As something of a sports fan (although the last few years have been a bit of a challenge in dealing with the state-of-affairs in professional sport leagues), I’ve followed the various sports during the seasons when they engage in their games and during times of the year when they aren’t actively “playing” their respective sports. The intervals between seasons are referred to as “the off-season.”
During the off-season the athletes continue to train and improve their skills as well as go through various activities aimed at being more successful when the season begins again.
Advocacy is identified as something that involves promoting the interests or cause of someone or a group of people. It’s also said to be something about helping people find their voice.
Advocacy is one of the reasons that the Nevada Farm Bureau exists. Our mission statement says that Nevada Farm Bureau’s Voice for our state’s agricultural produces is to be used to promote, preserve, protect and resolve challenges through advocacy, education and leadership.
Even though 2022 is not a year where the Nevada Legislature holds the 120-day session of deliberating and sometimes passing legislation for changes to state law, this year is far from an off-season in the work of representing and advocating for farmers and ranchers. You could easily make the case that there isn’t even such a thing as a day off from needing to take opportunities for advocating on behalf of Nevada agriculture. Farming and ranching is a 365 day a year (with an extra day on leap-years) line of work and advocating is something that needs to be addressed whenever and wherever the need arises.
On the state level, the Nevada Legislature adopted a new procedure in the 2021 Legislative Session, forming interim joint committees of the number of standing committees in the Senate and Assembly. These joint interim committees have been holding meetings this year and will be developing proposed legislation that will be brought forward in the 2023 Legislative Session.
The Natural Resources Joint Interim Committees is one committee who is working this year by holding meetings, receiving informational reports and likely will be constructing an agenda of work through bill drafts that will be submitted for official consideration in the next session. Based on the scope of legislation, which come before the Assembly and Senate Natural Resources committees agricultural and natural resources matters fit into the portfolio the interim committee will be dealing with.
The Joint Interim Standing Committee on Natural Resources is planning to hold five meetings. Two of the five will have been concluded when you read this article. Beyond the January and February meetings, the committee have also scheduled meeting dates for March 21st, June 16th and August 22nd.
The committee is chaired by Assemblyman Howard Watts of Las Vegas and the vice chair is Senator Fabian Donate, also from Las Vegas (both legislators served as chairs for their respective bodies in the 2021 Legislative Session). Two additional Senators, Senator Pete Goicoechea of Eurkea and Senator Melanie Scheible of Las Vegas are also members of the committee. Assembly members include — Assemblywoman Maggie Carlton of Las Vegas, Assemblyman John Ellison of Elko, Assemblywoman Alexis Hansen from Sparks and Assemblywoman Sarah Peters of Reno.
The committee also has a subcommittee associated with it (the Subcommittee on Public Lands) and who’s members were appointed by Chairman Watts of the Natural Resourced committee in their first meeting on January 21st.
Based on recent information, the committee will be chaired by Assemblywoman Maggie Carlton and include members — Senator Melanie Schieble, Senator Pete Goicoechea, Assemblywoman Alexis Hansen, Clark County Commissioner Justin Jones and a representative of the Nevada Native American Community. Their first committee meeting was announced as being scheduled for April 15th, but the official calendar on the Nevada Legislative webpage doesn’t have this meeting on the calendar at this time. During the 2021st Legislative Session the subcommittee was assigned the responsibility of considering the topic of water conservation and Chairman Watts made a point of stressing the importance of this topic during the meeting where he appointed subcommittee members. What “water conservation” will mean in the context of considerations and possible legislative initiatives is not known at this point in time, but will definitely be a subject that agricultural water right owners will need to pay attention to.
There are also additional topics that will surface from the other eight Joint Interim Standing Committees and the other legislative working committees that are identified as “Statutory Committees,” “Legislative Interim Studies” or “Non-Legislative Committees.”
Beyond the legislative realm, a host of regulatory actions are on the front-burner based on state agencies completing assignments that came from the last legislative session or who are developing/amending regulations on their own initiative. The Nevada Department of Agriculture has brought forward a full schedule of workshops, hearings and other activities related to the range of areas which fit into their regulatory purview.
On the national level, possibly because so much of “national” issues hit the ground in a state which is 87-plus controlled by federal management, there has been an overwhelming rash of matters of significant importance over the current timespan. From another round of Sage Grouse possible planning to another round of federal agencies seeking to pursue greater control over water and lands, using the Clean Water Act there has been almost a full-time requirement for studying Federal Register Notices of which agency is announcing something new.
Although we’ve been fortunate that Congress haven’t been able to actually pass all the various horrible ideas that seem to be on their list of things that the majority party is wanting to cram through, but staying on top of those impending disasters have required priority attention. More of the same seems to be in the works with the proposal for throwing another monkey wrench into any progress for responsible actions of bringing Wild Horse and Burro populations to Appropriate Management Levels (AML) – (See HR 6635).
Lastly it is also important to consider the upcoming elections in the mix of areas that require advocacy attention. Every candidate seeking votes for whatever office they are interested in pursing needs to be engaged with by advocates who ask questions and make their perspectives known. Real, in-depth understanding of where candidates stand on important issues must be a priority and completely vetted when voters enter the voting booth – or as things are now set up to be the approach determined by the majority legislative process in Nevada – complete their mail-in ballots.
Agricultural advocacy is not the full responsibility of a single person or a single organization. Agricultural producers themselves need to be part of the process and make the most of every opportunity to weigh in with their stories and messages to build better understanding of the issues they face. It’s not something that can occur in starts and spurts. Time and effort are required on an on-going basis, creating working relationships and connecting with others to make things happen. There is no off-season for those who are associated with agricultural advocacy.
By Doug Busselman | NFB, Executive Vice President
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