Minutes of the December 2, 2006 Meeting

Members in attendance: Max Tenorio, Bill Ortiz, Joan Ortiz, Yolanda Tenorio, Mike Romero, Rick Flores, Earl Sena, John Higgins, and Sam Cowden.

Election of officers

The Guadalupe County Livestock Producers Organization (GCLPO) met on December 2, 2006. Election of officers was the first item of the agenda. The following individuals will server as officers: President - Max Tenorio, Santa Rosa/Milagro; Vice President - Bill Ortiz, Newkirk; and Secretary/Treasurer -Yolanda Tenorio. A motion was made by Ricky Flores to have officers serve a 3-year term, motion seconded by Sam Cowden.

Bill and Joan Ortiz reported that 106 newsletters were mailed out. Sam Cowden suggested the possibility of having a quarterly newsletter. Officers will meet to work on the newsletter. Any member that has ag-related news can contact the officers via e-mail or by accessing the web site, which is now www.gplco.org.

GPLCO website

It was discussed that once membership dues start coming in, one of the first things the organization is going to work on is a web site. This will be used to provide information to the members, as well as anyone that has access to the web. The web site will be officially up by December 5, 2006. The cost of the server space will be $120.00/year and for the domain name $10.00/yr. There are several advantage to having a web site. The web site will have a trading post, help or work wanted, calendar of events, online suggestion box and producers’ brands.

Guadalupe County Bred Steers

One of the goals of the organization is to support the Guadalupe County Bred Show at the fair. Producers that have steers for sale to prospective 4-H/FFA exhibitors have provided Mr. Gino Lujan, County Agent with a flyer of pictures of calves available.

2006 Calf Sale

Approximately 700 calves were contracted and sold to Canutillo Mtg. Co. Several ideas and suggestions were made to improve for 2007. Some of the concerns were:

A way to make the schedule work, so that calves can be unloaded and weighed and avoid the delays.
Corral help - assure that there are enough people to help with the sorting of calves in the pens.
Make sure the buyer has a secretary that can do the bookkeeping and expedite the checks to be paid to producers.
It was agreed that calves for sale in the future must, at the time of sale, have been in Guadalupe County for at least 90 days.

Some of the details of these discussions can be worked out in future meetings.

NAIS

(National Animal Identification System)

Bill Ortiz reported that as of November 22, 2006, that the USDA has abandoned plans to make the NAIS mandatory. He will bring more information to the next meeting.

Other business

The members in attendance discussed future projects they may be interested in such as: a bull exchange or sale, and an Artificial Insemination program.

A motion to adjourn was made by Yolanda, motion seconded by Joan Ortiz. Meeting was adjourned at 8:30 pm.