Just hours before Congress jets off for summer vacation, members in the House of Representatives took a small step forward to help ranchers struggling to keep herds alive in the worst drought the country has seen in 25 years, U.S. News reported yesterday. The House passed a disaster-relief bill Thursday by a margin of 223 to 196, although it's unclear whether the Senate will even take up the bill after the August recess. The $383 million emergency legislation provides payments to cattle and sheep ranchers who have lost livestock in the drought and assists them with monthly feed costs, which have skyrocketed as grazing lands are scorched by the nationwide heat wave. The payments would reimburse ranchers for 75 percent of their losses and provide assistance to fruit tree and honeybee farmers. The 2008 farm bill doesn't expire until Sept. 30, but the disaster-relief provision protecting ranchers and specialty-crop growers from natural disasters expired last year.
