US House Lawmakers Offer New Farm Bill Plan At Conference Mtg

Posted by Brian Gould Fri, 11 Apr 2008 15:28:00 GMT

Agriculture leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives unveiled a new farm bill proposal during a meeting Thursday with their Senate counterparts on a conference committee tasked with forming unified legislation over the next several days.

House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., told reporters that he expects Senate conferees to take the next few days to scrutinize the proposal and perhaps make a counter proposal as early as Monday.

The new House plan would go $5.5 billion over the farm bill budget, a sharp drop from the $10-billion-over figure that senators have been planning, but Peterson said he did not want to include a controversial $4 billion farm disaster program.