Followup: Dollarhites Reaction to USDA Settlement

Remember the Dollarhites? The little family that had the little rabbit farm that the USDA fined all over? Well, USDA spokesman David Sachs offered a settlement on behalf of the USDA for a $90,000 penalty fee; and the prohibition of breeding of any kind of animals on their current property (even if sold to somebody else) or in their name. Some backstory from Bungalow Bill:

The USDA was inspecting the petting zoo at Silver Dollar City when it came across invoices from the small bunny farm in Nixa, Dollarvalue Rabbitry. These invoices brought the feds to the front door steps of the Dollarhite’s in the fall of 2009. They immediately complied allowing the federal government agent to inspect their cages and didn’t see the need to worry. Things would soon turn for the worse. After being taken to the back where the rabbits were raised, the USDA began running the width of her finger across the cage and told the Dollarhites they would need to replace the cage because it was a quarter inch too small and didn’t meet federal regulations. The Dollarhites had just invested in new cages to ensure the bunnies had a healthy amount of space to develop. Cages stated to be for “large breed rabbits”, yet they were raising dwarf breed varieties, which require even less space. The USDA agent also noted a small rust spot on a feeder, citing that it wasn’t in compliance. They responded noting the rabbits urine cause cages to rust and they work hard to keep the rabbits cages in top shape. It didn’t matter, the USDA agent cited the less than an inch area of the cage as an infraction. The Dollarhites didn’t hear from the USDA again until January 2010. At that time an USDA Animal and Health Inspection Service (APHIS) began investigating pet shops in town. The agent arrived at the Petland store in Springfied, which doesn’t fall under USDA jurisdiction according to the manager, and began demanding seeing records for the Dollarhites rabbits. The manager called the Dollarhites stating a USDA investigator had come into his store demanding to see any records regarding Dolllarvalue Rabbitry. After consulting with their corporate attorney, the store manager complied.

So, what did they do? They rejected it! This via the Christian County Headliner:

“What it boils down to is this. Their offer to us, and we agreed, if we didn’t have any rabbits or any guinea pigs, they would verify that and drop (the issue) without a penalty,” she said. “They came out and we videotaped it. That was supposed to be the end of it. “We received another letter that we would never own any breeding animals.” Judy Dollarhite interprets the settlement agreement to not only prohibiting them from ever owning or having an interest in owning any kind of breeding animal, including cattle, but to any kind of breeding animals being on the premises—even if they sold the property. “We couldn’t run cattle or anything ever; nor could anybody on our premises,” she said. “Even if we wanted to fatten a beef.” That, she says, is “ridiculous.”

USDA spokesman Sacks responds with:

“Mr. Dollarhite did not accept the agency’s revised settlement proposal,” Sacks said in an email statement. “The Dollarhite case remains under agency review as we evaluate our options for resolving the matter. We typically refer cases to our Office of General Counsel for litigation when we cannot resolve a case through a settlement agreement, but there has been no formal USDA decision at this time in terms of our next course of action.”