“The early retirement and now this [corruption] stuff has taken away years and years of experience where you could call and try and resolve problems without making them acts of Congress,”
“A lot of guys are heading up departments they know nothing about. They're just managers wondering if they're running it or keeping a seat warm. Before, they had people around them who knew how to get the job done. No more. A lot of those people who ran departments for decades regardless of who the commissioner was are now gone.”
“Before, we were dealing with guys who knew the service end of a department and knew how to get things done for communities. If you were out there fixing a street, and somebody said, 'Can we extend it around this corner because there's a need here,' they'd figure out a way to do it. New people are reluctant to work with anybody unless it's scripted. There's not a lot of innovative stuff going on.”
“To be a member, you'll have to be involved in farm marketing and agriculture at some level. We're still sorting a lot of things out, and defining membership is a challenge. Does a corn maze qualify? How about someone with maple syrup or an on-farm gift shop or a bed and breakfast? I would say yes because we want the membership to be as wide as possible, knowing that it may be tightened. But at this point, we feel a wide interpretation is the best.”