State Resolution Committee meets

BOISE - Just a block from Idaho State House, inside the Idaho Farm Bureau building in Boise, you’ll find one of the best examples of grass-root politics: the Idaho Farm Bureau’s Fall Resolutions meeting.

Executive Vice President Rick Keller said Farm Bureau is unique.

“Our policies come from our membership. The counties submitted these resolutions from their members. They ‘re ideas our members want to improve, things in agriculture, business, rules, regulations, and even government agencies. These ideas are vetted in the counties and districts before they get here," said Keller.

Farm Bureau representatives from five state districts gathered today, bringing policies, concerns and wisdom from their fields, towns, counties to the annual meeting.

"The resolutions direct the Farm Bureau for the coming year," said delegate Bob Callihan. "We believe that the ideas that farmers have are solid, firmly based and come from the real world. What we do here at this meeting is important to the organization and to all of agriculture,"

If resolutions pass this hurdle they’re voted on at the House of Delegates at the Annual meeting in December then lobbied at the statehouse. Some resolutions have made it into the American Farm Bureau policy book and have been lobbied on Capitol Hill.

Not all resolutions pass, some are redundant, some are sent back for revision. Dozens of resolutions were considered and the best were added to the policy book.