Montana ranchers charge USDA targeting local processing plan

[frenchie]

Montana ranchers charge USDA targeting local processing plants

by Pete Hisey on 8/11/2005 for Meatingplace.com


The Montana Cattlemen's Association says it is "outraged" by the closing of the Ranchland Packing Co. slaughter plant in Butte, Mont., this week (See USDA shutters slaughterhouse for rodent infestantion, Meatingplace.com, Aug. 10, 2005.), claiming that USDA may be exacting revenge on Montana ranchers for their efforts to keep the Canadian border closed to live cattle and their support for Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund's lawsuit against USDA.

Dennis McDonald, president of MCA and also a member of R-CALF, said that the timing of the closing and sudden inspections of other plants in Missoula, Columbus and Beaverhead County was "disturbing. If you line up the dots, it's pretty obvious what is happening," he said.

A spokeswoman from the Food Safety and Inspection Service, which monitors food safety within USDA, denied the charges and said that all plants are treated equally. Gary Wold, owner of the Ranchland plant, told the Associated Press that while he felt he was targeted for unknown reasons, some rodent droppings had been found in a meat locker. Ranchland had until Wednesday evening to develop an acceptable action plan to clean up its facilities and prevent future infestations.

:o But I thought they were concerned about consumer safety. :? .

 

[Oldtimer]

Old News Frenchie-- Heres the latest...Montana Cattlemen are just questioning the timing of this action, along with the Congressmen- since they have been quite vocal about USDA's failure to get anything else right and their illegal activities...A political appointed government entity wouldn't target a group to get revenge now would they- especially an entity that is in the Big Packer Conglomerates pocket ;-) :?: :( :mad:

USDA may let meat plant reopen
Associated Press

HELENA - A Butte meat slaughtering and processing plant shut down on allegations of unsanitary conditions will be allowed to resume handling beef as soon as a simple cleaning procedure is completed, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., said Wednesday.

Baucus said Ranchland Packing Co. could be operating as soon as today.

The senator said he spoke Wednesday to Agriculture Undersecretary Richard Raymond and was told Ranchland could reopen after rubbing carcasses with a bleach solution, then rinsing them with water.


The USDA temporarily shut down Ranchland after an inspector last week found what spokeswoman Amanda Eamich described as unsanitary conditions, including some rodent droppings. Dennis McDonald, president of the Montana Cattlemen's Association and chairman of the state Democratic Party, said timing of the enforcement there and at other plants was "disturbing."

McDonald suggested a link to Montana cattle producers' efforts to block the federal government's resumption of cattle trade with Canada, which has confirmed three cases of mad cow disease since May 2003.

McDonald also is in R-CALF United Stockgrowers of America, the ranchers' group that went to court with efforts to prevent cattle and expanded beef trade with Canada. The Montana Cattlemen's Association was supportive and claims the USDA targets small plants for enforcement leading to closure, allegations Eamich called groundless. She said USDA enforcement is based on "the letter of the law."

Asked Wednesday how the Ranchland closure was resolved so swiftly if USDA adhered that strictly to regulations and procedures, Baucus said, "That's a good question. I don't know."

Ranchland Packing owner Gary Wold said Tuesday that he believed he was targeted, but did not know why. Mice droppings and cobwebs were found in his facility, he said, but not in places where meat processing took place. Some droppings were in a corner of a cooler where meat was kept, Wold said, adding he believed he had taken proper steps to resolve USDA concerns.

Montana has 29 federally inspected meat processing plants, state officials said.

"If any other plants are about to be closed ... we'll take it on a case-by-case basis," Baucus said.

 

[frenchie]

but,but Oldtimer its a food safety issue is it not ;-)

 

[Oldtimer]

but,but Oldtimer its a food safety issue is it not ;-)

IS THIS? I WONDER HOW MANY DAYS THEY SHUT TYSON DOWN FOR REPEATED VIOLATIONS? :( :mad:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mad-Cow Rule Breaches
By Meat Packers Are Noted

By BILL TOMSON
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
August 19, 2005

WASHINGTON -- Federal documents show U.S. meat packers sometimes failed to follow procedures to prevent the spread of mad-cow disease, including leaving spinal cords in cattle, miscalculating cattle ages and not sanitizing equipment.

