Save the Illinois River Inc. | Environment | June 22, 2025
Federal judge finds poultry waste still poses significant threat to Illinois River
By D.E. Smoot TDP Special Writer Jun 20, 2025
Illinois River
Recreationalists navigate the Illinois River during a recent outing on the state-designated scenic river, which a federal judge found has been irreparably harmed by increased phosphorus levels caused by poultry integrators’ business practices.
D.E. Smoot | Daily Press
Clean water advocates found no surprises in an opinion published this week by a federal judge who found poultry waste “continues to be a significant source of phosphorus” pollution in the Illinois River Watershed.
U.S. District Judge Gregory Frizzell found no merit in claims of made by Arkansas-based poultry companies about water-quality improvements due to industry changes made since 2010. Frizzell concluded phosphorus pollution in the Illinois River and its tributaries constitutes an “actual and ongoing injury to the waters,” causing irreparable harm that warrants injunctive relief.
The order is the most recent development in a lawsuit filed in 2005 by the state of Oklahoma against 11 integrators with poultry feeding operations scattered throughout the basin. Frizzell based his findings and conclusions on evidence presented during a post-trial hearing this past December.
Save the Illinois River President Denise Deason-Toyne said Frizzell’s ruling comes as no “surprise to anyone who has actually been on and observed the Illinois River over the past 15 years.”
“Anybody who has been on the Illinois River knows there has been no significant, if any, improvement in the water quality,” Deason-Toyne said. “I think the state’s evidence [of deteriorating water quality] was overwhelming.”
The evidentiary hearing in December was prompted by poultry integrators’ challenges to Frizzell’s 2023 ruling that found the integrators responsible for polluting the land and waters within the Illinois River watershed. The 11 named defendants pushed back against Frizzell’s findings and conclusions, which were published in a 219-page document almost 13 years after the trial concluded in 2010.
Lawyers representing the integrators sought a dismissal of the state’s claims. Defendants claim the judge’s findings and conclusions were grounded on evidence that ignores efforts undertaken by integrators since trial to reduce phosphorus pollution within the watershed.
During the five-day evidentiary hearing in December, Attorney General Gentner Drummond presented evidence contradicting claims of improved conditions offered by poultry integrators. Frizzell ultimately found the state’s evidence more credible than that offered by poultry integrators. Defendants, the judge notes, argue for the exclusion of data recorded when stream and river levels exceed base flow. Experts testifying for the state said the exclusion of that data ignores continued application of poultry waste in amounts that exceed the agronomic need for phosphorus.
Integrators also directed the “court toward evidence of a downward trend in phosphorus loading.” Frizzell acknowledges in his opinion that downward trend exists only when the data set being considered includes phosphorus levels recorded in 1999 — one year after state legislators passed laws intended to curb phosphorus pollution caused by poultry feeding operations.
“The trend in more recent years shows increasing phosphorus loads in the Illinois River and its tributaries,” Frizzell writes in his most recent opinion. “The data further demonstrates an upward tick in total phosphorus loadings from 2019 to 2023.”
In a prepared statement released after Frizzell published his opinion, Drummond said he remains confident about the prospect of negotiating an agreement with poultry integrators. The attorney general said he remains “committed to finding a path forward that restricts poultry producers from polluting the Illinois River and allows us to clean up the watershed to preserve it for future generations.”
“We very much value the poultry companies and want them to remain in Oklahoma, but that doesn’t mean the industry can pollute the Illinois River, one of our state’s greatest treasures,” Drummond said. “Having a clean river doesn’t mean we can’t also have good industry — both can, and should, exist.”
Deason-Toyne said she remains skeptical about the prospect for an agreed settlement of the state’s claims. Considering the poultry industry’s track record, she expects even more delays in the lawsuit that has dragged on for two decades.
“It is quite unlikely that the poultry industry will come to the table to enter good faith negotiations, to work to remediate the damage it has caused and continues to cause,” Deason-Toyne said. “Most likely, we will see more appeals and substantial amounts of time and money spent in litigation instead of doing what is right and working together to solve the problem and develop means to prevent creating harm in the future.”
Named defendants of the 2005 lawsuit include: Tyson Foods, Cobb-Vantress, Cal-Maine Foods, Cargill, George’s, Peterson Farms, Simmons Foods and various subsidiaries of those companies. Frizzell’s order notes that all but Peterson and Cal-Maine continue to operate within the Illinois River Watershed. The poultry industry generated about 446,045 tons of waste from 2015 to 2024 within Oklahoma’s portion of the basin.
Arkansas laws that protect the privacy of poultry feeding operations make it more difficult to determine the amount of waste the industry generates within the watershed. Public records compiled by the Arkansas Department of Agriculture show growers in that state’s portion of the basin may have generated about 119,500 tons of poultry waste in 2023.
