahoma City would obtain the right to Sardis Lake water needed to meet future drinking water and economic development needs, while the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations would receive assurances that certain lake levels and stream flows would be preserved, under a complex water rights agreement announced Thursday [The Oklahoman].
Yet another lawsuit keeps Texas from tapping into Oklahoma lakes, rivers for drinking water:
Water utilities in Dallas-Fort Worth have lost again in court, even though they had nothing to do with the case. A 5-year-old lawsuit involving two Indian tribes and Oklahoma state water regulators has been settled [Dallas Morning News].
Black vultures are protected by treaty, but eating profits of Oklahoma ranchers:
This is the centennial year of the Migratory Bird Treaty. The compact between the United States and Canada assures many birds can travel undisturbed, but the international agreement protects one species that’s a menace to Oklahoma farmers and ranchers [StateImpact Oklahoma].
FEDERAL
Why the GMO-labeling movement fell short:
Yet getting a full GMO label proved tougher than the campaigns by the Humane Society of the United States and others to get millions of egg-laying chickens out of battery cages and pregnant sows out of gestation crates. So why are the animal-welfare advocates succeeding while the GMO labeling camp is falling short [Food & Environment Reporting Network].
Clinton opposes lame duck TPP:
Attempting to counter Donald Trump’s anti-trade rhetoric, Hillary Clinton promised to “ramp up” U.S. trade enforcement and made it clear she would oppose congressional action on the Trans-Pacific Partnership during a lame duck session as well as afterward [Agri-Pulse].
Climate change may be doubted by some, but now it’s the law:
A federal appeals court in Chicago gave a thumbs-up this week to an obscure regulatory practice that helps the U.S. government account for projected costs of climate change [Bloomberg].
STATE
Oklahoma education leaders want teacher pay raises, but still support $140M surplus lawsuit:
Leaders of the Cooperative Council for Oklahoma School Administration are supporting a legal challenge filed in the state Supreme Court this week by Oklahoma City attorney David Slane [KGOU].
Increased regulation may be easing Oklahoma earthquakes:
While the earth continues to shudder more frequently than seven years ago beneath Oklahomans feet, the rate of earthquakes in the state in 2016 is down from last year [USA Today].
MISCELLANEOUS
How rural farming communities are fighting economic decline:
Like many rural towns, Brookfield’s top moneymakers in decades past were agriculture, transportation and manufacturing. While those industries still exist today, each has taken a hit [NPR].
