Friday, December 18, 2015

Update: Mark Baker still under scrutiny

In his satirical novel, Animal Farm, George Orwell wrote, “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”

George Orwell was right – some animals are more equal than others.

Take Mark Baker's Mangalitsa Hogs, for instance; raised on their family farm in Marion called Bakers Green Acres. The Baker hogs are definitely more equal than their pink, cookie-cutter consistent counterparts who are raised just as equal as one another; sometimes in dreary, Orwellian quarters known on some commercial farms as Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFO). That's an example of a CAFO above. Total animal equality. No pig first among his peers.

But Baker's Heritage Hogs, raised from birth to slaughter on the farm, enjoy the pasture life as "dirt pigs."

According to the description on the Bakers Green Acres web site, they are finished with special diets including grains and even acorns, which makes their meat desirable to foodies and chefs. In fact, some of them rely on the pasture raised, carefully fed end product to make specialty foods like sausage or prosciutto.

It was at one of these establishments that serves up Baker's specialty pork
recently that the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD) questioned a packaging issue with one of Baker’s products.

That led to the issuing of a search warrant, signed on Dec. 17 by Missaukee County District Judge Audrey Van Alst. Around 9:30 a.m., Baker said representatives from MDARD, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), and Michigan State Police Troopers arrived at his property to execute the search warrant.

Baker said that the warrant gave them the authority to take photos and copy records; size food in violation of the food law; and take any other action as is deemed necessary to follow the food law.

The reason given on the warrant was that, because of the alleged problem that MDARD had with packaging, they were searching for food “found to be suspected to be adulterated, misbranded, a nuisance, or a risk to the public.”

But let’s be honest here: The problem isn’t in the packaging; the problem is with Mark Baker.

Mark, who is retired from the United States Air Force, has been farming Bakers Green Acres for more than a decade now, with the help of his wife, Jill, and their eight children. It is truly a family operation. It's their livelihood - for now.

But sadly, a few years ago, the jackhammer of bureaucratic skullduggery began to chink away at the Bakers' way of life, thanks to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
In 2010, the DNR issued an Invasive Species Order prohibiting "feral swine."

It went into effect on April 1, 2012. The section which the DNR contends applies to the Bakers' pigs specifically prohibits the possession of any of the following live species:

"Wild boar, wild hog, wild swine, feral pig, feral hog, feral swine, Old world swine, razorback, eurasian wild boar, Russian wild boar (sus scrofa Linnaeus). This subsection does not and is not intended to affect sus domestica involved in domestic hog production."

We had a state department (DNR) that appears to be breaching the levy of its authority in the name of "public safety"; and agricultural special interests appear to be supporting that same overreach that exerts certain force over farm animals on private land (while being careful not to affect "hog production" - for some producers, of course).

That’s how Mark Baker ended up fighting that department over his farm animals, even being fined $10,000 per each pig (to the tune of $700,000).

But why?

Why should Mark Baker have been made to give up his property - his livelihood, his Heritage pigs - by order of a rogue band of bureaucrats who wrote their own definitions of feral and domestic based on so-called "scientific" data?


His land was certainly not public domain. His animals are quite healthy, very marketable, and live under the husbandry of humans; and unlike these beasts off the leash from the DNR, seem largely uninterested in busting through fences into territory where they aren't meant to go.

He shouldn't. And as The People, we should be deeply offended and gravely concerned when our rights are so blatantly disregarded.

The DNR, using their own authority to add or delete species as restricted or prohibited, through the Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act, Act 451 of 1994 [324.410302(1)], somehow used the prohibition of feral pigs to cross that bridge from forest to farm; from wildlife to livestock.

But since these bureaucrats are unelected and unaccountable to The People, what do we do when they breach the levies of their authority?

The DNR should have no jurisdiction over private property at any time. They should have no jurisdiction over any animals other than those that are wild and live on state land at any time. Livestock is off limits. However, because they defined "feral" and "domesticated" for the purpose of enforcing their order, they have found a way to exert control over private property and what might better be defined as "livestock."

Several years after Mark’s lengthy legal battle, the Attorney General’s office dropped the case against them, saying that their hogs were “compliant.”

(Nothing changed, by the way.)

So here we are again, with the Baker family again under scrutiny by some alphabet soup quasi-governmental agencies – and make no mistake my friends, Baker’s scrutiny is no coincidence. Many people believe it’s because Mark Baker chose to do what others did not: Fight.

Following discussion outside Baker’s home, the representatives from MDARD and USDA left without a search. There’s still time, of course – according to the warrant, Mark says, officials have from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. for three days from the date that the warrant was signed to execute that search.

According to Mark, it’s important to point out that although he’s faced issues with these state agencies over the years, there’s one group that’s remained professional and courteous: The Michigan State Police.

“The policemen that came – they were nice,” he said. “I have appreciated their professionalism through this thing. Every single one of them has been good to me.”

So what happens next? Will the warrant be executed? We’ll keep you updated as we know more details.


Here’s a link to Mark’s latest video describing the Dec. 17 incident: Mark's Dec. 17 Video


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