One Farmer’s Decade-old Battle With NRCS Appears Over

WASHINGTON, DC – Details are emerging in a closely-watched case over a farmer’s right to use and care for his own land. According to a determination by the director of USDA’s National Appeals Division, the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has been admonished for failing to obey its own rules. In 2010, the NRCS determined that Illinois farmer Kurt Wilke and his family could not maintain and farm their land, claiming it contained wetlands, despite documentation to the contrary. Though an administrative judge ruled against the NRCS, the agency repeatedly filed the same findings, forcing Wilke to fight the issue in court four times over more than a decade, and each time he prevailed. The latest decision follows a unanimous ruling by the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, which sternly rebuked NRCS conservation program enforcement in 2019.