I had the chance to sit down with the Oklahoma director of the Wind Coalition Mark Yates, yesterday at our new offices at the Oklahoma City National Stockyards on Monday. You've probably kept up with the ongoing discussions about how to go about fixing our state's budget issues. You may have also heard about a plan recently announced and developed by a group of civic and business leaders calling themselves, Step Up Oklahoma. This plan included participation by the wind industry. However, it wasn't until Yates pointed out that the wind industry hadn't been involved in this discussion that he was able to open up a dialogue about how those in the wind industry could contribute on more equitable terms. From that discussion, Wind leaders developed and proposed last week for consideration, two options in which the industry could contribute to state coffers and generate revenue, and at the same time avoid double taxation.

"If you look at the two proposals, one says, 'Treat us like oil and gas... let's quit the fighting...let's create parity," Yates said. "The other looks at the nameplate capacity tax, which would provide over $50 million annual revenue in the state and be a much more stable source of revenue as opposed to a generation tax."


However, these options would offset the current ad valorem taxes the wind industry is paying into the 23 counties in which it conducts business. Yates says, to avoid double taxation, there would have to be some relief to ad valorem taxes in the wind industry's tax structure. This would deprive these affected rural communities of about $9 million each on average.


"As an industry, we would prefer things to stay the way they are and pay ad valorem," Yates remarked. "It's where we do business and it keeps those dollars local. But, at the end of the day, political pressures of groups wanting to push wind into a corner... that's where these conversations have ebbed and flowed."

Learn more about Yates and his position on this issue, and review an outline of his proposed tax options for the wind industry, by clicking over to our website.

The U.S. Supreme Court Monday ruled that federal district courts, not the federal court of appeals, have jurisdiction to review the 2015 Waters of the U.S. rule. The decision, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, "brings greater clarity" to an issue that has "bogged down" the litigation for years.

AFBF general counsel Ellen Steen says the decision is positive, but also provides uncertainty.

"The U.S. Supreme Court ruled correctly today that federal district courts-not federal courts of appeals-have jurisdiction to review the 2015 Waters of the U.S. rule," she said. "That is a positive result, but it also creates uncertainty and confusion in the short term, because the Sixth Circuit must soon lift its nationwide stay of the 2015 rule."

Click here to read Steen's full statement.

Richard Thorpe, president of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association issued a statement as well, applauding the Supreme Court's decision.

"This decision not only maintains the integrity of our judicial system, but ensures that challenges will first be weighed by courts closer to the people and communities they effect," he said. "The so-called WOTUS rule has already been withdrawn by the EPA, but the ruling sets a sound precedent for future challenges to over-reaching federal rules."

The Environmental Protection Agency of the Trump Administration is reworking the rule but has not yet finalized the proposal to delay the 2015 WOTUS rule.

Nearly all sides of the WOTUS rule declared the ruling a win, including environmental groups, as all sides argued that the rule did not fall within categories that the Clean Water Act stipulates belong in appeals courts. However, the Trump Administration had argued that the challenges were legally within the purview of appeals courts because the rule touched on the EPA's permitting authority.

Anti-animal agriculture activism is alive and well here in 2018. Activist groups continue to pursue an agenda absent that of meat production and appear to be as reliant as ever on many of the same tactics which they have demonstrated in years past. We caught up Hannah Thompson-Weeman of the Animal Agriculture Alliance to find out what strategies her organization has been monitoring so far in the new year.


"We really need to always recognize the bar is continuing to raise on what their groups are willing to do in terms of aggressiveness; in terms of breaking the law, crossing lines, endangering animal health, human health and safety and really just kind of no holds bar," Thompson-Weeman said. "These groups are willing to go very, very far in their endeavor to decrease consumer trust in our industry. I think that is something we're going to continue to see. We in animal agriculture need to be increasingly vigilant of what's going on in our farms and in our plants."


According to the Animal Agriculture Alliance, activist groups like the Humane Society of the United States and PETA are advocating for programs such as Meatless Mondays and base their arguments on moral or religious grounds. Thompson-Weeman says that Meatless Mondays was an initiative with roots beginning in the early war effort when Americans came together to ration meat supplies to make sure troops overseas had much needed protein to consume. Today, she says there is no foundation for such a program. Furthermore, she says activist groups are now bringing people on staff with the sole purpose of reaching out to faith and community leaders to promote a disingenuous stance that meat consumption is immoral.


"Animals and religion is a trend we have been seeing, really over the past decade," she said. "Their whole goal is to try to make people feel guilty and feel like it's against their religion or against the Bible to eat meat."


Listen to Thompson-Weeman and I discuss some of the preferred tactics being used by animal agriculture activists right now, on yesterday's Beef Buzz - click here.

Allendale, Inc. shared its estimates for the upcoming Cattle on Feed and Cold Storage reports, due out this Friday from the USDA.


The company's estimate says it expects December Placements to decrease by 3.9% under last year at 1.715 million head, which is worth noting as it stops the 10.2% to 13.9% year over year increases in the three previous months. Profitability concerns have been recognized.


Allendale anticipates Marketings in December to drop by 1.5% under last year for a total of 1.750 million. This would be the second largest December in six years.


The estimate by Allendale also projects total Cattle on Feed as of January 1 will be 7.6% over last year at 11.415 million. This is the largest January 1 total in six years.


In addition, Allendale projects beef stocks, at 503 million lbs., over the five-year average of 486 - an increase of 16 million lbs. from the previous month.

Just days after the state of Arkansas has put into place a ban on the use of Dicamba for much of the 2018 growing season- the state of Oklahoma is looking at how to best handle the herbicide in the upcoming growing season.  Arkansas was ground zero this past year in the severity of Dicamba related damage in mostly soybean fields that had non tolerant plants growing near fields that were treated with the chemical.

to read the rest of the proposed statement from ODAFF- and their proposal to not ban the use of new Dicamba chemistry in the state.