The Morro Bay 4-H Club's participation in the California Mid-State Fair is at stake now that their farm was flooded by last week's storms.

The club's farm, located off Highway 1 in Morro Bay, is a special place for many people in the community.

The San Luis Obispo City Council will hold the 2023 Community Forum at the Ludwick Community Center on January 26. The forum will be an in-person meeting that will start at 6 p.m. and end at 9 p.m. Residents that attend can learn about what efforts are being made to meet community-identified priorities.

The city of Morro Bay is seeking community feedback as part of the development of a Master Plan for the 95-acre Morro Bay Power Plant property via an online survey. The Master Plan will establish a vision and plan for the growth and development of the power plant site and surrounding area.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - Multiple flood protection projects in California are on hold after Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed cutting their funding to help cover a $22.5 billion budget deficit - a decision disappointing environmental advocates as weeks of powerful storms have caused widespread flooding that damaged homes and washed away roads.

SACRAMENTO - Governor Gavin Newsom today announced that the White House has added the counties of Monterey, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara to the Presidential Major Disaster Declaration issued to support the state's storm response and recovery efforts, joining the counties of Merced, Sacramento and Santa Cruz initially approved for assistance this weekend.

The American Farm Bureau Federation and 17 other organizations announced a legal challenge to the new WOTUS rule Thursday. Micheal Clements shares more on why the groups decided to file the lawsuit. Clements: The American Farm Bureau Federation and 17 other organizations are challenging the new Waters of the U.S.

Today, the USDA National Organic Program (NOP) published the Strengthening Organic Enforcement (SOE) final rule, with an effective date of March 20, 2023. This update strengthens oversight and enforcement of the production, handling, and sale of organic products.

CAPITOLA, Calif. (AP) - President Joe Biden walked along the splintered boardwalk of this picture-postcard California beach town Thursday and heard from business owners struggling to repair damage to their shops after deadly storms caused devastation across the region and killed more than 20 people statewide.

Farmers and ranchers have a few weeks left to respond to the Census of Agriculture. Micheal Clements shares more on why your response matters. Clements: The Census of Agriculture provides the only source of uniform, comprehensive, and impartial agriculture data for every state and county in the nation, according to American Farm Bureau Federation Vice President of Public Policy, Sam Kieffer.

PUBLISHED ON SACRAMENTO - California Farm Bureau President Jamie Johansson has been re-elected to a two-year term as one of six executive board members for the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Calls for stronger protections against discrimination and retaliation for small rural farmers January 18, 2023 - OAKLAND - California Attorney General Rob Bonta, as part of a multistate coalition, filed a comment letter in support of a proposed rule by the U.S.

The Agriculture Department on Thursday issued new requirements for foods labeled organic, a move aimed at cracking down on fraud and boosting oversight. The rule strengthens enforcement of the USDA's strict definitions of organic, which must rely on "natural substances and physical, mechanical or biologically based farming methods to the fullest extent possible."

PUBLISHED ON SACRAMENTO - The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) has awarded $247,956 for organizations to enhance agricultural education and leadership opportunities under the 2022 California Special Interest License Plate (CalAgPlate) grant program. The CalAgPlate program is funded with proceeds generated through the sale of special interest, agriculture-themed license plates through the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV).

By CDFA The 2023 CUSP Drought Relief Technical Assistance and Direct Producer Grant Program is designed to facilitate support for small-and-medium scale California agricultural producers or small-and-medium scale Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers (SDFR's) through technical assistance with business planning and marketing strategies.

PUBLISHED ON WASHINGTON - As Farm Bill talks get underway, the Walton Family Foundation, in collaboration with Morning Consult, is pointing to recent polling that shows nearly 90% of Americans believe that it is "important to update the agricultural system to encourage sustainable farming practices that support clean water and healthy, productive soil."

To battle climate change and clean up its severe air pollution, California enacted a historic mandate to replace gasoline cars with zero-emission vehicles within 12 years. But can the transition really happen as quickly as the state requires? And what will it mean for Californians and their economy?

