What's up at the FSA Office?

by Joyce Davidshofer, Allamakee County Executive Director

The next Allamakee County FSA Committee meeting will be announced at a later date.

Reminders
December 15, 2014 - Deadline to certify forage crops for 2015 year.
December 19, 2014 - Margin Protection Program-Milk. This program had a deadline of December 5, 2014 and now the National FSA Office has extended the deadline to December 19, 2014. Producers can change their elections or sign-up until the new deadline.
December 25, 2014 - Office Closed for Christmas.
January 19, 2014 - Office Closed for Martin Luther King Day.
January 29, 2015 - ISU/FSA meeting for landowners and operators on the ARC/PLC program at 1 p.m. at Farmers & Merchants Savings Bank in Waukon.
January 30, 2015 - Deadline for 2012 Livestock Feed Program (LFP) and 2012 Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP).
January 30, 2015 - Deadline for the “Early Out” on CRP (Certain criteria must be met to qualify.
February 27, 2015 - Deadline for landowners to update yield history and/or reallocate base acres.
March 31, 2015 - Producers make a one-time irrevocable election of ARC or PLC for the 2014 through 2018 crop years.
After March 31, 2015 - Enrollment into 2014 & 2015 program.
Producers may contact the Allamakee County FSA office at 563-568-2148 for more information or make an appointment.

Allamakee County FSA Crop Loan Rates for 2014 crop year are as follows:
Corn - $1.87
Barley - $1.72
Oats - $1.43
Soybeans - $4.99.
Eligibility for loans is as follows:
• Has the risk in the crop.
• Can be a measured farm loan, certified farm loan or warehouse storage receipts loan.
• All necessary Payment Limitation forms, lien searches have been conducted, and HELC form on file.
Policies:
• Need to notify the Allamakee County FSA Office if you plan on selling the loan crop. Prior authorization from the Allamakee County FSA Office is needed or a penalty will be assessed.
• Subject to spot check during the nine-month loan.
• Check condition of the commodity under loan.
If there are any questions on the loan program contact the office.

Update Records
The Allamakee County FSA office would like to remind sellers and buyers of land to contact the office when the recorded deed has been filed. NOTE: If all or part of the land has a CRP contact active there will need to be a succession to the CRP contract. If the buyer does not want to succeed to the CRP contract, the seller will need to refund all payments, received, plus interest. Please inquire at the FSA Office on the policies of buying/selling CRP land.

Newsletter mailing schedule
Due to budget constraints, the Farm Service Agency does not regularly mail newsletters to producers. To receive news from your local FSA Office as well as up-to-the-minute federal farm program information, please visit www.fsa.usda.gov/subscribe to subscribe to FSA’s GovDelivery electronic news service. Print copies of electronic newsletters are available at your local FSA office.

Future meetings
The Allamakee County FSA Office will be setting up meetings in the next coming months on the ARC/PLC program. The meeting dates will be announced per the Waukon Standard newspaper column “What’s Up at the FSA Office?”, The Postville Herald, KNEI Wednesdays at 9 a.m. for the FSA report, and through Govdelivery bulletins.

Schedule appointments
With the large workload with the new ARC/PLC program, the Allamakee County FSA Office is requesting producers to call for an appointment. When making an appointment let the employee know if you will be farming the same farms as last year or if there is an addition or loss of a farm.
The Allamakee County FSA cannot express the importance of the landowner and the operator working together on the updating of the yields on their farms. FSA has not updated yields since 2002; this is the time to update these yields for the future. Besides the yields, this is also the time to reallocate bases. The landowner will be the one filling out this information for his farm(s).