President’s Podium: Your Voice, Your RMFU

Convention season within Rocky Mountain Farmers Union is well underway. The advocacy work that RMFU does for our members starts at the county conventions, with members of our county chapters coming together to start the process that culminates in the adoption of our policy at the RMFU Annual Convention. This policy and the process by which it is crafted and used is what really sets us apart from many other organizations.

Each of our members has the opportunity to influence what we advocate for. By attending your chapter meeting, you can be selected as a delegate to the RMFU Convention. As a delegate, you can make a motion to amend, add, or delete any language in our policy. If you can make your argument successfully enough to gain a majority, we could be advocating for your policy next year.

Advocating for our policy is going to be a large part of what we do over the next year, if not the next few years. The ag economy is not in a good place to put it mildly. Beyond low commodity prices and high input costs, there is the very real possibility that some areas will not have enough storage for this fall’s harvest and no prospect of selling what’s currently in storage. As I write this, the 2018 Food and Farm Bill is expired, with farm programs reverting to permanent law from the 1930’s and 40’s. Many of our family farmers and ranchers are going to have very tough conversations with their lenders this winter. If we don’t get help for family agriculture, our rural communities face very hard times along with the farming families.

I do a lot of interviews, write a lot of statements and articles, and talk to a lot of people throughout the year. Our Government Relations staff works closely with legislators and testify in Sante Fe, Denver, and Cheyenne, as well as Washington DC. The message we bring, the positions we take are not ours, they are yours as members of RMFU.

I believe RMFU is in a unique position. We have worked hard to position our organization as a nonpartisan, policy based organization which speaks for family agriculture and rural communities. I can and do sit down with legislators at all levels, of both parties, and have conversations about what effect their actions and lack of actions have on our members. We take our members to meet with their representatives and help them share personal stories of what they are dealing with. We have contacts within the various departments who can help members navigate bureaucracies. We are at the table, working to make our member voices heard. Even though you don’t always see and hear us, we are in the rooms, at the tables, working for you. We work hard to be the bridge between the two sides of the aisle, bringing the message that policy is more important than politics.

As we come together in Cheyenne next month, our members will come together and debate this policy in a way that I wish more legislative bodies would. We will have civil debate, we will share our thoughts, and we will vote on policy. We will have disagreements, we will find new ways to agree, and we will sometimes agree to disagree. And we will remain friends and part ways and look forward with as much optimism as we can to the next year. For as Will Rogers said, “The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn’t still be a farmer.”