Beef Board Rejects Plan To Suspend Funding

KEARNEY — Amid mounting evidence of questionable spending of beef checkoff dollars at the national level, the Nebraska Beef Council voted 5-3 Tuesday to defeat a motion that would have suspended about $1.5 million in annual discretionary contributions to the Federation of State Beef Councils.

The split vote came as an accounting firm retained by the National Cattlemen's Beef Board determined that as much as $216,000 in checkoff funds, raised at the rate of $1 per head from beef producers in Nebraska and other states, appeared to have been spent improperly or without proper documentation over the past several fiscal years.

That's up from the $37,000 figure that turned up in an internal audit of a small portion of total budgets.

News suggesting bigger problems in spending on air fares, meals and other expenses — some of it involving spouses and other family members — emerges as the federation prepares to vote Saturday in Denver on a charter of principles meant to give it more separation from the National Cattlemen's Beef Association.

To read the rest of this story please go to: The Lincoln Journal Star