MARCELLUS, Mich. —
Officials went to Nourish Cooperative in Marcellus for the third and final time to oversee the dumping of raw dairy product, which they said violated Michigan law.
Nourish estimates that the cost of the disposed product totals $90,000, but they’re still waiting on official numbers.
Manager and Co-Founder Ashley Armstrong said she thought everything was good when they submitted their food license months ago.
“We submitted our pet food license back in March, submitted the $100 check with our application and the check was cashed,” Armstrong said. “And then insert the raid where everything was put under seizure.”
The team had been operating since then and needed to fix some label issues. Armstrong said they included things like adding specific serving sizes and crude protein.
She said they fixed and submitted the new labels, but when the Michigan Department of Agriculture came out in late May, Nourish was alerted that all raw dairy pet product needed to be thrown out.
“I can drive to a pet food store throughout the state of Michigan and buy raw goat milk,” she said “So I'm a little bit confused as to why we can't.”
The department came out three times because the dumpster couldn’t handle all the product. Thursday morning’s dump saw nearly 100 gallons disposed of — the smallest amount so far.
When a product is seized by the state, it can’t be moved or touched. That means the product was sitting in fridges and freezers until MDARD officials could be on site watching the disposal.
“That's a huge hit on us financially, but also valuable freezer space. We're renting other like, you can see we're using our reefer freezer as extra freezer space because we're very limited in the space that we have in our warehouse there,” she said “So it's definitely been a challenge logistically as well, to work around and try to find a place for all of our beef and our chicken to be stored.”
MDARD said in a statement to 13 ON YOUR SIDE earlier this week that once the supplier information was confirmed, products labeled for human consumption were released from seizure.
What remained, and was disposed of, were pet food products that contained raw milk.
Armstrong said Nurish’s lawyers have asked MDARD for reconsideration on selling the pet food, but haven’t gotten a clear response back.
“The lawyers are again asking for an actual response to our request for reconsideration, because it's almost like [MDARD] just didn't even read it,” she said. “And so they're asking for please address these questions so a little bit more specific, to make sure that we can get an answer out of those.”
Armstrong believes that regulations like the ones on raw dairy hold back small-scale farming.
“In order for us to actually produce like healthy food work with the soil, we need more small-scale regenerative farming to kind of be more of a decentralized food system,” she said.
The product isn’t just from Michigan; product at Nourish Cooperative comes from a partnership of farms.
“We provide a market where we pay our farm partners above market price so that they can actually make a living farming at home. And we have very high standards for our farm partners, in terms of like farming practices like rotational grazing, regenerative agriculture and then also the highest sanitary standards to ensure that we are producing a really quality product for pets,” Armstrong said.
MDARD said in a statement they're working with Nourish as they come into compliance with all regulatory requirements.
"MDARD is dedicated to the long-term growth and success of Michigan food and agriculture as well as ensuring businesses are adhering to state regulations and the safety of the state’s food and feed supply," the statement said.
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