This alert is no longer active, but here for reference. Animals still need your help.

The Oregon Department of Environmental Quality intends to renew a water quality permit for a Foster Farms chicken slaughterhouse that has been shuttered since 2006. This renewal request has locals in the city of Creswellextremely concerned that the slaughterhouse may have plans to reopen, bringing cruelty, death, and environmental hazards to the area.

If the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality renews this permit, it would allow the slaughterhouse to expel treated wastewater to an “unnamed” tributary along Camas Swale Creek eventually flowing into the Willamette River, which could have serious environmental implications. We are asking you to speak up and urge the Department to cancel this proposed permit renewal which will help millions of chickens every year and local communities. There are two distinct ways you can help. The first is by attending a virtual Zoom meeting with the Department on the afternoon of Monday, August 29 to share public comment virtually. The second way you can help is by making calls and signing the letter - all actions we provide detailed steps to help you accomplish further in this alert. Please don't ignore this opportunity to help - only locals are being asked to take action on this issue!

Wastewater leaving the slaughterhouse would be tested prior to discharge for certain contaminants under the permit, but the possibility of wastewater seepage could cause major issues; contaminated seepage could find its way into recreational waterways and into irrigation systems used to water crops which could introduce salmonella into the local food supply. Salmon, trout, and sturgeon, among others, all call Willamette River home and seepage could injure and kill millions of fish slowly and painfully, only adding to the massive suffering and death count associated with the slaughterhouse.

While the Creswell slaughterhouse in question may not be currently operational, concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) nearby have been permitted to raise millions of chickens every year for Foster Farms. J-S Ranch, located between Jefferson and Scio, has received permits to raise just under 3.5 million chickens to be sent off to slaughter for Foster Farms every year once additional conditions with the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) and other local agencies are met; one other facility has submitted an application for a similar CAFO permit and a third is in its planning phase. Local activists are connecting the dots: as more CAFOs find their footing, more animals will be raised, but without a slaughterhouse nearby, transporting chickens becomes expensive. Foster Farms renewing its wastewater permit would keep its slaughterhouse in a position to reopen, near multiple CAFOs raising chickens on a mass scale, and in a convenient transport location along the I-5 corridor.

Of the billions of farmed animals across the world, chickens face some of the most heinous cruelty at the hands of animal agriculture and have very few laws protecting them. Broiler chickens who are raised for meat suffer horrific conditions, often crammed into filthy warehouses with thousands of other birds. Overcrowded and deprived of any type of enrichment, chickens will peck at their surroundings as a way to cope with the unbearable stress of confinement, sometimes injuring each other. As a result, the painful procedure of debeaking—slicing off half of their sensitive, nerve-filled beaks — is standard practice on most farms.

We need your voice in demanding that the DEQ not renew Foster Farms' water quality permit, for the animals, and the environment. A reopened slaughterhouse would wreak havoc in Creswell for chickens and community members alike, and taking the opportunity to oppose this renewal is critical.

This alert is no longer active, but here for reference. Animals still need your help.