The Indiana Farm Bureau will prod legislators to shield rural areas from economic damage from population loss.

49 of Indiana’s 92 counties lost people in the last decade, most of them rural. Indiana’s 12 largest counties gained people, while the 13 smallest shrank. Farm Bureau public policy director Andy Tauer says the Farm Bureau isn’t seeking specific bills in the upcoming session, but wants to make sure legislators start to think about how to offset the potential squeeze created in rural areas by declining population.

Tauer says the growing popularity of electric cars creates potential problems for farmers who profit from ethanol and biodiesel. And he says legislators need to think about fixes to Indiana school funding, which is closely tied to enrollment. Tauer says local schools are often the glue which holds rural communities together, and says declining enrollment as people migrate to cities and suburbs threatens to gut school budgets. Some schools have plugged the gap with local property tax referenda, but the Farm Bureau has long complained property taxes hit farms disproportionately hard.

The Farm Bureau applauds the quarter-billion dollars included in the new state budget to expand rural broadband. The just-passed federal infrastructure bill will add 100-million more over the next decade. Tauer says the Farm Bureau will push to make sure the state steers that money to unserved and under-served areas.

And the organization wants legislators to address rural gaps in public health and job training.

The General Assembly convenes Tuesday for the ceremonial start of the 2022 session. Legislators begin the 10-week session in earnest in January.