RHODES — Iowa State is considering selling the university’s largest research farm, located in Rhodes, to a Marshalltown-area development group due to decreases in funding for agricultural research.

University officials are entertaining the possibility of selling the Rhodes research farm to the Marshalltown Economic Development Committee, or MEDIC, which wants to initiate the Clear Creek Lake Project and turn the area into recreational grounds.

Brian Meyer, program director of Agriculture Information Services, said a committee has been set up to take a wide look at the various possibilities for the College of Agriculture’s options regarding the farm.

“It’s early in the talking stage now,” Meyer said. “This is an idea that the folks in that area have been talking about developing into a recreational area for several years.”

In 1996, MEDIC made an offer to purchase the land, but at that time, Iowa State was not interested in selling, Meyer said. The idea never died with MEDIC, and last fall, ISU officials met with MEDIC, and discussed future plans. Iowa State told supporters of the lake project they would be involved with the planning process and asked to be informed in new developments.

For the fiscal year of 2003, the College of Agriculture faced a $4.1 million budget cut, with $829,000 of the funds needing to be reduced in research facilities.

Meyer said the budget cuts and the possibility of selling the farm are “related issues.”

“The College of Agriculture is looking at all of its budgets,” he said. “We are still dealing with meeting some of the budget cuts from last year, so we’re taking a look at all of our research facilities to either scale back or close.”

The 2,008-acre Rhodes research farm is located in Marshall County. Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc. used the farm for research until 1973, when the company transferred the farm to Iowa State. Additional land was added in 1999.

The Heart of Iowa bicycle trail bisects the farm located near the Harvester Golf Course, making it prime location for recreational grounds.

The MEDIC plan

“The type of research on the farm is mainly beef cattle research,” said Tim Goode, superintendent of the Rhodes research farm. “We also have a herd of 400 purebred Angus cows.”

Goode said three people work full time on the farm, and four students are hired most summers. Meyer said the farm costs about $100,000 a year to operate.

If the university were to sell the land, the research conducted at the Rhodes farm would be merged with the research performed at the McNay research farm in Chariton, which is 1,968 acres.

“The cow herd we have here is a commercial cross-breed herd,” said Jim Secor, superintendent of the McNay research farm. “I would suppose if the research from Rhodes moved here, we may lose the commercial herd, but they will tell me what happens and then I will make the adjustment to fit.”

Secor said he believes the discussion about selling the farm is in a “speculative state,” but admits if the research at Rhodes farm were to move to the McNay farm, a few changes would occur. “We would have staffing changes, different records to take and new types of housework,” he said.

Secor said it’s a “mixed bag” of whether he believes the research should be moved.

“In some ways, some of the cow/calf research should be done where they’re from, in southern Iowa,” he said. “It’s tough because Rhodes is close to Ames, but the development idea does fit with the golf course and the condominiums [in Rhodes].”

Mike McGhee, lakes project coordinator for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, said the Clear Creek Lake project has been in discussion for a long time.

“The Clear Creek Lake site was an area that the DNR identified back in the ’80s and ’90s as potential areas that were lacking in lakes,” he said. “Marshalltown was also one area that had no quality-based lake recreation nearby. There was a feasibility study done in 1996, and the project looked like a genuine possibility.”

McGhee said recently the MEDIC made some contacts and approached the DNR director to revive the Clear Creek Lake Project with a public-private relationship. He said there will have to be some discussion among the DNR, MEDIC and Iowa State.

“It’s important to consider two things,” McGhee said. “One, that the DNR will only purchase ground from willing sellers and, more importantly, where the money would come from.”

Barb Boose, communications director for the Iowa Board of Regents, said Iowa State will present its information and recommendations to the board, which will have the final say whether or not the land can be sold. “Land authority approval is the responsibility of the board,” she said.

If the decision to sell the Rhodes farm to MEDIC is approved later this spring, research would not be the only thing affected. Fifty landowners would also be directly affected by the lake project.

Home is where the land is

Chris Freland is the head of the opposition committee of the Clear Creek Lake Project. Chris and her husband, Rich, have lived on their farm on Brown Avenue in Rhodes for eight years. They have three children: Cody, 7; Rachel, 6; and Regan, 13 months old.

Freland has been actively involved in the awareness and opposition of the project. She has expressed her concern regarding the lake by writing letters to the DNR and the Board of Regents, working with Iowa legislators and appearing on a radio call-in show out of Des Moines.

Freland said, as she understands it, after MEDIC buys the land from Iowa State, individual land owners will be approached.

“So at this point, they’re saying anything that’s on the public side of the lake, that the DNR would be involved with, would be only assessed land value,” she said. “They said everything north would be private entity, so we would sell out to private developers. [MEDIC is] saying we don’t have to sell, but we have to give them easement to the lake. From an environmental standpoint, you must have a quarter of a mile of the watershed without cows, manure, fertilizer. That can’t happen here — or you’re going to have a whole lake cleanup project.”

Freland said her group is also concerned about the results of the 1996 feasibility study. She said the study shows a dam would not be able to hold water because of erodible soil, so bedrock would have to be moved in to secure it. She said her group worries the lake would become “a dirty, silted, mudhole,” over time.

“The average depth of the lake is going to be 19 feet, and the widest point is 300 feet wide, so all you’re going to be able to do is fish, and they think that is going to draw all these people, and all this economic stimulus.”

Freland said she asked MEDIC why they chose the Rhodes area to construct the creek.

“They informed me it was centrally located, this is wasteland that we live in, it’s not even good farm ground, and people can’t drive to the other Iowa lakes because it’s too far,” she said.

Freland said she hasn’t been approached by a private developer yet, but feels community pressure from those who support the lake.

“They’ve told us if you’re not a willing seller, you won’t have to sell, but yet they keep pushing on. They keep pressing, they keep pursuing,” she said.

The farm the Frelands live on is not located on the proposed site of the lake. But their second farm, where they milk their cows, is close enough to the creek that it would be completely under water.

At a meeting of 32 landowners, all 32 were opposed to the Clear Creek Lake Project, Freland said.

Freland, along with six other landowners, are in the process of gathering signatures in opposition of the lake project, she said.

Freland said there are many reasons the lake project should not be pursued.

Residents who do sell their lands won’t get as much as they could because of the project, Freland said. Others may lose their businesses because they won’t have the money to relocate.

“People in the watershed are not going to be directly bought out, but they’re going to lose roughly 10 to 20 percent of their crops because they can’t apply fertilizers, or do any of the natural, regular farming measures that they do now for fear of runoff.”

And residents won’t just be able to pick up from a current location and move within the county, she said.

“If it’s important for you to stay in Marshall County, or this area and this school district, there’s no more land to be had, you’re not going to find 200 acres for every person that’s affected in this area because it’s in housing development, and it’s broken up into small parcels.”

For Freland and her family, that’s a big problem.

“We’re 10 years from being a century farm, which is very important for us. We have a lifestyle out here,” Freland said. “It’s hard for a nonfarm person to realize how tied you get to the land, and how hard you work every day.”

Meyer said he anticipates a decision regarding the Rhodes farm to be made later this spring.

“We’re taking a very wide look at all of our facilities,” he said. “We will make some recommendations to the dean and talk to other folks on campus that would be affected, as well as agricultural groups in the state.”