About Us

Neighbors Opposing a Polluted Environment (N.O.P.E.) is a non-profit organization serving rural residents, family farmers, and concerned Fulton County citizens who are committed to safeguarding and protecting public health in addition to restoring local control over where livestock-confinements are located and monitored.  Our mission is to empower citizens to understand their current rights, foster democratic processes, and sustain healthy communities.  We are dedicated to keeping our air clean, our water safe, and our Illinois communities alive and healthy. Our members search for up-to-date studies and investigations so we may educate citizens about the community, environmental, and human impacts of Concentrated Feeding Animal Operations (also called CAFOs). 

Projects

NOPE opposed two CAFOs proposed for Fulton County - one in Bernadotte Township and one in Isabel Township.  Residents in both townships had many concerns regarding the 20,000+ hog cities [confinements] proposed for our quiet, back-country farm areas with family homes, churches, businesses, and many historical features.  Several comments were made, stating "a little stink from a farm is normal" and no one had a quarrel with it. However, many local residents did not agree!  Neither of these CAFOs were family farms and would be a large-scale factory farms benefitting the owners not the local residents. Each of these projects was proposed to be SEVEN times bigger than the Cedar Crest project (Table Grove/Ipava) of 3000 hogs and FORTY times larger than the Bear Creek (Lewistown) facility in our county with 500 boars.   That would be a lot more than a "little stink!"

NOPE members called, e-mailed, and wrote to the Illinois Department of Agriculture to express their concerns with the siting of both CAFOs. The LFMA outlines specific siting criteria that had to be met before the application could have been approved.  Based on this criteria, the group provided a detailed listing to the IDOA of the errors and omissions we felt were made in the applications.  Many residents also sent letters regarding the community parks and gathering areas that are located within the set-back area of the proposed facilities.  

PROJECT UPDATE ... The applications for the both proposed CAFOs have passed the five-year anniversary.  NOPE members in both townships continue to be vigilant to protect their communities from factories farms.  We have also been helping other townships in Central Illinois with their efforts to keep their communities safe from corporate farm factories.

Visit the RESOURCES page to learn more about CAFOs and their impacts on local residents.