T he Office of the Minnesota Legislative Auditor has released its report on Agricultural Commodity Councils. Last April, Bluestem looked at their resistance to review in "Confused" MN Corn Research & Promotion Council so doesn't want OLA review and AP: reluctance of commodity councils to face audits raised red flags for MN lawmakers.
The report generated by the review is out today. The Associated Press reports in Legislative auditor calls for more oversight over Minnesota's agriculture commodity councils:
Minnesota's legislative auditor called Friday for greater oversight over the state's 13 agricultural research and promotional councils, which are funded by millions of dollars in check-off fees that producers pay.
The councils currently get minimal oversight from the Minnesota Department of Agriculture, the auditor's office said in a report. Information about several councils' operations and finances is not readily available, their effectiveness is often not measurable, and some councils have potential conflicts of interest because of their close links and overlapping memberships with their corresponding growers associations, it said.
The report called for closer oversight by both the agriculture department and lawmakers, and legislation to mandate more transparency and address conflict of interest concerns. All of the councils should be required to have websites where they regularly post financial, election, meeting and contact information, it said.
And the report said state laws don't prohibit the councils from using check-off revenues to influence legislation, despite a common understanding to the contrary, so the Legislature should decide what limits, if any, it wants to place on the use of that money.
The OLA summarizes the findings on its page:
We found that the state’s 13 agricultural commodity councils are largely self-governing entities, subject to minimal oversight by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture. We make several recommendations to enhance transparency and strengthen accountability. For example, we recommend that the Legislature (1) require commodity councils to have a Web site on which they regularly post financial, election, meeting, and contact information; (2) amend statutes regarding board conflicts of interest; (3) consider increasing oversight of the councils; and (4) determine if it wants to place limits on the use of checkoff-fee revenue and amend statutes accordingly.
Here's the longer summary of the report. To read the full report, click here for the PDF file.
MN Legislative Auditor: summary of report on commodity councils
Photo: The turkey commodity council was scrutinized. Delicious.
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The State Capitol sure looks different after the renovation... oh, wait...
Posted by: Phoenix Woman | Mar 23, 2014 at 08:17 PM