Peter  >Well, there is a different story in NYS. For decades the bee inspectors were also commercial beekeepers. The records on registered bee yards were closely guarded by the government but the bee inspectors knew where they were. They took advantage of that information to site their bee yards in good locations that they had found out about by inspecting their competitor's hives.<
That's a common story in many states.  We were involved in a case in another state where this same type of inspector abuse occurred.  We conducted a study of carrying capacity to show that there were places in the state where additional bees could be placed without infringing on established, local beekeepers and to show that adding 200 colonies across the fence from established yards  exceeded carrying capacity, which we could show from the production records of both parties.
50 years ago, Montana had a State Apiculturist/Bee Inspector who did something similar and and used his state-funded assistants to manage his personal bees on the state's nickel.  He left for a job in another state, and Montana State Agriculture cleaned house, moved the office to a location where better oversight could occur, and tightened the rules.
Couple of years ago, I did a search of state bee laws, especially the issue of conflicts of interest between bee inspectors and beekeepers, Montana's problem occurred before those in NY, NY problems were well known and the impact appears to still continue.  Some states have clear language about conflicts of interest and bee inspectors.  Many are silent. 

The oddest language that I found was in TX rules.  Maybe Gene Ash can tell me what happened.  The TX state language goes way beyond simply stating that bee inspectors can't have beekeeping operations, that would compete with professional beekeepers.  TX adds in nepotism, even by marriage! 

I assume there's an interesting story behind these restrictions in TX. 

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