nenmrancher
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Sent: Friday, March 30, 2007 4:04 AM
Subject: Groups splinter over strategy
http://agjournalonline.com/articles/2007/03/29/news/news01.txt
Groups splinter over strategy
By Candace Krebs, Regional Correspondent
Published: Thursday, March 29, 2007 11:46 AM MDT
E-mail this story | Print this page
KANSAS CITY - A group founded to give disgruntled cattlemen a voice and an alternative to the century-old National Cattlemen's Beef Association has now further splintered. A third grassroots entity has emerged, while some of the members of the original alternative organization say maintaining "a unified voice" would have been a better solution.
Seven years ago, several energetic, concerned leaders formed the Ranchers-Cattlemen's Action Legal Fund, known as R-CALF, to tackle rising beef and cattle imports into the U.S. Adding United Stockgrowers of America to its name, the group evolved into a compelling alternative association and a relative powerhouse with nearly 20,000 active members, a satellite office in Washington D.C. and a clearly articulated position on a number of key issues, including international trade policy and Country-of-Origin labeling.
A year ago last January, the founders stepped aside and the association changed its top leadership for the first time. At the 2006 annual convention, long-time popular president, Leo McDonnell, of Columbus, Mont., passed the gavel to Texan, Chuck Kiker, who held an appointed position on the national beef checkoff board, which R-CALF routinely criticized for being too closely aligned with NCBA, the predominant industry group. R-CALF expanded its reach, forming new private property rights and beef check-off committees.
Developments early this year indicate the leadership change tested the group far more than observers realized at the time. Internal conflicts simmered and finally came to a head shortly after this year's annual convention in Denver in January. Kiker was suddenly removed as president during an otherwise routine conference call. Following that action additional leaders resigned in protest.
In the interest of transparency, an aspect on which the group's leaders have always hung their hats, key figures on both sides of the internal power struggle eventually went public, culminating with the publication of an anonymous wesite and blogs (www.swift-horses.com) that exhaustively chronicled the rift.
Roughly two-dozen directors, committee chairmen and membership recruiters who resigned from R-CALF are in the process of establishing a new organization, the United States Cattlemen's Association, which for now is based in California.
The new group issued its first news release on March 15, naming its interim president as former R-CALF board member Jon Wooster, of San Lucas, Calif., and listing an address where $1,000 founding memberships and $100 active and affiliate memberships could be sent. The release also said the group was creating a governance structure and intended to have legislative representation in Washington D.C. with "no time to waste."
Chase Carter, a young rancher from Clayton, N.M., and the group's interim vice president, confirmed that Kiker and several other well-known former R-CALF leaders are involved in putting the group together. He said their first priority is to raise enough money - hopefully in the next month or two - to retain former R-CALF lobbyist Jess Peterson in Washington D.C.
"When what happened at R-CALF happened, a lot of people decided that wasn't the direction they wanted to go anymore," he explains. "A lot of people were tired of litigating. We felt our money would be better spent lobbying like other groups do."
He said organizers are hoping to appeal to cattle producers who may not quite agree with either NCBA or R-CALF, but he added, "We are not going to shut our doors to working with any organization when we get up and running." He said no organizational meetings had yet been planned and that an official website would likely be the group's next step.
Founding R-CALF president McDonnell, who resigned from the board the day after Kiker's removal, continues to cast a long shadow with both groups.
At a recent regional meeting in Kansas City, one of a series of events held to address the recent turmoil, current R-CALF President Max Thorns-berry invoked McDonnell's name numerous times. The Richland, Mo., veterinarian who replaced Kiker as the group's chief said he and McDonnell have maintained a close working relationship.
Carter said McDonnell is supportive of organizers of the new group and will hopefully "play a role" in its future.
"At this particular junction if R-CALF was dissolved it would hurt the movement at least to some degree," Carter said. "But we cannot continue pouring money into litigation and stay solvent. We need somewhat of a safety net."
Fighting for a united identity
In this year's R-CALF mail-in ballot election - which has been delayed by the inner controversy - several key resolutions are up for a vote. Instead of using its common tagline, "Working for U.S. cattle producers," a resolution has been proposed to switch that reference to "fighting for" U.S. cattle producers. That could be pivotal in defining the group's identity. Former president Kiker, of Beaumont, Tex., took a lot of heat internally for approaching legislators and USDA officials in Washington by describing the organization as a "kinder, gentler R-CALF."
