Beef Commission Senate Bill

I'm Bob Larson. Giving direction to the Washington Beef Commission take action on promoting the health of cattle and improving the transparency of its financial operations.

That's the intent of House Bill 2073 which passed through the House of Representatives after more than a year of study ...

TOM DENT ... "Last year, there was a bill in the Senate to raise the check-off fee and there was a lot of push-back so I talked to my colleagues in the Senate and asked them to let me vet this a little bit before we went forward with a check-off fee increase. I did that through the interim, I probably had 10 or 12 meetings around the state with all types of cattle people, from the dairy people, the cattle producers, the feedlot operators, pretty much everybody that has something to do with raising beef."

And, Moses Lake Representative Tom Dent says those discussions helped him learn raising the check-off fees wasn't really the issue ...

TOM DENT ... "And what I came back with was, it wasn't so much the money they have an issue with is they'd like to see the money and what the Beef Commission actually does directed in a little different direction. So, I crafted this bill, we took the mission statement was, the RCW's for the Beef Commission, which is its present statute, and kind of changed it a little bit, and redirected it and simplified it and also put some accountability measures in there which will make it more transparent."

Dent says a lot has changed in the 30 or so years since the Beef Commissions RCW's were first created and it was time for an update.

We'll tell you more about those changes tomorrow.