> it was difficult to see large scale beekeeper one
> after another pleading for their financial lives.
One does not win votes with crying about lost revenue.
We need a constitutional scholar on this, as this bill
is an "unjust taking" of the rights of adjacent property
owners that is not only unconstitutional, but unconscionable.
California law and US law do not allow the taking of private
property (or property rights) for the sole purpose of the
economic gain of another party. It is just that simple.
The attempt here is to legislate nature away, and make up
for simple-to-correct errors made by the growers of these
"seedless" Frankenfood oranges. If they want "seedless",
they should remove their other types of oranges that
can cross-pollinate, or plant the newer trees that cannot
produce seeds at all, as I mentioned here:
http://listserv.albany.edu:8080/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0706c&L=bee-l&T=0&P=258
3
But even if the bill passes, the strict language of the bill does
not really present much of a burden to a landowner who is willing
to lend his favorite beekeeper a hand. The interim period before
the inevitable overturning of this bill as unconstitutional will
not cause much hardship, for reasons I'll outline below.
Let's slog through the current text of the bill, available here:
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/postquery?bill_number=ab_771&sess=CUR
"29835. Any beekeeper who owns property within a Seedless Mandarin
Protection Area shall provide assistance to the person
requesting the designation of the Seedless Mandarin Protection
Area in developing mitigation steps to protect the seedless
variety of mandarin fruit from contamination."
That's interesting... the bill mandates indentured servitude
for beekeepers, without compensation. The adjacent landowner
who keeps bees is expected to work for the Mandarin grower on
some sort of Sisyphean task to keep bees from visiting these
Frankenfood "seedless" oranges. Its an impossible task, so
the burden is infinite, and more than "unreasonable".
It is not clear what sort of "mitigation" would help. If there
was any sort of "mitigation" that was effective, the bill at
hand would need to only call for a mitigation effort, rather
than the complete removal of beehives.
But wait a moment here, who is the "beekeeper"? A landowner
that keeps bees on his property is a "beekeeper" under this
language, and that would include someone who rents part of his
property to another beekeeper. One need only realize that the
payment of any sort of rent (money or honey) allows the landowner
to declare that he IS a beekeeper, as he clearly keeps bees on
his property, and he has a financial interest in doing so.
It is no one's business who works the hives, or what is
subcontracted out to who. Recall that many of the largest
beekeeping operations on the planet are run by people who
hire OTHER people to do the actual work, lease equipment,
rent or borrow hives from other beekeepers, agree to care
for the hives of another beekeeper, and so on.
The use of independent contractors, capital equipment
leasing, and outsourced services are common in agriculture,
and this would be no different from any other modern
business venture. (It is also true that nearly all the
airplanes flow by the airlines are either leased, or owned
and operated by other companies. Is American Airlines not
an airline simply because many of its flights are operated
by "American Eagle", with planes owned by "American Eagle",
and all of the flights are flow on planes that AA leases?)
This looks like a hole large enough to drive 55-foot tractor
trailer loads of bees through, right up to the edge of Paramount's
property line.
"29836. (a) Any person who owns or operates property and
grows a commodity requiring pollination located in an established
Seedless Mandarin Protection Area shall not be denied access to
bees for purposes of pollination solely because of his or her
location within the Seedless Mandarin Protection Area."
So a land owner who grows crops that need pollination will
not be barred from getting pollination. That's nice. So,
the landowner plants a quarter-acre of something that blooms
at the same time as the Frankenfood "seedless" oranges, and
contracts for 500 hives at very reasonable rates. No law
against insuring good pollination, now is there?
"29837. Notwithstanding the establishment of a Seedless
Mandarin Protection Area, a property owner located within a
Seedless Mandarin Protection Area shall continue to have the
right to farm any commercial crop without restriction. Any
damages to a Seedless Mandarin Protection Area that result from
an individual enforcing his or her rights pursuant to this section
shall not be actionable."
OK, my crop is HONEY. That's a commercial crop, and beekeeping
is farming. I have a contractor bring in hives, and we spilt the
crop, and its none of your business what my end of the deal might be.
Dare I say "Slam Dunk" here?
I'd advise honey producers to concentrate their hives strategically,
saturate the Mandarin areas with bees while complying with the strict
language of any law that might be ignorantly voted into force, and
force the growers to address the real problem by removing the
cross-pollinating varieties, or planting the newer "sterile" types.
Remember the movie "Scarface", starring Al Pacino?
It had some appropriate dialogue for guys with boxes
full of our "little friend", the bee:
"Do you want to play rough?
Ok, let's play rough.
Say hello to my little friend".
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