Posted: May 31st, 2011 - 7:14pm
Source: The Brunswick News

An aide to U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston says the first district Republican is opposed to new regulations that would end up costing taxpayers a bundle to implement, even if the intended goal is tougher food safety requirements.
President Barack Obama would like to strengthen food safety regulations, but he's running into a Republican wall in the U.S. House of Representatives.
Kingston is part of that wall.
"Food safety is an easy issue to draw up to scare people, but the fact is that our food supply is already 99.99 percent safe," said Chris Crawford, spokesman for Kingston.
Not everyone is so sure, including those participating in a national survey by 11 organizations. The majority of people surveyed indicated that they support more rigid safeguards.Among the organizations conducting the survey was the Pew Health Group, a part of the Pew Charitable Trusts, a nonprofit group that analyzes data on matters of public policy.
The problem is funding. Kingston and other Republicans, eager to trim the federal budget, are proposing to trim $285 million from the Food and Drug Administration budget just as new food safety laws are scheduled to go into effect. That reflects a reduction of 11 percent.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service would also be cut, by about $35 million.