United States Reps. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill, and Fred Grandy, R-Iowa, told DeKalb residents agricultural conditions are improving in the country.

Hastert said the focus of Monday’s town meeting at the Dekalb County Farm Bureau was one issue—agriculture. “The meeting is basically for you (the people of DeKalb), and for us (the congressmen) to listen to what you have to say,” he said.

“Agriculture is very important in the Midwest, and we want you to know we don’t forget that,” Hastert said.

Hastert opened the floor to Grandy by saying the meeting would discuss congressional issues on agriculture from 1987, “but more importantly, to discuss what is in store for agriculture in 1988,” he said.

Grandy, best known as “Gopher” on the popular television series “The Love Boat,” opened discussion on the Budget Definition Reduction Package. He said the package has helped farmers greatly.

“The Agriculture Committee in Congress is writing many bills to help farmers in debt,” Grandy said, “but will bureaucracy be able to keep up with all the programs we keep churning out?”

Grandy said he feared prosperous farmers may have trouble in keeping up with all the farmers that have been revitalized through farm bills.

“All these bills may have a backlash effect. The more programs we write, the more they will take away from each other,” he said.

Grandy said the Congressional Tax Bill will eventually have an impact on farm income. He said Congress must decide what is going to be important in the next 10 to 20 years and invest in it now.

Agriculture is usually left out in decisions and trade negotiations, Hastert said.

Grandy said this was because in trade negotiations, the U.S. is not only negotiating with another country. Manufactured products are in direct competition with agricultural products within the U.S., he said.

Grandy said the U.S. would not suffer from the Soviet Union expanding agriculture within their country.

He said the U.S. is not entirely dependent on Soviet trade because there are still many other countries to export to, and even if the Soviets do expand their agriculture, their poor soil conditions would never yield many crops.

Hastert said the Soviets will have more money to spend on their agriculture because of cuts in defense spending, but they will still need U.S. help and trade.

“Argentina and Brazil are now included in terms of our major trade contenders,” Grandy said.

The U.S. is helping South American countries to pay debts, but at the same time hurting itself by lowering world agriculture prices because these countries are expanding their crops, he said.

“We need them to repay their debts, but not at the expense of our own players,” Grandy said.

“We’re all in this together, and we need your input to develop a world-wide strategy—or we may hurt our own players,” he said.