November 2016
Construction has started on the Sandy Creek Lane LLC hog confinement facility in Marshall County near Wenona. The facility will house 20,000 head of swine. A local group, Save Our Sandy, has been fighting the proposed facility for the last two years. Their biggest concern is hog waste from the facility leaking into nearby waterways, including Sandy Creek. Unfortunately, the Illinois Department of Agriculture approved construction of the facility. The Marshall County Board voted to oppose the facility but they have no authority over it's construction.
Last August the Chicago Tribune published an in depth investigative report, The price of pork: Cheap meat comes at high cost in Illinois, which detailed the high environmental cost of raising large numbers of hogs in an efficient, factorylike setting.
