Who needs to watch a soap opera when you can follow the cattle industry?

Let me see if we can follow all of this.

The Cattlemen's Beef Board Executive Committee voted and issued a statement in late June that the Federation of State Beef Councils should be separated from the National Cattlemen's Beef Association. http://www.beefboard.org/…

Then we had the audit results, in which an auditor stated NCBA did not spend checkoff dollars appropriately. NCBA responded that overall it wasn't a large amount, there were questions about some policies, and it was really unfair for CBB to publicly announce this stuff.

The CBB Executive Committee voted as recently as Thursday to form a committee that would look at recommendations for separating the federation from NCBA.

On Friday morning --- in a packed and raucous meeting ---- the Federation of State Beef Councils got together. They held a straw poll in which about 85 percent of federation members stated they want to stay with NCBA, but they still want more independence and self-governance. The federation will actually vote on some resolution language to this effect on Saturday.

By Friday afternoon, members of the CBB Executive Committee were defending the audit, and pointing out that there are a lot of guidelines and policies to explain how money should be spent. But CBB's overall membership voted 62-30 to void some of the executive committee decision regarding the recommendation of separating the federation from NCBA when approving minutes of executive committee meetings for the past several months. The overall CBB group then voted to support the federation's decision in the morning --- the federation should stick with NCBA, but move toward more independence and self-governance.

Finally, CBB members debated over whether to meet with NCBA next summer. NCBA has decided to combine the Washington, D.C., fly-in with the summer meeting at a hotel just south of Washington. CBB generally meets with NCBA, but the executive committee told NCBA earlier that it would cost $189,000 more in checkoff dollars over the next three years to hold those meetings in D.C. And there is the perception that CBB would look like it is lobbying by meeting in Washington. There was a debate to push to ensure CBB continue to meet with NCBA in the summer. Yet, following an amendment to a resolution, CBB members voted to meet with NCBA anywhere in the summer, except Washington, D.C. (now, technically this hotel is Maryland so ...)

For more, check out CBB's meeting blog at http://beefboardmeeting.com/…

More to come.

And I am not even getting into the salvos between NCBA and R-CALF over the GIPSA rule. That story is for another day.

I can be found on Twitter at ChrisClaytonDTN.

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