Checkoff election challenged by opponents

Oklahoma farmers and ranchers who oppose paying an additional $1 checkoff fee to the Oklahoma Beef Council are taking their beef to Oklahoma's Supreme Court.

On Monday, an attorney representing four plaintiffs who raise cattle in Oklahoma filed a case before the court that challenges the legality of the election, for several reasons.

The plaintiffs argue Oklahoma's Department of Agriculture, Food and Forestry didn't appropriately follow the Oklahoma Administrative Procedures Act when it set up the election.

They also said the Agriculture Department erred by giving the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Association — the organization promoting the election — nearly 20 months to gather signatures to call for the referendum. Ordinarily, petition drives seeking other, similar types of elections have 90 days to gather signatures, their petition states.

Additionally, the litigants argue the cattlemen's association didn't require proof of eligibility for petition signers, and that the department didn't give opponents an opportunity to challenge the validity of those signatures.

The plaintiffs also argue the election is unconstitutional. The Commodity Research Enhancement Act, legislation approved in 2014

that authorizes calling for checkoff elections such as the one proposed now, amounts to authorizing a new tax, they claim.

Tax increases can’t be assessed on Oklahomans without either the approval of three-fourths of the Legislature or through a vote of the people, and the act — which the plaintiffs contend should have originated in the House, but didn’t — also failed to get the super majority support it needed from House members.

The plaintiffs seek a hearing and ruling from the Oklahoma Supreme Court before any additional checkoff fees are collected on May 1.

The proposal

The $1 Oklahoma Beef Checkoff, if approved, would generate additional money the Oklahoma Beef Council could use to support its programs.

Federal law already requires Oklahoma producers to pay a $1 checkoff on every head of cattle they sell. After money is transferred to other states that produce cattle sold in Oklahoma markets, half of what is left goes to the Cattlemen’s Beef Board, a national organization that seeks to promote beef consumption through advertising, marketing and through product research and development.

The remainder is retained by the Oklahoma Beef Council to do the same on a local level.

If the additional $1 fee were approved, it would be retained entirely by the state organization.

A website created to promote the election by the Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association, oklahomabeefcheckoff.com, says the additional checkoff would provide the Oklahoma Beef Council and its member producers not only more promotional dollars, but also more control on how the money is used.

According to the site, the money would be only used to promote marketing, research and education for beef and beef products. It could not be used for lobbying activities to influence public policy or government affairs.

Plus, any beef producer who paid the assessment also could obtain a refund of that money from the Oklahoma Beef Council if they filed an application to the council within 60 days of when it was paid.

Outside interference?

Late Monday, Michael Kelsey, executive vice president of the Oklahoma Cattlemen’s Association, provided statements by several state cattle groups and numerous cattle producers that assert the legal action is being supported by the Nebraska-based Organization for Competitive Markets, which they say is supported by the Humane Society of the United States, and R-CALF, another group they say has similar motivation.

“It’s unfortunate outof-state activist groups are meddling in our state’s referendum and beef industry by working to keep Oklahoma beef producers from voting in an Oklahoma state beef checkoff,” it reads. “These out-ofstate activist groups have no place in the Oklahoma beef industry.”

But the attorney representing the plaintiffs in the case took issue with those assertions.

“I don’t think it is fair to characterize either of these organizations as anti-agriculture,” said attorney Brian Ted Jones, of Oklahoma City. Instead, Jones said he understands the groups are combating monopolistic powers in food production systems across the globe.

“In reading their materials, something that struck me was just how focused they are on small, familysized independent producers.”

The Organization for Competitive Markets said on its website that it is the only national think tank focusing strictly on antitrust and trade policy in agriculture.

The Montana-based R-CALF USA, the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund, United Stockgrowers of America, said on its website it represents thousands of U.S. cattle and sheep producers on domestic and international trade and marketing issues.

Plus, Jones noted that each of the plaintiffs in the case are Oklahomans — not outsiders intent on wreaking havoc on Oklahoma’s agriculture economy.

“And I was born and raised here, too,” he added. “This concerns them, I understand why it does, and I think they have got a case.”

One of those plaintiffs, Linda Carol Best, a Logan County cattle producer, said she has no problem being involved in the case.

Best, as some other opponents have said, doesn’t trust the Oklahoma Beef Council would be a good steward of the money.

Her concerns stem from an embezzlement case involving Melissa Day Morton, of Edmond, a former Beef Council employee who pleaded guilty to charges in the embezzlement of more than $2.6 million from the organization over a seven-year period. Morton remains out of prison on bond. A sentencing hearing has not yet been set.

“I am a lifetime member of the Cattlemen’s Association,” Best said. “How can it justify (Morgan’s) theft, and that she hasn’t spent one day in jail, because of it?” Best said it’s her understanding the Oklahoma Beef Council won’t ever have to repay producers for the loss of that money.

“There are so many producers in our state who aren’t members of the association, because they don’t believe in it,” she said. “They aren’t going to be supportive, but they also aren’t informed.”

The Oklahoma Beef Council has obtained a civil judgment against Morgan for the full amount she embezzled, and that they intend to collect as much of it as they can. Council officials have said they improved its accounting practices and hired a third-party firm to handle its books.

The process

Currently, mail-in referendum ballots are being accepted by Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service offices until Oct. 27. The offices also will be open Nov. 1 for in-office voting by people who buy and sell cattle within the state.

Election results will be sent to an auditor who will tabulate the results and send them to the Agriculture Department for certification.

Oklahoma’s Agriculture Department on Monday said in an emailed statement that while it is reviewing the suit, it is confident it followed proper procedures in approving the petition for the referendum.