{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=CE9C91D3-F01D-4420-8557-104AF2957789", "McConnell Delivers $20 Million to Fund Grain Storage for Tornado-Impacted Farmers, Including in Western Kentucky", "2022-09-26", "2022", "2022-09", "Republican", "Senate", "KY", "Mitch McConnell", "M000355", "www.mcconnell.senate.gov", "mcconnell", "https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) announced today the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will distribute $20 million to build temporary grain storage facilities in areas affected by last year\u2019s tornadoes, including Western Kentucky. The region lost millions of bushels of grain storage capacity in the storm, threatening this year\u2019s harvest. Today\u2019s announcement will help reconnect local farmers to grain purchasers and reimburse those who have already constructed temporary facilities using their own resources.\n\nSenator McConnell included a provision in last year\u2019s government funding bill directing the USDA to fund temporary grain storage infrastructure in Western Kentucky in response to last year\u2019s tornadoes. As a senior member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, the Senator also attended a Committee hearing to question U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack and seek confirmation that USDA would distribute funding as soon as possible.\n\n\u201cLast year\u2019s tornado outbreak was one of the worst disasters to ever hit Kentucky and its devastation continues to hamper our families and businesses. That includes Western Kentucky\u2019s farmers who, after losing millions of bushels of grain storage capacity in the storm, feared they might be unable to complete this year\u2019s harvest. I knew we couldn\u2019t allow their hard work to go to waste or their farms to fail, so I leveraged my position as Senate Republican Leader to secure USDA funding for new temporary storage facilities and pushed Secretary Vilsack to release the federal funds as soon as possible. I look forward to watching this extra capacity come online quickly and remove another obstacle to Western Kentucky\u2019s tornado recovery efforts,\u201d said Senator McConnell.\n\n\u201cOver the past two years, weather events in several states caused catastrophic losses to grain storage facilities on family farms as well as a large, commercial grain elevator, leaving stored grain exposed to the elements and affecting commodity marketing options for many producers. USDA heard from congressional leaders, including Minority Leader McConnell, who identified a gap in our disaster assistance toolkit, and we went to work designing a new program to deliver direct assistance to producers who are struggling to meet their on-farm storage capacity needs in the wake of disasters,\u201d Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said. \u201cCongress has provided USDA with important flexibility through the Commodity Credit Corporation, which gives us the tools to be nimble as we work to support the production and marketing of agricultural commodities and quickly respond to agricultural producers\u2019 needs.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T18:29:59Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=CE9C91D3-F01D-4420-8557-104AF2957789"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.2243620585650206, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}