[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 139 (Friday, November 14, 2014)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1583]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         FEDERAL OVER-REGULATION AND THE CASE OF COUNTRY MEATS

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                         HON. RICHARD B. NUGENT

                               of florida

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, November 14, 2014

  Mr. NUGENT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to draw the collective 
attention of the House to an unfortunate case of federal over-
regulation and the consequences to a small business in my district. In 
Ocala, Florida, we have a small family business that has produced and 
distributed snacks to schools across the country for more than three 
decades. Country Meats makes a pork-based snack that is common to 
student fundraisers and the proceeds of its sale in public schools over 
that time have netted more than $30 million in support of marching 
bands, athletic teams and academic clubs nation-wide.
  New standards established under the Healthy Hunger-Free Kid Act would 
prohibit the sale of anything in schools that cannot meet the nutrition 
standards. A well intentioned policy, but one that when rigidly 
enforced, excludes: cheese, milk, nuts and the snacks made by Country 
Meats. The Department of Agriculture applied common sense to offering 
exemptions for each of those items and their many variations, but not 
to the small family business in my district.
  Country Meats is not an international business that can pool 
resources into a common interest of a multi-billion dollar industry to 
make its concerns heard in Washington. Its twenty employees in Ocala, 
whose jobs will be lost as collateral damage to federal overreach. This 
company does not have the clout to educate each state legislature on 
how to file exemptions with the Department of Agriculture. It needs to 
do that in order to continue fundraisers that have been a mainstay in 
schools dating back to 1978. Instead, Country Meats will be added to 
the list of small businesses that lost their income because of obtuse 
federal regulation.

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