Activists from farming communities across the state are inbound for Sacramento on Wednesday to make public comments and protest new pesticide regulations they believe don't properly address the risks to public health. They will make public comments before the California Department of Pesticide Regulation, which announced in November it will update rules surrounding the commercial use of the fumigant pesticide 1,3-Dichloropropene, or Telone, on agricultural sites.

California strawberry farmers have suffered up to $200 million in damage from wind, rain and floods that have devastated 1,840 acres from Southern California to the Central Coast, an industry group reports. In all, 1,840 acres face catastrophic losses that could reach $200 million from crop, property, and equipment damage, the commission announced Jan.

This month's storms flooded Ventura County's agricultural fields, costing what farmers estimate may be millions of dollars of damage in the form of lost crops and livestock operations. But the rains have also resulted in the loss of much-needed income for the region's farm laborers as lost crops have meant lost wages for families living near the poverty line.

( KRON) - After weeks of rain and snow have been dumped on the West Coast, many farm workers are wondering when they might see a paycheck again. For some of them, it may not be soon. According to Antonio De Loera, Director of Communications for United Farm Workers, a farm workers union, the storms in our area have had a significant impact.

The United States government is ramping up efforts to protect vulnerable states and at-risk communities from devastating wildfires. The Department of Agriculture announced Thursday that $490 million from President Biden's Inflation Reduction Act will be earmarked for projects to reduce fire risks in parts of Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington.

WASHINGTON - Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has announced expanded efforts to reduce wildfire risk across the western U.S. These investments, made possible through President Biden's landmark Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), will directly protect at-risk communities and critical infrastructure across 11 additional landscapes in Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Utah and Washington.

PUBLISHED ON WASHINGTON - Today, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) filed a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) challenging the Biden administration's final "Waters of the U.S." (WOTUS) rule. "The Biden administration's WOTUS definition is an attack on farmers and ranchers and NCBA will be fighting back in court," said NCBA Chief Counsel Mary-Thomas Hart.

Fully implemented in January 2022, Prop 12 outlines new standards for confinement systems for sows, poultry and veal calves in California. Each breeding sow must have 24 ft2 of space and gestation crates are not permissible. However, it also prohibits any business from selling into California pork meat, veal meat and eggs derived from animals housed in a manner that violates Prop 12 standards.

Rain is on everyone's mind lately, and we're all looking at the forecasts for the coming days and weeks. Grape vines, currently in a stage of dormancy, are largely unaffected right now, but what about the long-term outlook? We talked with five winemakers about the rain.

For several days, Jason Haas and his employees at the Tablas Creek Vineyard couldn't reach their vines. The January storms that pummelled California washed out the roads and burst river banks, making even the simplest commute treacherous. Their tasting room closed for four days. But even so, he was thrilled.

Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance's Annual Gala slated for Feb. 2 - On Feb. 2, the Paso Robles wine community will come together to recognize [...]

LOS BANOS, Calif. - California will finally get a break from the parade of atmospheric river storms late week, but it might be too late for some crops. Some farmers are working to deal with the consequences of the excess rain.

Environmental rules designed to protect imperiled fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta have ignited anger among a group of bipartisan lawmakers, who say too much of California's stormwater is being washed out to sea instead of being pumped to reservoirs and aqueducts.

California's recent storms have brought record amounts of precipitation but have also revived a perennial debate at the state Capitol over water storage and management. On a levee overlooking the swollen Sacramento River last week, a group of Republican state lawmakers criticized their Democratic colleagues and Governor Gavin Newsom for not prioritizing new projects to capture the deluge.

State has committed more than $8.6 billion to build water resilience in the last two budgets and the 2023-24 budget proposal includes an additional $202 million for flood protection SACRAMENTO - California is taking urgent action to protect communities from climate-driven extremes in weather and expand the state's capacity to capture storm runoff in wet years.

As damaging as it was for more than 32 trillion gallons of rain and snow to fall on California since Christmas, a worst-case global warming scenario could juice up similar future downpours by one-third by the middle of this century, a new study says.