Steve Eisenberg forwarded the following good-news article from the Great Falls Tribune:
BY KIM SKORNOGOSKI • TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER • APRIL 24, 2009
A Teton County jury Thursday sided with an organic rancher, saying it was a property owner’s right to decide how to control weeds along county roads.
For his beef to be certified organic, Carl “Kip” Mortenson must prove his cattle are chemical free for three years — that means no hormones or antibiotics, but it also means they can’t eat hay or grass treated with fertilizers or weed killers.
Mortenson started the three-year process in 2005, arranging with the Teton County Weed Board to hand-pull weeds on his 10,000-acre Montana Spirit Organic Ranch.
In 2006, when a neighbor spotted weeds along the well-traveled Blackleaf Cut Across, a county-owned road that splits the ranch in half, the county went in and sprayed them despite the “no spray” signs.
The county maintained that the organic ranch failed to meet its obligation to control weeds and therefore the agreement to yield responsibility for those weeds to the rancher was null and void.
The county again sprayed weeds in 2007, while legal wrangling was going on and letters were being exchanged between he two parties, setting back Mortenson’s efforts to become organic-certified.
A judge ordered that the county stop spraying weeds along the 3.5 mile road right-of-way last summer.
This week’s three-day trial caught the attention of the growing number of organic producers around the state and the weed districts that are aggressively fighting weeds to prevent them from invading eastern Montana.
Initially, the jury returned to court saying their verdict was in favor of Teton County. But when polled individually, the five-man, seven-woman jury was evenly split on the issue.
The judge sent them back to deliberate further, noting that state law requires civil juries to come back with at least eight of the 12 jurors siding together.
After deliberating for five hours, the jury decided the county was grossly negligent and awarded Mortenson $17,000 — the amount he will have to pay to feed his cattle organic hay for the next year.
Mortenson previously decided to keep his cattle on a 1,300-acre stretch that’s separate from the main ranch, and feed them hay to keep his organic certification on track.
The next step is for Mortenson to try to obtain a permanent injunction against the county.
After the jury returned its decision, Mortenson said that more important than the financial reward is that the jury’s decision will guide weed-district policy around the state.
“I hope that it helps move things forward for organic producers,” he said. “I don’t think this issue is going to go away. I think more and more people are going to switch to organics. I hope (the lawsuit) is of some service beyond my immediate situation.”