Founding member Herman Schumacher of Herried, S.D., recalls Kiker saying in one conversation, "I didn't join this organization to go around suing everybody," expressing a frustration that others felt too.
In the latest salvo, R-CALF leaders say they will sue USDA if that is the only way to stop the government from opening the Canadian border to live cattle over 30 months of age. They fear it will flood the market and pose new food safety and international trade problems and have been raising money to mount a legal fight.
In Kansas City, Thornsberry said R-CALF devotes "90 percent" of its efforts to policy issues versus actual litigation. He also gave a 15-minute presentation opposing the national animal ID plan. R-CALF is now advising its members not to obtain a premise ID.
Less than 50 people attended the meeting, and a Kansas couple who had been involved with membership recruitment and fundraising, Dennis and Dorothy Goodman, each made brief but heated comments, resigned in protest and stormed out. A handful of others spoke in support of the group. A soft-spoken man from Iowa approached the microphone and said solemnly, "I'd just like to heal this."
Those who remain staunchly aligned with the original R-CALF characterize the split as growing pains and part of a learning process they insist will make the group stronger.
For now both R-CALF and USCA appear to have nearly identical legislative agendas and both expect to be politically active in Washington. Whether there's a silver lining in that is yet to be seen.
"I don't think it's good. I think it dilutes our message," Thornsberry said.
He also wasn't sure what kind of impact a new group would have. "I can tell you that the group starting USCA is a very small group," he said. "Maybe 40 to 50 people at this point in time. I don't know what kind of voice they are going to have, but they do have experience because they have gained experience working with R-CALF."
R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard, who had also been caught up in the controversy, now travels to Washington D.C. three days a week from the group's Billings, Mont., headquarters. R-CALF's lobbying team resigned earlier this year.
"Washington is a city that is very accustomed to change. You have elections every year. So they recognize that you will have lobbyists at one point, and then faces will change. That is what has happened here," Bullard says. "I think R-CALF's reputation remains at a very high level. We remain a very high profile participant in the cattle arena."
He said he would work with any group interested in implementing Country-of-Origin labeling.
"We successfully passed Country-of-Origin labeling in 2002, not because R-CALF acted alone. We passed it because R-CALF is very willing to work with coalitions," he said. "If we have a new organization now they will be added to the 200-plus organizations that are already working as a coalition, so what impact they would have is hard to say."
He also weighed the potential benefits of adding another voice to the din in Washington.
"I think competition is healthy and to the extent that more organizations mean more competition between the organizations it will self-discipline all of the organizations," he said. "Where you run into a challenge is our organization has experienced difficulty in raising sufficient money to do all that we want to do." Out of roughly 700,000 cattle producers, R-CALF claims 15,000 members and NCBA claims 26,000 to 28,000.
"R-CALF needs to grow. The larger we are, the more influence we have in Washington," Bullard said.
Despite the recent fallout in D.C., he added R-CALF is in a unique position to "elevate its profile" there. R-CALF leaders said they are working aggressively to re-fill vacant lobbying positions.
"At this point in our maturity, growing our organization becomes second to winning the issues. And that is an advantage we have as an existing association that has already gone through that growth and development process," Bullard said.
Coloradoan Kimmi Lewis, who resigned an R-CALF leadership position and shortly thereafter rescinded her resignation, said it could be advantageous to have two very dynamic competitive organizations advancing a similar political agenda.
"If I was big in NCBA, I'd be a little bit nervous about that," said the rancher from Kim, Colo.
She added that the current R-CALF leaders were being "very na•ve" if they didn't expect the disgruntled members to be proactive and aggressive in pursuing their concerns.
"You have a lot of leadership there," she said. "I've always been very impressed. They've done a lot of the work on a volunteer basis."
As for the state group in which she's involved, the Colorado Independent Cattlemen's Asso-ciation, it never chose to automatically collect memberships on behalf of R-CALF. She said CICA remains independent and considers the issue of its national affiliation once a year. When asked if she was worried about a showdown over the issue at the next annual convention - scheduled for the OXO Hereford Ranch at Ridgeway on July 21 - she said she was not. Some state groups as well as individuals might consider affiliating with both organizations, she said.
