Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Food safety and regulatory with Cabot Creamery. Joining us this afternoon to testify on H seven fifty eight, which is an act relating to banning the use of rodenticides. And we have taken, just for your knowledge, we've taken a certain amount of testimony, both this session and then last year as well on this topic. And looking at the bill now and trying to figure out what to do. So helpful to have your testimony. And if you wanted to start by introducing yourself and then we can get going.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Sure. So I'm Dan Wodeeka. I'm the VP of Food Safety, Quality Assurance and Regulatory Compliance here at AgriMark. I've been in the food industry for my entire career, twenty some years, exclusively in the food safety and quality regulatory realm. And kind of around the country, I worked in Iowa and Michigan and Ohio and Oregon, and now I'm here in Vermont.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Welcome. How long have you been in Vermont? Since last July. So you're still figuring out your your first time to the State House then? It is. K. Well, we're happy to have you. So, yeah, we we we're happy to hear anything that you might wanna tell us about, your thoughts on the bill.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Sure. So I I I prepared something if that's right.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: That's absolutely fine.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: So Aggramoc's probably well known to this group. Our hundreds of farmer owners provide the milk that supports our three manufacturing facilities here in Vermont, where we employ hundreds of manufacture where we employ hundreds in manufacturing the best cheese, yogurt, sour cream and other dairy products in the country. Just last week, AgriMark won 17 top awards in the American Championship of Cheese contest, a competition that attracts companies from around the country and Europe. New employees at Agamark learned that we have two top priorities. They are personnel safety and food safety. This helps ensure that all of our employees return to their homes at the end of the day without injury, and that our consumers trust our brand to provide delicious, nutritious, and safe products with every experience. A fundamental part of ensuring the safety of those products is an effective pest control program. Pests, including mice, birds, insects, are naturally attracted to food manufacturing facilities where they can find sustenance and protection from predators. Unfortunately, those pests are also a well known transmission vector for various human diseases, including Salmonella, Vibrio, and Staphylococcus aureus. To protect the national food supply, both the FDA and the USDA require an effective pest control program under titles nine and twenty one of the code of federal regulations. Rodenticides, like that affected by the legislation at hand, are the industry standard, and they are a critical component in those programs. They have been used in every facility where I've been responsible for pest control. The rodenticides in question are located around the exterior of the buildings and locked traps that are weighed to stay in place. Barring some bizarre circumstance, only licensed pest control operators that are trained to handle these agents can access those boxes. They do that on a routine cycle every few weeks or days or months. Production facilities like ours do not store any rodenticides outside of those that are actively used in the tracts. In discussion with our pest control operator, it is not clear what alternatives to the current anticoagulant rodenticides would be available for the ban to proceed. My concern is that without these agents, food manufacturers in Vermont would be unable to meet the federal requirements and the industry standards that ensure our food supply is unadulterated by pest activity.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: The I just wanna go back to the comment you made a moment ago. So the traps are all outside your buildings?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: All the traps that include rodenticides. Yes.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. And then inside?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Inside, we have traps, but there's no bait in them. It's just they're meant to capture.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It's like a mousetrap or something a little bit larger. Would I'm sorry. This sounds like a naive question, maybe I'm setting you up, but how would a mouse get inside? Inside the exterior traps? No, get inside the facility.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: A door that was propped open or a door that didn't quite have a good seal. We're loading and unloading trucks all day long. So

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: one of those means. So an open door. I don't know how new or old your manufacturing facilities are, but if the doors were closed, would there be ways for mice to get inside?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Not generally, but there are times where you know, people come in, people are exiting and entering the building, trucks are being loaded and unloaded. So there are there are still opportunities, which is why these programs are important.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Committee members, questions, representative Bos-Lun.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Yeah, so you mentioned how only certified people can access the traps, and that sounds good, except that the concern is that the mice that go in and access the poison and come out, get eaten and move up the food chain. So that's where our concern is in terms of the environmental impact. So I guess I wanna answer one of your questions, because you had said, if we got rid of rodenticides or scaled back on rodenticides, you don't know what we would do. And we've actually taken a fair amount of testimony about that last year and this year. This year we heard from one food provider that was a grain producer And they actually were a test site looking at birth control for mice. So basically they had, trap for the mice was they would eat the tainted Bait. Bait, right. And then it became birth control for them, so they wouldn't reproduce. They noticed in that study, they were able to notice an ongoing 83% reduction in rodents. We also heard from, I can't remember if it was California or Hawaii, where there was a motorized type of system where they had almost like a spring trap. And if a rodent came inside, it would zap them. And then you would, basically that one was done for. So there wasn't any poison, but the rodent, it could be as big as a squirrel, would be killed by the mechanized kind of equipment. So we did hear about places that have scaled back on rodenticides and have utilized some of these alternatives. I guess what we're looking at, or what I think we're looking at is not ruling out all rodenticides in every single situation, but scaling back so that we have less of them entering the food chain because of the environmental benefit. Okay. I mean, have you heard of those kind of other alternative techniques? Because I mean, they're out there. None of none of them are 100% at any one site, but also clearly whoever's working with you isn't a 100% either because they have to keep coming back. I mean, if the rodenticides work to stop all the rodents, then they wouldn't have to come back a month later or two months later or three months later, right? If it's a recurring problem, if you have to keep treating it, that's gonna be true with whatever methodology you're gonna use that would think.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Yeah, so when they're coming back and looking at the exterior traps, they're usually replacing the bait. So it gets it gets moldy over time. Yeah. So they're they're replacing anything that was eaten. Yeah. So that's that's really why they're visiting it. I can only share regarding the other mechanisms that our pest control company has heard of them. He mentioned a few of those, but it didn't sound to me like they were actively in use by industry, at least not by our pest control provider. And that's not to say that they're impossible. I mean, obviously, it's working, but just not commonly used by by our company.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I would say nothing. Well,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: what happens if you find evidence

