A photo from U.S. Department of Agriculture shows an Iowa wetland that was restored through a Farm Service Agency conservation program. (Photo courtesy of USDA)
Iowa sustainable agriculture groups submitted a motion to intervene in a lawsuit challenging a federal law that prohibits landowners from farming in wetland-designated areas.
“Preserving wetlands is key to reducing flooding and reducing soil erosion,” said Michael Schmidt, staff attorney for Iowa Environmental Council. “The more that we can preserve and restore wetlands in Iowa, the better off Iowans will be.”
The lawsuit deals with a 9-acre area out of a 72-acre parcel owned by CTM Holdings LLC in Delaware County, that was designated a wetland by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The Iowa-based company, which rents its land to Iowa farmers, wanted to farm the 9-acre strip but “swampbuster,” or the Wetland Conservation Compliance provisions of the 1985 Farm Bill, states “people who convert wetlands to allow production of agricultural commodities will be ineligible for USDA benefits.”
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The lawsuit was filed April 2024 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Iowa and named USDA, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service and its director, Terry Cosby; and Jon Hubbert, the Iowa state conservationist for the NRCS as defendants.
CTM Holdings, represented by non-profit litigation groups Pacific Legal Foundation and Liberty Justice Center, argues that swampbuster creates an unconstitutional condition for collecting federal farmland benefits and fails to compensate farmers for the easements.
Iowa Farmers Union, Dakota Rural Action, Food & Water Watch, and Iowa Environmental Council submitted a motion to intervene in the case, on the grounds that eliminating swampbuster would have environmental impacts that would “threaten” the sustainable agriculture groups’ members and communities.
According to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, Iowa has lost nearly 95% of its wetlands since European settlement in the state. Many were drained for agricultural development.
The sustainable agriculture groups argue that without swampbuster, landowners would not preserve wetlands, which would cause more floods, lower water quality and threaten property value.
Schmidt clarified that wetlands are not necessarily areas with standing water, but are often areas of spongy soil that help absorb big rain events and slowly release water back into the land. Wetlands can also help to absorb excess nutrients and keep it from entering waterways.
Loren Seehase, a senior attorney with Liberty Justice Center representing the case, said the plaintiff does not dispute the environmental benefits of wetlands, but the lack of compensation to landowners for a conservation easement.
“We’re saying that if you’re going to take private property, you have to provide that just compensation,” Seehase said.
The lawsuit holds that farmers have no choice but to adhere to swampbuster and “an uncompensated taking of his or her property,” unless they want to forgo participation in any USDA benefits.
“USDA benefits are quite vast – it’s everything from crop insurance to home loans, agricultural structures,” Seehase said. “There’s a lot of assistance that goes into the farming industry, and so essentially, the only way that a farmer can avoid (swampbuster) altogether is to not receive any USDA benefits.”
The swampbuster law states that landowners cannot engage in, “any activity that alters natural wetlands,” including filling, draining, leveling, clearing woody vegetation or diverting run-off water.
The lawsuit argues that this definition of converting a wetland “exceeds the statutory definition.”
Reform to swampbusters to, for example, create a structure of reimbursing farmers for the wetland conservation easements or changing the definitions of conversion, could only come out of legislative action.
“I think there is room for the legislature to reform the law, but oftentimes, litigation will have to take place for the legislature to move,” Seehase said.
Seehase said the lawsuit also takes issue with the wetland determination process, and more specifically that the rule’s restrictions on requests of redetermination, “exceeds the statutory definition.”
The case document said redetermination will only be granted if there is an “act of God changing the hydrology or topography of the land or the agency decides that it made a mistake.”
“This rule far exceeds the statute’s authority,” Seehase said.
Seehase said she expects there will be appeals to the court’s decision either way it rules.
“This case doesn’t just affect this particular farmer, it is a great opportunity for hopefully an appellate court, U.S. Supreme Court, to rule on the constitutionality of the statute,” Seehase said.
Schmidt said he suspects the court will decide after October whether or not to accept the sustainable agriculture groups’ motion to intervene, and future steps of the legal process will unfold from there.
“We’ve seen what happens in Iowa without the incentives to protect wetlands,” Schmidt said. “The idea of losing even more, if we lose swampbuster, would just set Iowa back even further.”
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