Ag Secretary Naig Hopeful New Ownership of Charles City Chicken Plant Can Be Successful

The former Pure Prairie Poultry facility in Charles City has been sold.

Pitman Farms of California has purchased PPP, which will be their second go round in Charles City. Pitman owned and ran the chicken processing plant previously as Simply Essentials, which closed in 2019.

Iowa Ag Secretary Mike Naig says he’s curious on how another run at the operations will fare.

When PPP shutdown in October 2024, the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship (IDALS) was forced to care for approximately 1.3 million broiler chickens. A hard lesson according to Naig.

In the end, the state had to euthanize all of the chickens. It also cost the state almost $2.3 million dollars.

Those debtors included the City of Charles City, which was fortunate to recoup about $540,000 of some $625,000 in unpaid water and sewer bills left behind when PPP ceased operations.

Naig made his latest comments to KCHA/KCZE on Pure Prairie Poultry after he was featured speaker at the First Security Bank & Trust Ag Seminar Wednesday (03.04) on the Floyd County Fairgrounds.