Published once a week at Palmer, Aiaska for the Matanuska Valley Farmers’ 4
Cooperating Association for the purpose of giving news of the Associations
work, problems and accomplishments.
LATEST OEVELOPfllEflT 01) FfiRfllERS LlCEllSE TAX
There has been a change in the views of the Territorial officials in regard to the
decision that farmers were required to pay the License Tax to the Territory. It seems
that it has now been decided that farmers are not required to pay and that the tax
will not be collected this;year. So far so good but don't forget that the original
law still stands on the sthtutebooks of the Territory and that some future administra
tion will again decide that farmers are required to pay it and then the thing will
have to be threshed out again.
Lawmakers who introduced the bill say that it was not intended that fanners would
have to pay the tax and there are many other reasons why this tax if imposed on the
farmers would be harmful to the development of agriculture in Alaska, one of the main
things that is being stressed would be for the best interest of the development of
agriculture in Alaska, has been the need for more farms and' farmers. Now it seems
that the law either be amended or that a new law exempting farmers be passed in the ne>
session of the legislature,in order to insure that it will be taken care of it would
be a good idea to find out where the different candidates for the legislature stand
on the question. Letters should be written to the various candidates so they can ex
press themselves. This is very important because there isn't much interest in agri
culture in the first and second divisions, so it will be necessary for the legislators
in the third and fourth divisions to take the lead and change or eliminate the law.
Write to your candidates this next week, remember that the election is not far away,
in fact the date is October 10th.
UJHfIT OUR COniPETlTOliS ORE 00106
The Grange News sponsored by the Washington State Grange had an interesting article
about the proposed handling of the price of milk in the Northwest Milk Area, it seems
that the Army and the U. S. Department of Agriculture is not quite satisfied with the
present methods of determining the price of milk to the farmers.
A hearing has been called in Seattle and many prominent attorneys for the milk pro
curin&waPd processing interests, as well as Army and Government officials are assist
ing in the hearing to determine the facts and how to improve methods. It was brought
out at the hearing that the present price for fluid milk delivered to the receiving
stations is about $U.75 per hundred pounds and in the course of processing and sell
ing the middleman take over half of the consumers purchasing price.
The Army wants to buy independently of the milk producers agreement but the other in
terests are not agreeable to this. This is all interesting to the dairymen of the
Mevanuska Valley for it may be possible for the Washington producers to ship their
milk to Alaska by new methods of processing, in fact a company has been organized in
V» ivhington State to process fresh, milk that can be kept indefinitely by using a new
ir.c~hod of processing and shipping in tin cans. If this method proves successful it
w<uld be possible to ship milk that will compare favorably with fresh milk, and coming
t.;r barge or steamship it could be shipped so cheap that it would be a real threat to
thf present setup. So far evidently the Army doesn't regard the new idea with any
g'mat confidence, for they would not grant a five year contract for recombined milk
if they thought there was some cheaper or better way of getting milk for the troops
in Alaska.
The News also had an article about the way middlemen who are purchasing vegetables
in the Valleys in central and eastern Washington are taking advantage of the producers
it seems that purchasers paid 30 cents a crate for cantaloupes from farmers and sold
them for $2.2$ a crate in Seattle and a lot of other things at prices like this.
It must be wonderful to be independent and to have the priviledge of selling your
own products like this. Despite the fact that co-operative marketing associations
have been preventing this kind of thing for fifty years all over the U. S. we still
have a lot of farmers who want to preserve the conditions that mean so much to his
financial returns.
CRR