II 109th CONGRESS 1st Session S. 1776 IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES September 27, 2005 Mr. Dayton introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry A BILL To amend the Federal Crop Insurance Act to establish permanent authority for the Secretary of Agriculture to quickly provide disaster relief to agricultural producers that incur crop losses as a result of damaging weather or related condition in federally declared disaster areas, and for other purposes.

1.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the Permanent Emergency Agricultural Assistance Act.

2.

Crop disaster assistance for future crop years

The Federal Crop Insurance Act is amended by inserting after section 518 (7 U.S.C. 1518) the following:

519.

Permanent authority to provide emergency agricultural assistance

(a)

Definition of federally declared disaster area

(1)

In general

In this section, the term federally declared disaster area means a county covered by— (A)a Presidential declaration of major disaster issued under section 401 of the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 5170); or (B)a declaration by the Secretary of a disaster area under subpart A of part 1945 of title 7, Code of Federal Regulations (or successor regulations). (2)

Exclusion

The term federally declared disaster area does not include a county contiguous to a county covered by a declaration described in paragraph (1) unless the contiguous county is also covered by the same designation. (b)

Authority to provide emergency assistance

The Secretary shall use the funds of the Commodity Credit Corporation to make emergency financial assistance available to producers on a farm that incur qualifying crop losses for an insurable crop due to damaging weather or related condition, as determined by the Secretary, that results in the designation of the county in which the farm is located as a federally declared disaster area. (c)

Administration

Except as provided in subsections (d) and (e), the Secretary shall make assistance available under this section in the same manner as provided under section 815 of the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2001 (Public Law 106–387; 114 Stat. 1549A–55), including using the same loss thresholds for the quantity and quality losses as were used in administering that section. (d)

Payment rate

The Secretary shall make assistance available to producers on a farm for a crop under this section at a rate equal to 65 percent of the established price for the crop for any deficiency in production of 35 percent or more for the crop. (e)

Receipt conditioned on having crop insurance

The producers on a farm shall not be eligible for assistance under subsection (a) with respect to losses to a crop unless the producers obtained, before the losses were incurred, a policy or plan of insurance for the crop under this title that provided a level of coverage equal to or greater than 60 percent. (f)

Authorization of appropriations

There is authorized to be appropriated such amounts as are necessary to reimburse the Commodity Credit Corporation for funds expended by the Secretary under this section. (g)

Effective date

This section applies to the 2005 and subsequent crop years.

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