While she admitted, "the hardest thing is getting people to switch horses," she also thought the new group had a good chance of becoming effective.
"Who knows if their ideas aren't going to work?" she said of USCA. "Competition is always good. There's just a real opportunity here for the cattle industry, period."
Mike Schultz, of Brewster, Kan., who attended the Kansas City meeting, described the recent splintering within R-CALF as "gut-wrenching." Similar tensions erupted at the Kansas Cattlemen's Association, an affiliate of R-CALF, when the association moved its office to Manhattan and ousted Shultz as CEO. He was then elected to the group's board of directors. The leadership has remained somewhat divided on how to best accomplish its objectives.
He admitted the internal strife had cost his organization about 1,000 members that it had yet to regain.
"I have people telling me now they are going to re-join," he said. "I think there's been some concern but in the long term I think it's beneficial."
When asked if there was room for another cattle industry group in his state and whether he was worried some KCA members would join USCA, he said, "I think there are some who will go try it. I wish them all the power in the world, if they want to go help finance it. I hope they don't leave KCA. I hope they don't leave R-CALF totally. It's going to take money and starting these things is not an easy task. With the time and commitment it takes, I'm not sure most people want to do that again."
He also said, "I don't think long-term it will last. It takes too many years to get name recognition and to get the support. I think you'll see people try a lot of things. But most organizations that start up fail."
Like others at the meeting, his statements sounded oddly like those one might have overheard at NCBA events 10 years earlier.
"A majority still rules in a democracy," Schultz said. "You may not like all the decisions but unified you are going to get better results."
For more information on USCA,
email [email protected] ;
Visit R-CALF online at www.r-calfusa.com.
************************************************************
I dont know if this is true or not but our state organization has been working on another matter and in the course of this work they have been meeting with our congressional delegation. They have had several staffers from different offices say that RCALF has lost any politcal influence that they had and that most of DC see's the org as either dead or dieing. Dont know if that is true or not but it is what we are hearing. From what I was told they see RCALF and USCA as competing and canceling each other out. Before all the rabid fighting starts MY question to the board is this true has any one else been told this or is our delegation blowing smoke our way?
Subject: Groups splinter over strategy
http://agjournalonline.com/articles/2007/03/29/news/news01.txt
Groups splinter over strategy
By Candace Krebs, Regional Correspondent
Published: Thursday, March 29, 2007 11:46 AM MDT
E-mail this story | Print this page
KANSAS CITY - A group founded to give disgruntled cattlemen a voice and an alternative to the century-old National Cattlemen's Beef Association has now further splintered. A third grassroots entity has emerged, while some of the members of the original alternative organization say maintaining "a unified voice" would have been a better solution.
Seven years ago, several energetic, concerned leaders formed the Ranchers-Cattlemen's Action Legal Fund, known as R-CALF, to tackle rising beef and cattle imports into the U.S. Adding United Stockgrowers of America to its name, the group evolved into a compelling alternative association and a relative powerhouse with nearly 20,000 active members, a satellite office in Washington D.C. and a clearly articulated position on a number of key issues, including international trade policy and Country-of-Origin labeling.
A year ago last January, the founders stepped aside and the association changed its top leadership for the first time. At the 2006 annual convention, long-time popular president, Leo McDonnell, of Columbus, Mont., passed the gavel to Texan, Chuck Kiker, who held an appointed position on the national beef checkoff board, which R-CALF routinely criticized for being too closely aligned with NCBA, the predominant industry group. R-CALF expanded its reach, forming new private property rights and beef check-off committees.
Developments early this year indicate the leadership change tested the group far more than observers realized at the time. Internal conflicts simmered and finally came to a head shortly after this year's annual convention in Denver in January. Kiker was suddenly removed as president during an otherwise routine conference call. Following that action additional leaders resigned in protest.
In the interest of transparency, an aspect on which the group's leaders have always hung their hats, key figures on both sides of the internal power struggle eventually went public, culminating with the publication of an anonymous wesite and blogs (www.swift-horses.com) that exhaustively chronicled the rift.
Roughly two-dozen directors, committee chairmen and membership recruiters who resigned from R-CALF are in the process of establishing a new organization, the United States Cattlemen's Association, which for now is based in California.