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: of rodents inside the plant?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So Droppings or what have you and whatnot.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: It's a big issue, right? Because we've got to understand if anything's been affected, any products been involved, we've got to figure out how they got in. And it could it could be pretty significant. We could hold a lot of product and withhold a lot of inventory from commerce.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Then you have to test that product or do you have to?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: I mean, it's it'd be difficult to test for for things. So we would probably take a side of caution and and trash it.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I think we heard so to representative Bos-Lun's illustration, I think that was in California, where that particular alternative method of dealing with of controlling the tests was was being marketed. And I believe we heard testimony also that California has enacted a ban at some level anyway on the various types of rodenticides. You mentioned other states, but you hadn't worked in California?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: No, we haven't worked in California.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Is there anything you're familiar with, what they're doing there?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: No, I couldn't say what California is.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Representative O'Brien? Yeah.

[Rep. John O'Brien]: So Dan, are you in charge at AgroMark for hiring pest control companies?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Yeah, I would have influence on the contract that we pick.

[Rep. John O'Brien]: And so is it just for Vermont, for example, like Cabot Middlebury, Wakesfield, are those all the same company? That's the first company that you have to do this or even Chateaugay or is that different?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: If I remember correctly, all of our facilities are the same company.

[Rep. John O'Brien]: West Springfield? Okay. So I was just wondering if there were different strategies, but it was the same company, right? Yeah.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: We actually use the same company, and they use the same rodenticide at all of our facilities. Can you tell us what that is? The brand name is called First Strike, if I remember correctly.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Where is that company out of? I I don't know.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Did you mean the the Pest control. Pest control. Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you meant the manufactured company. Pest control company is based in New Jersey.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: They're a national company. I've never heard Regional company anyway.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: At least a regional.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Yeah.

[Unidentified Representative (possibly 'Brad Bellamy')]: Representative Brad Bellamy. So we alluded to some alternatives that may be not in common use. I'm just sitting here wondering if you're a pest control company and this is the tool you always use because that's what you're used to using. If suddenly you can't use that tool anymore, might that give you incentive to try the other tools that are more effective or less damaging to the environment? Maybe they're just using it because it's just what they're used to, it's what they've got in stock, rather than going out and finding alternatives that are out there. Because obviously for the past two thousand years, we have been looking for ways to control roads. And we're not winning, but we're, you know, have some, we do have some tools. And I would think that in this day and age of technology, got to come up with some better mousetrap.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: So releasing cats throughout the facility probably wouldn't be a good option. Well, you know, depends.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I was wondering, you've already answered the question, but whether a company, the size and scale of Cabot would have its own licensed applicator on staff, somebody who was responsible for facilities who might handle the pest control piece. But it sounds like in your case, at least in Cabot's case, that's not the

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: way that's being handled. Correct. Yeah, we do not handle the rodenticides. None of the companies I've worked for have had a licensed pest control operator on staff. It's something that everybody in the industry outsources.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Good, thank you. That's very helpful.

[Unidentified Representative (possibly 'Brad Bellamy')]: Do you use a licensed, put inside a person? I mean, just do it, have someone do it themselves, like go out and go to the store and buy something.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: No. None of our employees go out and and handle these things. No.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Representative Nelson.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Part of that is if it's dependent on what schedule it is, I can't buy deco not deco, but a raid wasp killer and go to your house and spray for wasp. Legally, I can't do it. So they couldn't have someone that wasn't licensed applying bait at their facility legally. That's how that role works.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Sorry, I'm going to break my own committee rule there and ask Richard Nelson a question. If I wanted to have mouse poison in my basement, you go to the store, buy it and come in and put it in my basement or?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: I could not because I have a private applicator. I'm not a consumption.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: There's a

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: difference there. You could go buy your own as long as it wasn't second generation. Which currently restricted to the other ones you could use.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thank you. Doctor. Anderson?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Yeah, I was just gonna say I just found the language from what I was trying to remember. So they describe it as electronic rodent monitoring, those mechanized machines. And in Colorado, there's actually a rodenticide bill that passed that was kind of a compromise between the environmentalists and the pest control community. And basically what it says is that you have to have an active electronic rodent monitoring with authorized applicators. And that's like your tier one system. If that doesn't work, and applicators say this isn't working in this particular case, then they can have access to using the rodenticides on a limited basis. So it's kind of a, it's like the rodenticides are still available in some cases, but it's as a backup plan trying to use these alternative methods first. And like in that particular case, the compromise that they came up with in Colorado, California also has policies similar to this. And the California Pest Management Association actually was in support of that methodology. So, these are new. I know these are new because there aren't a lot of states that have gone these routes yet, but it does seem like there are states that are finding new ways forward to try and minimize rodenticides and maximize other kind of methodologies. And I'm hoping maybe we can find one of those for Vermont closely. Okay.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Other questions?

