The actions by hard-pressed and determined farmers, which targeted processing companies, included picket lines, blockades, and press conferences.

"Milk the Cow, Not the Farmer!" was the slogan on one of the signs carried by about 75 farmers and supporters protesting outside the Dean Foods milk processing plant in western Pennsylvania. The farmers were protesting low prices they receive for milk. The action here was one of 10 that took place in Pennsylvania, New York, and Wisconsin.

The farmers set up a picket line at the entrance to Dean Foods in the presence of a number of police and county sheriffs. Mike Logan, who has 70 cows, gets a $1 quality premium, receiving between $10 and $11 per hundredweight. He explained that "a year ago we got $19." Both Scribben and Logan estimated their cost of production at about $18.50. Scribben explained the situation farmers face having to sell their products to only one processor. "I sell to Dean Foods here," he said. "There aren't many producers in this area. You pretty much have to sell to Dean." Logan explained that Dean recently bought Hillside and Ryder, two other milk processors, and then shut down the Hillside plant in Cleveland.

"We have to pay the freight," to have the milk taken to the plant, Logan said. "Every place else the buyer pays the freight. And we don't even have any control over what plant they take it to. We pay about 65 cents per cwt to haul the milk."

Tom Yuhasz owns a grain elevator and farms corn and beans. He said, "I have to run this elevator, to store farmers' grain, to keep my farm going. They should let the farmer stay on the farm and let other people have those jobs. Pay the farmer a decent price! This milk is below 1970 prices!"

In Yuhasz's opinion, "The worst one is the Farm Bureau. They just keep saying get bigger. But how much can one guy do?"

One person who came to the protest to support the farmers was Larry Pugh, a locked-out steelworker from AK Steel in Mansfield, Ohio. The 600 workers there have been locked out since the end of August. When asked why he had driven the 135 miles to the rally, Pugh responded, "I volunteer to help anybody who has a problem. Working people are going to have to lock elbows and stand together. I've got 41 years at the mill," continued Pugh, who is 59 years old. "I could retire, but I'm fighting for the young guys."

Many of the farmers were interested in talking to Pugh and took the literature he passed out about the lockout. He urged them to come to the rally the Steelworkers union is planning for March 25 in Mansfield.

Kit Fogel, a farmer in Marion County, Ohio, said, "This is not a one-day thing. We can't let it be a one-day thing. We've got to keep this up." Robert Cotterman, president of the Ohio Farmers Union in Geauga, Lake, and Ashtabula counties, urged the farmers to participate in upcoming national protests in Washington, DC, on March 20-21.

Twenty people, including five union carpenters, picketed at Crowley Foods in Binghamton, New York. Some of the farmers at this protest pointed to the effect last summer's drought had in worsening an already bad situation for the farmers.

Debra Marvin, from New Milford, Pennsylvania, said she just sold her 60-head herd. "I couldn't afford to keep farming anymore. The cost of buying hay for this winter finally forced the question." It has been about $165 per ton In Williamsport, Pennsylvania, more than 50 farmers picketed the Schneider Valley Farms processing plant. A worker came out of the plant on his break and told the farmers, "For what it's worth, I wanted you to know I'm on your side in this."  
 

Randy Jasper, who has 100 dairy cows and 300 acres of grain, explained, "For years we were told that California was producing too much milk. This was a way of pitting farmers against farmers. It is the worst thing we have to overcome. It's guys like here," referring to the Foremost Farms corporate office building, "that are the bad guys."

Six farmers, four women and two men, protested for three hours in sub-freezing temperatures. They held picket signs aloft and passed out a leaflet explaining the drastically worsening position of dairy farmers and a list of demands.

Greeno and Jasper are leaders of the American Raw Milk Producers Pricing Association (ARMPPA). Greeno called it, "a grass roots effort to rise over and above the federal milk pricing system and to price milk at the farm gate. It is a bargaining tool for the farmer." ARMPPA hopes to bring together dairy farmers around the country and small co-ops that buy and distribute milk in order to force up the price farmers receive for it.

Currently farmers have no say in the price of their product. According to Greeno, the big milk processors are able to control prices by manipulating the inventory numbers of milk products in storage and creating false "surpluses" through importing dairy products. The farmers are demanding an emergency floor price of $15.50 per hundred weight price for their milk. Prices fell as low as $9.63 per hundredweight in December of 1999.

The farmers are also demanding a full public accounting, including the participation of independent farmer inspectors approved by farm activists, of domestic milk production, commercial use and food storage systems.  
 

For more than three hours in the cold and snow the protesters slowed traffic and made it difficult for tanker trucks to enter the milk manufacturing facility. "We don't have anything special against Crowleys," said Jay Burrows, an area dairy farmer. "This was just one close enough for many of us to get to. We'll be visiting some of the others too."

The farmers pulled farm equipment with large signs tied to the side reading, "Why Should Consumers Pay So Much for Dairy Products When Farmers Receive So Little;" "We Demand Cost of Production for Our Milk;" and "Farmers Receiving Same Price Now as 20 Years Ago."

The handmade signs carried by the picketers said, "Farmers Suffer While Processors get Rich!" "U.S. Gov't Gives Processors Rights to Steal our Milk," and "Consumers Getting Ripped Off as Well as Farmers."

Farmers complained the prices paid for their milk were not keeping up with their costs to keep farming. "Since the prices for your milk don't go up, but the price of everything else does, you end up going into debt to get more cows to milk to increase your income," said Don Mitchell, a dairy farmer in Hammond.

"You just end up working longer and longer hours, and then you might still not make enough money to hold on."

Tony Prince is a member of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees in Cleveland; Don Mackle is a member of United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 174. Kathie Fitzgerald, a member of the United Transportation Union (UTU) in Newark; Mike Galati a UFCW member from New York; and Ruth Robinett, a member of the UTU in New York also contributed to this article.  
 
 
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