03/24/08 Wheat and Barley Commissions drafting merger legislation

Washington Ag March 24, 2008 The Washington Wheat Commission and Washington Barley Commission voted at a joint meeting last week to proceed with drafting legislation to merge the two commodity commissions. Barley Commission Chairman Tom Swainz says the response to about 12-thousand surveys sent to growers on the merger was positive. Swainz: "And we've 35-hundred back and it is 92% in favor of merging the Wheat and Barley Commissions into the Washington Grains Commission. We are really happy to have that kind of response." Swainz says the new board would likely include seven growers, three industry representatives and the state Department of Agriculture representative. Swainz: "We are looking at keeping the same five wheat districts we have now and maybe two barley districts or two at large barley. We haven't worked those out yet." A smaller board had been contemplated but commissioners decided more positions were needed to handle the joint workload. Currently there are 15 positions on the two boards and that will probably be reduced through attrition of expiring barley commissioner terms. The Grains Commission would only spend barley assessment revenue on barley projects, wheat revenue on wheat projects and there would be no change in assessment rates. The legislation being drafted may leave the door open to have other commodities join the Grains Commission. I'm Bob Hoff.