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Ag tourism should be allowed to serve food and that the gross volume test is an excellent way to <br />regulate it so it doesnt become a restaurant. Sure you dont restaurants on Ag lands. But if you <br />said 50% of the gross volume of the operator can be Ag tourism you could also say 25% of that <br />50% or a half of that 50% could be in the service of food. How can you offer people a cup of <br />coffee and not a donut? How can you offer people a taste of honey and not a cracker? I mean, <br />and the length of time that a visitor visits a farm generally stretches over several hours. During <br />that time they need a little bite to eat and we should be able to provide it and we should be able <br />to think of a way of providing that and allowing it in a way that doesnt restrict it to the point <br />where we cant do it at all. Thats sort of negative admonition is what Id like to see avoided in <br />this Bill. Also if were going to have tour operators bring small vans to our farms we should be <br />able to charge something and right now you cant, its illegal to charge for a tour and I think <br />thats wrong. I mean, now lets go back to the first paragraph in my write up where I said we <br />have one employee, my wife and myself and one employee run our farm. Shes a full time gal <br />and shes covered with workers compensation and medical insurance. Those two insurance <br />policiescostus$7,100.00ayearforoneemployee.Thatsshocking.Thatswhywehaveonly <br />one employee. And I believe that the 3 of us do about 6 jobs on that farm. Now if you limit the <br />number of visitors to, lets just say 16 a day just for argument sake and each visitor spends <br />$10.00 buying a product thats $500.00. Well, guess what, your employee costs you 220 by the <br />time you pay him a fair wage and all the benefits so the 16 visitors a day isnt going to pay for <br />someone to man your Ag tourism operation. Thats why I think that those sorts of limitations <br />should be stricken from the Bill and allow private enterprise to determine whats necessary to <br />make it work. You know the world experienced central planning in the Soviet Union and it <br />didnt work. The central planners tried to insert themselves in between free enterprise and <br />business and it absolutely didnt work but we do need regulation, we do need thoughtful <br />regulation to make sure that it works well for everybody. We need to make sure that neighbors <br />are not aggravated, but they do live in agricultural zones and agriculture does have impacts. Pigs <br />smell. Coffee pulping takes place in the evening. It takes big diesel trucks to pick up mac nuts <br />and the likes so there is an impact on agriculture and I believe that the Ag tourism bill should <br />recognize and allow for those impacts. As Mr. Alban stated there should be noise abatement <br />provision for this Bill if theres not already in the community. And Im not privy to that. You <br />cant start before 8 and you cant do anything until 6 I believe thats already included in this Bill <br />which is good. It protects the neighbors. And I think Im winding down pretty soon. <br />GALDONES:Mr. Conant you have much more to go otherwise Im going to call for a <br />recess if you have a long more ways to go? <br />CONANT:Two or three minutes. Thats all. I just want to say about impact on <br />neighbors, not all farms share their roads with 80 neighbors. Our farm for example, there are <br />only 2 neighbors that share our road and its 5/8ths of a mile long. And so, thats another reason <br />to make certain that the bill doesnt include provisions which dont apply equally to all and that <br />will disadvantage some at the expense, for the benefit of others. And I think the other comments <br />that I had, have already been addressed. The Schedule F is a good example of being able to put <br />the horse before the cart you know. The horse is the agriculture the cart is the tourism. In order <br />to file the Schedule F you have to file a Federal Tax Return and thats happened over the <br />previous 12 month period either fiscal year or calendar year. And so you already demonstrate by <br />submitting a Schedule F that you are a bona fide farm and youve done it in the past. Its not that <br />10 <br />EXHIBIT E <br /> <br />