Judge strikes down lawsuit over California egg law

• A federal judge has thrown out the lawsuit filed by Missouri and five other states that asked the court to bar California from preventing the sale of eggs brought into California from other states that are not Proposition 2 compliant.
  The ruling, handed down Thursday, is a victory for California in a battle between animal rights advocates and the economic interests of Southern and Midwestern egg producers.
  The judge said the states involved in the lawsuit – Alabama, Iowa, Kentucky, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Missouri -- lacked legal standing to sue because they could not show that California’s law does harm to their citizens instead of possible future damage to some producers.
  "It is patently clear plaintiffs are bringing this action on behalf of a subset of each state’s egg farmers," the judge wrote in the decision, "not on behalf of each state’s population generally."
  The states can appeal the decision, but the suit cannot be refiled or amended.
  Missouri Attorney General Chris Koster said in a statement that the case is "not just about farming practices" but about "whether elected officials in one state may regulate the practices of another state’s citizens, who cannot vote them out of office."

Arkansas won’t join suit challenging California egg rules

Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel said he has no interest in joining the Missouri attorney general's federal lawsuit asking the court to declare invalid California statutes that would allow the state to enforce Proposition 2 provisions on all eggs sold in California. However, he is considering filing a friend of the court brief in support of Missouri and the other states that joined the suit.
Missouri filed the lawsuit in February, and since that time Alabama, Iowa, Kentucky, Nebraska and Oklahoma have joined the suit. The lawsuit was brought because the representatives of these states maintain that the California statutes (AB1437 and 3CA ADC) violate the commerce and supremacy clauses of the U.S. Constitution.
McDaniel on March 25 said California's rules do not impact Arkansas egg producers because they already meet the California guidelines, but he agrees that one state should not be able to cause harm to another state's agricultural production, according to reports. Only a small portion of Arkansas eggs are shipped to California, he added.
In the amended lawsuit, the representatives for the six states involved say egg producers face a difficult choice regarding California AB1437:
"Either they can incur massive capital improvement costs to build larger habitats for some or all of their egg-laying hens, or they can walk away from the largest egg market in the country. For example, Missouri farmers - who export one-third of their eggs to California each year - must now decide whether to invest over $120 million in new hen houses or stop selling in California. The first option will raise the cost of eggs in Missouri and make them too expensive to export to any state other than California. The second option will flood Missouri's own markets with a half-billion surplus eggs that would otherwise have been exported to California, causing Missouri prices to fall and potentially forcing some Missouri farmers out of business."
California, the most populous state in the nation, is the largest single egg market in the U.S. According to the lawsuit, Californians consume 9 billion eggs per year, with 4 billion of those eggs coming from other states.
Proposition 2 is scheduled to take effect on January 1, 2015, for all eggs produced in California. California AB1437 was enacted to protect California egg producers from competition from egg producers outside the state who would not have to comply with Proposition 2.

California Egg Farmers support national housing standard for egg-laying hens

The Association of California Egg Farmers has announced its support for the Egg Products Inspection Act Amendments of 2012 introduced by U.S. Senator Diane Feinstein.
Among the bill's provisions, it would establish a national housing standard for egg-laying hens. It proposes similar requirements to a bill introduced earlier in 2012 in the House of Representatives, HR 3798, and it is jointly supported by the Humane Society of the United States and the United Egg Producers. The Egg Products Inspection Act would recognize the enriched colony system as the new national housing standard for laying hens instead of conventional cages. The enriched colony system enables hens to sit, stand, stretch and turn around in a clean, safe enclosure that protects hens from outside predators. The colony system house provides 116 square inches of space compared to 67 square inches of space in a conventional cage.
"Passing the Egg Products Inspection Act would be a historic improvement for hundreds of millions of animals per year," said Wayne Pacelle, president and CEO of the Humane Society of the United States. "It is always our greatest hope to find common ground and to forge solutions, even with traditional adversaries. We hope Congress seizes the opportunity to embrace this legislative collaboration and mutual understanding."

California egg farmers want clarification on Proposition 2, join lawsuit

The Association of California Egg Farmers has filed an Application to Intervene in the Superior Court of California, seeking to become a party in the lawsuit brought by JS West Milling Company against the state of California and the Humane Society of the United States. The lawsuit seeks clarity on what Proposition 2 requires for egg-laying hen housing systems.
Last December, JS West filed the lawsuit seeking a clear understanding on whether its newly constructed housing system meets the requirements of Proposition 2. The lawsuit seeks a determination of the specific types of housing systems because the law does not provide the exact size or dimension for an enclosure. The law also fails to state the number of hens that can occupy the enclosure, the density or otherwise specify the furnishings within the enclosure. According to JS West, more specific information on housing standards is needed as soon as possible so California's egg farmers have sufficient time to fund and make the necessary changes to their facilities prior to the law going into effect on Jan. 1, 2015.
"The JS West lawsuit is of great importance to the state's egg farmers who need clear guidance on how much space and what types of housing systems will be legal, and ACEF needs to be a party in that lawsuit," said Debbie Murdock, executive director of ACEF. "Compliance requires the egg farmers to spend a significant amount of money on construction costs long before the law takes effect in 2015. Egg farmers will soon invest hundreds of millions of dollars on their facilities, and in doing so, they should not be forced to guess whether their new facilities will comply with Proposition 2." 

Compromise on California Proposition 2 evaporates

California House Bill AB 1437, which was introduced by Jared Huffman, Assemblyman for San Rafael, to attempt compromise between opposing parties with respect to Proposition 2 has been dissolved.
Both the Humane Society of the United States, which promoted Proposition 2 and the California Egg Industry which opposed it, rejected the bill. The bill would have allowed the Department of Public Health to develop standards for stocking density in cages in order to clarify the wording of Proposition 2, which passed with a 27% margin in November 2008.
HSUS objected on the grounds that AB 1437 would alter the intent of Proposition 2 to effectively ban cage confinement of hens and the industry was disinclined to allow any government agency to develop standards for housing flocks.