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Drought Aid

By WKRG Staff

Published: Mon, July 09, 2007 - 9:07 pm Last Updated: Tue, July 31, 2007 - 6:36 pm

WASHINGTON (AP) - Alabama's congressional delegation requested 17 (m) million dollars in federal aid today for farmers affected by the severe drought, which a state climatologist says is the state's worst in more than a century.

The proposal was submitted to the Senate and House Appropriations Committees for legislative consideration. It seeks ten (m) million dollars from the Emergency Conservation Program to restore pasture and drill wells to sustain livestock. It requests another seven (m) million dollars from the Livestock Assistance Program, which provides payments to livestock producers who suffer grazing losses because of natural disasters.

The letter also asks that farmers who experienced losses during an April freeze be made eligible for assistance contained in a disaster supplemental bill passed earlier this year. The U-S Department of Agriculture has declared all 67 counties in Alabama as disaster areas as a result of the drought.

(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)