|
WASHINGTON (AP) - Livestock producers around the country are still waiting for agricultural disaster payments Congress approved a year ago to help them deal with an ongoing drought.
Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and other senators are pressuring the Department of Agriculture to distribute money that Congress appropriated in an October 2004 spending bill. Baucus, who met with Deputy Agriculture Secretary Chuck Conner Friday to discuss the issue, said that only 13 percent of the checks have been distributed to qualified producers.
Department spokesman Ed Loyd attributes the delay to "one glitch after another" in department computer systems and said Friday that the payments should be distributed within the next two weeks.
|