Press Releases

Youth will serve Farm Safety Symposium program

 

For Immediate Release
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
For more information contact:
Holly VonLuehrte
(502) 573-0450


FRANKFORT, Ky. - Young people are one of the target audiences of the Louis Crosier Farm Safety Symposium. This year, young people will deliver the program.


For the 20th edition of the event, Dale Dobson, the Kentucky Department of Agriculture's Farm and Home Safety Program coordinator, handed the baton to members of the Central Hardin and LaRue FFA chapters. They accepted the challenge and took charge of the program, which they call Learning From Our Past to Protect Our Future. The symposium is Friday at Elizabethtown Community and Technical College.


"Most of Dale's program aims to make our youth more safety conscious, so it's only natural to have them give the message," Agriculture Commissioner James Comer said. "Dale always comes up with a new wrinkle for the Farm Safety Symposium, and this is one of his better ideas."


The FFAers have raised money for the symposium, secured speakers, set up a display contest, and created an Ag Safety Awareness Challenge page on Facebook. Some of the speakers are parents and other relatives who helped Dobson start his farm safety program 20 years ago. Dobson joined the department in 1998 and brought his program along.


The display contest is scheduled for 5-7 p.m. EST. The symposium will follow from 7-8:30 p.m. The public is invited to attend.


The event is co-sponsored by Hardin County and LaRue County Farm Bureau in partnership with the Dixie Firefighters Association. For more information, go to www.dixiefirefighters.com.


The Kentucky Department of Agriculture's Farm and Home Safety Program travels to every county in Kentucky to deliver safety messages to schools, farm groups, civic organizations, and other groups that request a presentation. The program operates a one-of-a-kind rollover tractor simulator, which demonstrates the correct use of a rollover protective structure (ROPS) on a tractor, and a miniature grain bin and wagon. Last month, Dobson unveiled a PTO safety demonstration at the National Farm Machinery Show. For more information on the Farm and Home Safety Program, go to the Kentucky Department of Agriculture's website, www.kyagr.com.