The new group issued its first news release on March 15, naming its interim president as former R-CALF board member Jon Wooster, of San Lucas, Calif., and listing an address where $1,000 founding memberships and $100 active and affiliate memberships could be sent. The release also said the group was creating a governance structure and intended to have legislative representation in Washington D.C. with "no time to waste."
Chase Carter, a young rancher from Clayton, N.M., and the group's interim vice president, confirmed that Kiker and several other well-known former R-CALF leaders are involved in putting the group together. He said their first priority is to raise enough money - hopefully in the next month or two - to retain former R-CALF lobbyist Jess Peterson in Washington D.C.
"When what happened at R-CALF happened, a lot of people decided that wasn't the direction they wanted to go anymore," he explains. "A lot of people were tired of litigating. We felt our money would be better spent lobbying like other groups do."
He said organizers are hoping to appeal to cattle producers who may not quite agree with either NCBA or R-CALF, but he added, "We are not going to shut our doors to working with any organization when we get up and running." He said no organizational meetings had yet been planned and that an official website would likely be the group's next step.
Founding R-CALF president McDonnell, who resigned from the board the day after Kiker's removal, continues to cast a long shadow with both groups.
At a recent regional meeting in Kansas City, one of a series of events held to address the recent turmoil, current R-CALF President Max Thorns-berry invoked McDonnell's name numerous times. The Richland, Mo., veterinarian who replaced Kiker as the group's chief said he and McDonnell have maintained a close working relationship.
Carter said McDonnell is supportive of organizers of the new group and will hopefully "play a role" in its future.
"At this particular junction if R-CALF was dissolved it would hurt the movement at least to some degree," Carter said. "But we cannot continue pouring money into litigation and stay solvent. We need somewhat of a safety net."
Fighting for a united identity
In this year's R-CALF mail-in ballot election - which has been delayed by the inner controversy - several key resolutions are up for a vote. Instead of using its common tagline, "Working for U.S. cattle producers," a resolution has been proposed to switch that reference to "fighting for" U.S. cattle producers. That could be pivotal in defining the group's identity. Former president Kiker, of Beaumont, Tex., took a lot of heat internally for approaching legislators and USDA officials in Washington by describing the organization as a "kinder, gentler R-CALF."
Founding member Herman Schumacher of Herried, S.D., recalls Kiker saying in one conversation, "I didn't join this organization to go around suing everybody," expressing a frustration that others felt too.
In the latest salvo, R-CALF leaders say they will sue USDA if that is the only way to stop the government from opening the Canadian border to live cattle over 30 months of age. They fear it will flood the market and pose new food safety and international trade problems and have been raising money to mount a legal fight.
In Kansas City, Thornsberry said R-CALF devotes "90 percent" of its efforts to policy issues versus actual litigation. He also gave a 15-minute presentation opposing the national animal ID plan. R-CALF is now advising its members not to obtain a premise ID.
Less than 50 people attended the meeting, and a Kansas couple who had been involved with membership recruitment and fundraising, Dennis and Dorothy Goodman, each made brief but heated comments, resigned in protest and stormed out. A handful of others spoke in support of the group. A soft-spoken man from Iowa approached the microphone and said solemnly, "I'd just like to heal this."
Those who remain staunchly aligned with the original R-CALF characterize the split as growing pains and part of a learning process they insist will make the group stronger.
For now both R-CALF and USCA appear to have nearly identical legislative agendas and both expect to be politically active in Washington. Whether there's a silver lining in that is yet to be seen.
"I don't think it's good. I think it dilutes our message," Thornsberry said.
He also wasn't sure what kind of impact a new group would have. "I can tell you that the group starting USCA is a very small group," he said. "Maybe 40 to 50 people at this point in time. I don't know what kind of voice they are going to have, but they do have experience because they have gained experience working with R-CALF."
R-CALF CEO Bill Bullard, who had also been caught up in the controversy, now travels to Washington D.C. three days a week from the group's Billings, Mont., headquarters. R-CALF's lobbying team resigned earlier this year.
"Washington is a city that is very accustomed to change. You have elections every year. So they recognize that you will have lobbyists at one point, and then faces will change. That is what has happened here," Bullard says. "I think R-CALF's reputation remains at a very high level. We remain a very high profile participant in the cattle arena."
