Checkoff will be target of lawsuit over how funds are used 

A free-market advocacy organization, the Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM), has promised to file a lawsuit today seeking a permanent injunction against the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service, Cattlemen’s Beef Board and the Beef Promotion Operating Committee, and their use of beef checkoff funds, according to OCM’s website and a release from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association.

Essentially the OCM contends that NCBAJ has “misused” the checkoff funds, primarily by funneling the money to large ag companies at the expense of small farmers and ranchers.

The lawsuit will be filed on behalf of Michael Callicrate, owner of Ranch Foods Direct, a small producer and processor in Colorado Springs, who also is vice president of OCM. Callicrate has been involved in about a dozen lawsuits since the 1980s, some of which similarly challenged the business practices of large companies such as Cargill and IBP.

OCM is collaborating with the Humane Society of the United States on the lawsuit. Specifically, HSUS is providing legal support to OCM for the case; is it not a party to the lawsuit itself, however.

HSUS is “concerned about the demise of the independent farmer and rancher,” HSUS’s Director of Rural Development and Outreach, Joe Maxwell, told Meatingplace. “We believe that traditional farmers and ranchers are more likely to be better stewards of the animals.”