WI DNR approves another huge dairy CAFO, despite...

[Updated 1:00 p.m. 4/29 with a bigger picture analysis].

[Updated 7:00 p.m. 4/28]...the out-of-state owner's troubled record operating another such operation, because - -

...the state doesn’t take a company’s pollution record into account when deciding on a permit for a new site.

More on this permit, here.

[Updated 7:40 p.m, 4/28 Another fresh news report on the battered Wisconsin small dairy farming operation.] 

Feel free to add this major, Kewaunee County-style CAFO's greenlight for a 5,800 dairy cow milking-and-manure operation 40 minutes from Madison
to these recent Walker/DNR pro-business, anti-environmental 'highlights,' here and here.

Sorry this week to have been distracted by the Lake Michigan water giveaway to Foxconn.

And by the way, maybe the DNR will update this 2014 web chart and page about CAFOs in Wisconsin last edited 45 months ago.

Wisconsin CAFO WPDES permits by animal type over time

[Update] Additionally, this relentless CAFO expansion is coming while smaller dairies are being driven out of business:

Wisconsin now leads the nation in small farm bankruptcies.

As dairy crisis crushes farmers, Wisconsin's rural identity in jeopardy

And more than a year ago, I noted that Walker's DNR has been reducing pollution inspections while also promoting more and more dairy production, which hurts the smaller operators in a time of over-supply and public health, too: 

It's not surprising that the smaller farming operations are at the greater risk when the supply chain take a sudden hit, yet Wisconsin government in the Walker years of one-party, corporate-obeisant rule has been applying its official authority in a coordinated way to increase milk production to over-supply conditions while disregarding the consequences on small dairy farmers - - and the water supply, drinking water contamination and other issues.

Clearly there is a lot wrong with this picture;  the common thread -- - those with the least power are being ignored and abused by those with more power, or access to it. 

So consider that:

 Walker in 2012 began financing a state plan to boost milk production in the state:

Walker hopes to grow Badger State milk production to 30 billion pounds annually by 2020. The effort to do that has been dubbed "30x20" and is part of the Grow Wisconsin Dairy program.

Walker unveiled his proposal in Madison on March 13. He chose the twentieth annual business conference of the Professional Dairy Producers of Wisconsin (PDPW) for his announcement.