[Rep. John O'Brien]: Representative Trey. Do you have, we're talking about integrated pest management to some extent here, do you have conversations with the New Jersey based company about, because Steve who's at the agency of Ag now who actually, I think managed some of these companies in the past in Florida said, there's certain strategies like first thing you do is where are the rodents coming from? Or can reduce their numbers without rodenticides or killing them? So do you have conversations like that? Like, oh, it seems like Cabot for whatever reason is the plant that has the most X pressures.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Yeah, absolutely. So if there's a bunch of activity in a certain area, we try to figure out what is

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: there

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: a safe area for them? Is there something that's allowing them to breathe that area? So, you know, we kind of in the food safety realm, we talk about the hurdle effect, which is oftentimes you're not just putting one barrier in place. You're putting a whole bunch of barriers in place. So the pest traps with the rodenticides is one of those snaps that we use.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Representative Lipsky.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Yes. Thank you. We've heard earlier testimony of the prolific reproduction of these growths and wisin brown nose and browns. You know, rack is stacked against homes who produced the subject expanding army that's after her. So and you say if rodents are found indication in the building, you know, absolutely wrong. Get rid of whatever may be they could have suspected of terminating. Mhmm. How many pounds, tons, and hundreds of thousand dollars or tens of thousand dollars worth of product, have you, as Cabot, had to dispose of it, typically annually?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: For all reasons entirely or specifically for pest control?

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: It's pest control. That's what we're really most concerned with. Yeah.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: I mean, I don't think we have, at least not since July since I started with the company. But but that's because we have the current program in place with the antiviral and rodenticides.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: You're saying you haven't had to get rid of anything prior?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: For a pest control issue, no.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Program is effective in that sense, at least using the last eight months is a illustration. All right, yes, President O'Brien.

[Rep. John O'Brien]: As a fan of your cheeses, obviously not all from dairy cows. So when you have pepper jack or habanero or something like that, are those ingredients also tested? Could that trail go bad? Like, you're sourcing them back. Could they have been exposed to rodents at some point?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Yeah. I mean, pest control is a standard practice in every part of the food industry for all those reasons, including on the farms. They've got the similar issues. I mean, you've got a silo full of grain, there are lots of animals out there who would like to enjoy that just as much as we would.

[Rep. John O'Brien]: So do you test though, like the pathogens you were talking about earlier that could come in with your ingredients? There testing done for that to see?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Oh yeah, our suppliers test, it depends on the risk profile of the specific ingredient, but where there is a risk, they do a lot of testing.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I've been to Cabot, to the Cabot facility back when there were tours available to the public. I'm familiar with the facility in Middlebury, not with the others, I think. I guess I'm wondering whether your facilities are in developed areas, built up areas, or are they on the edge of the woods, near water? Can you give us a summary?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: Yep. So you've been to the Cabot campus, right? So we've got two manufacturing plants there.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: In Cabot Village. Yep. Yep.

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: And there's the creek that runs right by there. Cabot's obviously not a big town, but it's You've been to Middlebury, which is a bigger town. Our other facilities are in Chateaugay and West Springfield. You know, when we built the West Springfield facility forever ago, there was nothing there. But now it's it's a big city. There's a lot quite a lot going on there. The Chateaugay is probably more like cabin.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It's

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: it's one streetlight, you know, gas station or two.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It's probably is eternally relevant since I don't think we have much control over what happens across the lake

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: or That's where they make macabre cheese. It's true.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Great product.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Is there any other questions? Anything else you wanna add?

[Dan Wodeeka, VP Food Safety, QA & Regulatory Compliance, Agri‑Mark/Cabot Creamery]: No, I appreciate the opportunity to talk to you today.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thanks for coming in. I'll just mention for committee's sake that tomorrow we have Fish and Wildlife is coming in on this bill, Department of Fish and Wildlife, and they asked to have the agency of ag come in as well. We'd already taken some testimony last week or two weeks ago now, whenever from Steve Joinell and Dave Huber. They're coming back and said, that's fine. In fact, maybe we'll have new questions if we wanna ask them. They both testified last year too when we were having this general conversation and maybe they've got new data to share. But I think that's the only testimony that we've got left scheduled anyway, so we'll wanna try and be thinking what Oh, for this bill. For this bill, yeah. What are we doing next there? So alright. Let's I guess we can be at ease for five minutes. Ellen