Dr. Szymanski said a big agenda item would be discussing regionalization efforts and moving products, especially if there was a detection of African Swine Fever in the US. Mr. Honeycutt said there would be time given for the US to meet separately with both Canada and Mexico, adding that we would like to continue shipping feeder cattle to Alberta
and no one from the Department of Agriculture was able to attend. With Dr. Szymanski also not able to attend, Mr. Honeycutt would be the only representative from Montana during those meeting days
(3:36:08) 11:53 AM
Jake Feddes moved to approve out-of-country travel for Mike Honeycutt to attend the Tri-National Accord meeting in Calgary, Alberta on September 28-October 1, 2026. William Kleinsasser seconded. The motion passed.
Dr. Tahnee Szymanski updated the BOL on USDA Federal Fiscal Year RFID tags:
Dr. Szymanski said that Montana should receive an allocation north of 250,000 RFID tags for this year. An early-on shipment of 10,000 of those tags had been received and an additional 135,000 out of our FY26 allocation should be received as well. There were some leftover tags from last year that had been distributed between Brucellosis vaccination states, putting another 45,000 out for Montana by the end of September. Federal FY27 starts October 1st and Montana was hoping to receive more allocation of RFID tags because of USDA discussions regarding additional allocation for states with a high historical tag use. So far, 55,000 tags had been received and shipped to Veterinarians and an additional 135,000 tags were on their way to the DOL.
Last year, Dr. Szymanski reported that Veterinarians received about 70% of their Brucellosis tag needs and the Market Veterinarians received about 50% of their tag needs. She said that the DOL still had no-cost RFID tags for swine available
Mike Honeycutt reported that he had gotten Senator Sheehy's staff to send a letter to USDA with regards to tags
(3:47:35) 12:04 PM RECESS
(3:48:32) 1:01 PM – MEAT, MILK & EGG INSPECTION BUREAU
Alicia Love, Meat, Milk & Egg Inspection Bureau Chief, introduced herself
(3:48:58) 1:02 PM Out-of-State Travel Request