BISMARCK, N.D. - The North Dakota Public Service Commission is seeking to have the Legislature repeal a law requiring hay buyers to be licensed and bonded for a simple reason: no one uses it.
Konrad Crockford, director of compliance for the PSC, says there hasn’t been a hay buyer licensed with the state since 2005, and that license was revoked in 2006 for failure to maintain a bond. Prior to that, the last licenses were valid in 2002 and 1999.
“For at least the last 20 years, it’s not something that’s been widely used,” Crockford says.
The law doesn’t cover every person who buys or sells hay. Instead, it requires people who are in the business of buying and selling hay - basically, a middleman in the transaction - to be licensed through the PSC and bonded, Crockford explains.
The PSC doesn’t expect repealing the hay buyers law will expose producers to problems with rogue hay buyers since there is no indication that hay brokers have been defrauding anyone in the state in recent history, Crockford says.
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The House Agriculture Committee has the bill, House Bill 1125 on its agenda for today.
