Nebraska lawmaker Ibach wins round of rural ‘civil war' over feedlot bill
State Sen. Teresa Ibach of Sumner speaks on the legislative floor on Tuesday, May 16, 2023, in Lincoln, Neb. (Zach Wendling/Nebraska Examiner)
LINCOLN — A bill to exempt feedlots from Nebraska branding and inspection fees is headed to the second round of legislative debate after Wednesday's 26-2 vote.
After hours of debate, State Sen. Teresa Ibach of Sumner, in west-central Nebraska, amended Legislative Bill 646 to cap the amount the Brand Committee can charge feedlots and seek to exempt feedlots in the state's brand inspection area from paying branding-related fees. It would replace them with a one-time payment of $500 to apply for feedlots to get an exempt status. The bill also exempts dairy cattle.
'I think this is good legislation,' Ibach said. 'This will be a good thing going forward.'
Ibach said she is open to additional amendments to her priority bill regarding the language of the fee structure and other technical issues lawmakers might have. She faced opposition from State Sen. Tanya Storer of Whitman, a freshman rural lawmaker from north-central Nebraska, who proposed an amendment to essentially kill the bill—an effort that failed Wednesday while urban lawmakers chose not to weigh in.
Storer has expressed concerns about lawmakers making an uninformed decision about the agency responsible for investigating cattle theft and verifying ownership through branding when cattle are bought, sold, or moved in and out of the brand zone established by state law, which essentially covers the western two-thirds of the state. She also said the agency could not fund itself after the change.
The Nebraska Brand Committee is funded entirely through fees, not by taxpayers. If Ibach's bill passes, the committee would lose $1.6 million annually, roughly 25% of its operating budget, according to the bill's fiscal note.
'This is a major technical change to Nebraska's brand act that addresses oversight and law enforcement for our number one cash commodity,' Storer said on the floor Wednesday.
Storer said cattle are an essential economic engine for the state, and that she is trying to protect the integrity of the Nebraska Brand Committee. State Sens. Mike Jacobson of North Platte said the proposed change would be a 'big shock to the system.'
State Sen. Ben Hansen of Blair said the agricultural industry is too important for Nebraska to continue having routine fights over branding.
'I've listened to the same argument every year for seven years,' Hansen said. 'It is time we act.'
The rural divide between lawmakers is quite rare. While Democratic lawmakers have led many bill debates in this legislative session, Republicans mostly led the discussion about Ibach's bill. Most urban and Democratic-aligned lawmakers didn't weigh in, but some asked questions about the state's quirky branding law. State Sen. Wendy DeBoer of Bennington, for example, asked Ibach and Storer about the budget of the Brand Committee.
Other cattle-feeding states, including Texas and Oklahoma, deal with cattle branding differently. Branding isn't mandatory in those states but is encouraged to deter theft, while brand inspections are mandatory in Wyoming and Colorado. Hansen hinted that Nebraska should be more like Texas.
Nebraska is the second-largest cattle-producing state in the U.S., generating $13.2 billion from cattle and other livestock, according to the Nebraska Department of Agriculture. The Nebraska Brand Committee regulates parts of that industry.
The Nebraska Farm Bureau and Nebraska Brand Committee lost Wednesday's rural political battle, while the Nebraska Cattlemen were on the winning side. The Brand Committee called the legislation an attempt to 'severely' weaken the cattle industry's checks and balances. The Farm Bureau, in a statement, said'the Committee should have the fee authority necessary to adequately fund its programs.'
The Cattlemen's Board of Directors initially opposed LB 646 but voted to support the amended bill on Tuesday, saying it's 'time to stop kicking the can down the road on critical brand law reforms in the state of Nebraska.'
Sen. Barry DeKay of Niobrara said regardless of what the statehouse does, some in the cattle industry will be upset.
'Either way, this would be a civil war in Nebraska,' Dekay said.
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