Dateline: May 8, 2003

Boll weevil eradication receives 10-1 approval

AUSTIN — The Texas Department of Agriculture announced this week that cotton producers in the 22 counties of the Northern Rolling Plains Boll Weevil Eradication Zone have voted by almost a 10-to-1 margin to continue a boll weevil eradication program. 

Final results were 904 voting “for” and 94 voting “against” continuing an eradication program.

TDA mailed 2,028 ballots to cotton producers in the zone who were eligible to vote in the referendum.  A total of 998 ballots were postmarked by the April 21 deadline and counted.

Cotton producers also elected John Inman of Childress County to represent the Northern Rolling Plains Zone on the statewide board of directors for the Texas Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation, Inc. 

Inman is a cotton producer who has farmed in Childress County since 1980.

Growers in the Northern Rolling Plains Zone initially approved a boll weevil eradication program in April 1999 and a maximum assessment of $15 per planted row acre for irrigated cotton and $10 per planted row acre for dryland cotton to fund it.  With producers voting to continue the program, the current assessment rates were not affected.

The Northern Rolling Plains Boll Weevil Eradication Zone consists of approximately 350,000 acres in 22 counties: Childress, Clay, Collingsworth, Cottle, Donley, Foard, Gray, Hall, Hardeman, Kent, King, Motley, Wheeler, Wichita, Wilbarger, and portions of Archer, Armstrong, Briscoe, Crosby, Dickens, Floyd and Garza.