Contact: Diane Henderson      303-850-3465        dhenderson@beefboard.org

              Beef Board Seats New Members, Elects Leadership

                       O’Brien, Stielow, Bateman are CBB Officers for 2006

CENTENNIAL, Colo. - (February 7, 2006) - The Cattlemen’s Beef Board seated new board members and elected officers and representatives for its 2006 Executive Committee and Beef Promotion Operating Committee during its annual meeting in Denver Feb. 1-4, 2006. 

In addition, the Beef Board unanimously elected Amarillo, Texas cattleman Jay O’Brien to serve as 2006 chairman of the Board, with outgoing chairman Al Svajgr of Nebraska handing over the gavel as he ended his term. Kansas cattleman Ken Stielow was elected vice chairman, and Dave Bateman of Illinois was elected to serve as secretary/treasurer of the Beef Board for the year.

After being appointed by U.S. Secretary of Agriculture in December, a total of 30 Board members were seated for service on the CBB – including 10 reappointments of existing members to a second term and appointment of 20 new members, who accepted the oath of office from USDA representative Kenneth Payne.

New members seated and the states they represent include: Thomas Jones, Arkansas; Ross Jenkins II, California; Roger West, Florida; Tim Shaw, Idaho; Daniel Kerschen and Terry Handke, Kansas; Charles Bassett, Missouri; James Eschliman and Lindy Whipps, Nebraska; Margie Hande, North Dakota; Bob Drake and Andrea Hutchison, Oklahoma; Robert Bruner, Daniel Dierschke, Bryant Fisher and Daryl Owen, Texas; Bill Oliver, Virginia; and Ron Allen, John O’Carroll, and David Palmer, importers.

Reappointments and the states they represent include: Carlyle Currier, Colorado; Ken Stielow, Kansas; Charles Miller, Kentucky; Jim Almond, Montana; Pat Woods, New Mexico; Randy Meabon, Pennsylvania; Ed Blair, South Dakota; Sugie Sartwelle, Texas; and Greg Benedict and Kim Holzner, importers.

NEW BEEF BOARD OFFICER TEAM

Newly elected Beef Board Chairman Jay O’Brien was the 2005 vice chairman of the Board and served as secretary/treasurer in 2004. He was originally nominated to the Beef Board by a caucus of certified nominating organizations in Texas – including the Texas Cattle Feeders Association, Texas and Southwest Cattleraisers, Texas Dairy Farmers of America, Texas Independent Cattlemen’s Association, Texas Farm Bureau, and Texas CattleWomen - and was appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture in 2002.

He is a managing partner in JA Cattle Company and JJOB, Ltd., and a partner in Corsino Cattle Company. These companies pasture cows and yearlings on wheat and grass in the Texas Panhandle, New Mexico, Colorado and Oklahoma, and feed cattle in commercial lots in the High Plains. O’Brien is a past chairman of the Texas Cattle Feeders Association and the Texas Beef Council.

New Beef Board Vice Chairman Ken Stielow served as secretary/treasurer of the Board in 2005. He is owner of Bar S Ranch, an Angus and Charolais seedstock, cow-calf and backgrounding operation, in Paradise, Kansas. He also owns a minority interest in a commercial feedlot. Stielow was nominated to the Beef Board by a caucus of certified nominating organizations in Kansas – including the Kansas Dairy Farmers of America, Kansas Farm Bureau, Kansas CattleWomen, the Kansas Livestock Association, and the Kansas Cattlemen’s Association and was appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture in 2003.

Stielow is a past president of the Kansas Livestock Association and has experience in various segments of the beef industry. Stielow also has served as treasurer of the Paradise Township in Russell County, Kansas, as president of Agco Inc., the local cooperative, and on the board of directors of UMB-NBA Bank.

The 2006 Beef Board Secretary/Treasurer Dave Bateman was originally nominated to the Cattlemen’s Beef Board by the Illinois Beef Association and appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture in 2000. He served on the Board from 2000 to 2003, when Illinois lost a seat due to reapportionment/reduced cattle numbers. He then was appointed as a replacement to finish another’s unfinished term from 2003 to 2005, and then was appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture to serve his own term from 2005 to 2008.

Bateman is a farmer/feeder/cow-calf operator on his family’s farm, established more than 100 years ago. Bateman has been a highly active member of the Beef Board during the last six years, including service on the Beef Board Executive Committee; the Beef Promotion Operating Committee; the CBB Administration Subcommittee; the Joint Food and Nutrition Issues Subcommittee; Joint Public Relations Subcommittee; Joint Information Committee; and the Joint Evaluation Advisory Committee.

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

The 12-member CBB Executive Committee includes the board’s three officers and another eight members elected at large. In addition, the immediate past chair of the Beef Board (Al Svajgr of Nebraska) serves on the committee in an advisory-only capacity.

Based on recommendations from the Joint Beef Industry Nominating Committee, the CBB elected the following members to its 2006 Executive committee: CBB Vice Chairman Ken Stielow of Kansas, who will serve as chairman of the Executive Committee; and members Jay O’Brien (CBB chairman) of Texas; Dave Bateman of Illinois, (secretary/treasurer); Laurie Bryant, importer; Virginia Coehlo, California; Robert Fountain Jr., Georgia; Dana Hauck, Kansas; Neil Kayser, Washington; Charles Miller, Kentucky; Sugie Sartwelle, Texas; and Stan Zylstra, Iowa.

The Executive Committee operates under the direction of, and within the policies established by the full board and is responsible for carrying out Beef Board policies and conducting business and making decisions necessary to administer the terms and provisions of the Act and Order between meetings of the full board.

OPERATING COMMITTEE

The Beef Promotion Operating Committee was created by the Beef Promotion Research Act to help coordinate state and national Beef Checkoff Programs. The 20-person committee includes 10 members of the Cattlemen’s Beef Board, among them the Board’s three officers and seven others elected directly by Beef Board members.

CBB members elected to the 2006 Beef Promotion Operating Committee during the annual meeting in Denver include: Chairman Jay O’Brien of Texas, Vice Chairman Ken Stielow of Kansas; Secretary/Treasurer Dave Bateman of Illinois; Michael Cline, Iowa; Carl Crabtree, Idaho; Richard Nielson, Utah; Gary Sharp, South Dakota; Don Stewart, importer; Wayne Thames, Alabama; and Lucinda Williams, Massachusetts (Northeast Region representative).

The other 10 members of the committee are representatives of state beef councils, including the chair and vice chair of the Federation of State Beef Councils and eight other members elected by state beef councils. Those representatives include Federation Chairman Larry Jones of Kansas; Vice Chairman Gary Voogt, Michigan; Alan Albright, Iowa; Clifford Dance, Mississippi; David Dick, Missouri; Scott George, Wyoming; Laura Lickley, Idaho; Leo Vermedahl, Texas; Myron Williams, South Dakota; and Jim Wilson, Oregon.