He said he would work with any group interested in implementing Country-of-Origin labeling.
"We successfully passed Country-of-Origin labeling in 2002, not because R-CALF acted alone. We passed it because R-CALF is very willing to work with coalitions," he said. "If we have a new organization now they will be added to the 200-plus organizations that are already working as a coalition, so what impact they would have is hard to say."
He also weighed the potential benefits of adding another voice to the din in Washington.
"I think competition is healthy and to the extent that more organizations mean more competition between the organizations it will self-discipline all of the organizations," he said. "Where you run into a challenge is our organization has experienced difficulty in raising sufficient money to do all that we want to do." Out of roughly 700,000 cattle producers, R-CALF claims 15,000 members and NCBA claims 26,000 to 28,000.
"R-CALF needs to grow. The larger we are, the more influence we have in Washington," Bullard said.
Despite the recent fallout in D.C., he added R-CALF is in a unique position to "elevate its profile" there. R-CALF leaders said they are working aggressively to re-fill vacant lobbying positions.
"At this point in our maturity, growing our organization becomes second to winning the issues. And that is an advantage we have as an existing association that has already gone through that growth and development process," Bullard said.
Coloradoan Kimmi Lewis, who resigned an R-CALF leadership position and shortly thereafter rescinded her resignation, said it could be advantageous to have two very dynamic competitive organizations advancing a similar political agenda.
"If I was big in NCBA, I'd be a little bit nervous about that," said the rancher from Kim, Colo.
She added that the current R-CALF leaders were being "very na•ve" if they didn't expect the disgruntled members to be proactive and aggressive in pursuing their concerns.
"You have a lot of leadership there," she said. "I've always been very impressed. They've done a lot of the work on a volunteer basis."
As for the state group in which she's involved, the Colorado Independent Cattlemen's Asso-ciation, it never chose to automatically collect memberships on behalf of R-CALF. She said CICA remains independent and considers the issue of its national affiliation once a year. When asked if she was worried about a showdown over the issue at the next annual convention - scheduled for the OXO Hereford Ranch at Ridgeway on July 21 - she said she was not. Some state groups as well as individuals might consider affiliating with both organizations, she said.
While she admitted, "the hardest thing is getting people to switch horses," she also thought the new group had a good chance of becoming effective.
"Who knows if their ideas aren't going to work?" she said of USCA. "Competition is always good. There's just a real opportunity here for the cattle industry, period."
Mike Schultz, of Brewster, Kan., who attended the Kansas City meeting, described the recent splintering within R-CALF as "gut-wrenching." Similar tensions erupted at the Kansas Cattlemen's Association, an affiliate of R-CALF, when the association moved its office to Manhattan and ousted Shultz as CEO. He was then elected to the group's board of directors. The leadership has remained somewhat divided on how to best accomplish its objectives.
He admitted the internal strife had cost his organization about 1,000 members that it had yet to regain.
"I have people telling me now they are going to re-join," he said. "I think there's been some concern but in the long term I think it's beneficial."
When asked if there was room for another cattle industry group in his state and whether he was worried some KCA members would join USCA, he said, "I think there are some who will go try it. I wish them all the power in the world, if they want to go help finance it. I hope they don't leave KCA. I hope they don't leave R-CALF totally. It's going to take money and starting these things is not an easy task. With the time and commitment it takes, I'm not sure most people want to do that again."
He also said, "I don't think long-term it will last. It takes too many years to get name recognition and to get the support. I think you'll see people try a lot of things. But most organizations that start up fail."
Like others at the meeting, his statements sounded oddly like those one might have overheard at NCBA events 10 years earlier.
"A majority still rules in a democracy," Schultz said. "You may not like all the decisions but unified you are going to get better results."
For more information on USCA,
email [email protected] ;
Visit R-CALF online at www.r-calfusa.com.
************************************************************
I dont know if this is true or not but our state organization has been working on another matter and in the course of this work they have been meeting with our congressional delegation. They have had several staffers from different offices say that RCALF has lost any politcal influence that they had and that most of DC see's the org as either dead or dieing. Dont know if that is true or not but it is what we are hearing. From what I was told they see RCALF and USCA as competing and canceling each other out. Before all the rabid fighting starts MY question to the board is this true has any one else been told this or is our delegation blowing smoke our way?