II
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION S. 910
To require the Secretary of Agriculture to establish a pilot program to
implement a pre-qualification or pre-approval process for farmers and
ranchers with respect to a direct farm ownership loan under the Consoli-
dated Farm and Rural Development Act, and for other purposes.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
MARCH10, 2025
Mr. W
ELCH(for himself, Mr. HOEVEN, and Ms. SMITH) introduced the fol-
lowing bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Agri-
culture, Nutrition, and Forestry
A BILL
To require the Secretary of Agriculture to establish a pilot
program to implement a pre-qualification or pre-approval
process for farmers and ranchers with respect to a direct
farm ownership loan under the Consolidated Farm and
Rural Development Act, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Farm Ownership Im-4
provement Act’’. 5
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•S 910 IS
SEC. 2. DIRECT FARM OWNERSHIP LOAN PILOT PROGRAM. 1
Subtitle D of the Consolidated Farm and Rural De-2
velopment Act is amended by inserting after section 374 3
(7 U.S.C. 2008i) the following: 4
‘‘SEC. 375. DIRECT FARM OWNERSHIP LOAN PILOT PRO-5
GRAM. 6
‘‘(a) E
STABLISHMENT OF PILOTPROGRAM.—Not 7
later than 2 years after the date of enactment of the Farm 8
Ownership Improvement Act, the Secretary shall establish 9
a 5-year pilot program (referred to in this section as the 10
‘pilot program’) to implement a pre-qualification or pre- 11
approval process for farmers and ranchers with respect to 12
a direct farm ownership loan under subtitle A. 13
‘‘(b) B
ORROWERVIABILITY ANDREPAYMENTAS-14
SESSMENT.—In carrying out section 360(b) with respect 15
to a participant in the pilot program, the Secretary, as 16
the Secretary determines to be appropriate, may make use 17
of alternative methods, including financial benchmarking, 18
to reliably evaluate the financial viability of the participant 19
and the likelihood of repayment of the applicable loan. 20
‘‘(c) L
IMITATION.—This section shall not be inter-21
preted to repeal any borrowing requirement imposed under 22
subtitle A. 23
‘‘(d) O
UTREACHPRIORITY.—In conducting outreach 24
relating to the pilot program, the Secretary shall prioritize 25
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•S 910 IS
outreach to organizations that have demonstrated engage-1
ment with beginning farmers or ranchers. 2
‘‘(e) E
VALUATION AND REPORTS.—The Secretary 3
shall— 4
‘‘(1) evaluate the pilot program on an ongoing 5
basis; and 6
‘‘(2) annually submit to the Committee on Agri-7
culture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate and 8
the Committee on Agriculture of the House of Rep-9
resentatives a written report that includes— 10
‘‘(A) a description of the performance out-11
comes of the pilot program, including stake-12
holder and participant evaluations, assessments, 13
and participation demographics, that includes 14
the information described in section 15
5413(b)(1)(A)(iv) of the Agriculture Improve-16
ment Act of 2018 (7 U.S.C. 17
2008x(b)(1)(A)(iv)); and 18
‘‘(B) a recommendation as to the value of 19
the pilot program, including whether to author-20
ize a permanent program modeled on the pilot 21
program.’’. 22
Æ
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