Most of the 1,036 "noncompliance records" released by the Department of Agriculture appear to show record-keeping or other paperwork infractions.

And a violation recorded Aug. 3, 2004, said a USDA inspector stopped plant operations after watching employees fail to remove spinal cords from carcasses. Spinal cords are thought to carry the mad-cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy. The inspector said as a result the facility pledged to retain more than 500 carcasses and inspect them. A "similar" violation for the same establishment had been written up about three months earlier, the report said.

No company's name could be seen on the document that had sections blacked out, but it was accompanied by a letter from Tyson Fresh Meats Inc., a unit of Tyson Foods Inc. Tyson wrote that employees who should have been removing spinal cords were chastised for "poor work performance." Gary Mickelson, a Tyson spokesman, said, "We view this particular incident as more of a procedural issue than a food-safety concern because of the additional measures we take after this point in the production process to make sure nervous-system materials don't enter the food supply."

An unrelated violation said a factory wasn't correctly determining cattle ages. An inspector said when he tried to verify records that four cattle were younger than 30 months, he found three of the animals were older.

USDA maintains that, for the most part, mad-cow infection can only be found in cattle 30 months and older so most tissue capable of carrying the disease -- called specified risk material, or SRM -- only needs to be removed from older animals. If an animal is younger, those parts don't need to be removed. Some parts, such as tonsils and distal ileum, are considered SRM in cattle of all ages and must be removed.

After the first case of mad-cow disease was found in the U.S. in December 2003, USDA began requiring the removal of spinal-cord, brain and other tissues from older cattle. Several other food-safety rules were implemented, including a ban on "downer" or dead animals from the food supply. Humans are believed to be susceptible to the disease through consumption of some beef products if they contain infected tissue.

A slaughterhouse, owned by Smithfield Foods Inc. subsidiary Moyer Packing Co., was written up July 15, 2004, for mishandling an animal that was dead-on-arrival and slated to be tested in USDA's federal BSE surveillance program. The program focuses on downer cattle that are too sick or injured to walk or cattle that died before slaughter. USDA considers those cattle more likely to be infected. The USDA inspector said he observed "abdominal fluids and tissues" from the dead animals "scattered throughout the unloading and livestock scale areas."

Moyer said in a response letter to USDA that the "entire affected area ... was hosed with high-pressure water and debris were removed." Smithfield spokesman Jerry Hostetter said: "The dead animal in question was nowhere near a food-production or processing area. It was in the cattle receiving yards ... prior to being taken into the plant. No parts of the animal got anywhere near the food supply."

Write to Bill Tomson at [email protected]

 

[frenchie]

so Oldtimer...are you saying because you believe there are ongoing problems At other plants....They should ignore problems in Montana plants.
.

 

[mwj]

so Oldtimer...are you saying because you believe there are ongoing problems At other plants....They should ignore problems in Montana plants.
.

Washing with bleach and hosing them down sounds good if the customer finds out :shock: I guess as long as they bleach the carcas they will not have to worry about sanitation. This seems strange since this vocal group from Montana thinks the usda does not do enough for food safety :???:

 

[Oldtimer]

so Oldtimer...are you saying because you believe there are ongoing problems At other plants....They should ignore problems in Montana plants.
.

Washing with bleach and hosing them down sounds good if the customer finds out :shock: I guess as long as they bleach the carcas they will not have to worry about sanitation. This seems strange since this vocal group from Montana thinks the usda does not do enough for food safety :???:

The irony mwj is that the USDA inspector that is there daily had never found any problems- but after the Montana Governors criticism of the USDA, a regional inspector is sent in to inspect that plant (which also happened to be the plant that had a pork carcass the Governor had bought at a 4-H sale) and found violations so severe he thought it needed to be closed..... Coincidence? Why if it was so bad hadn't the normal USDA inspector thats there every day found it?

I also still wonder what actions were taken against the Tyson plants that were found with multiple violations involving SRM's- were they immediately closed?...

I have no problem with USDA carrying out the letter of the law- but it must be done consistently without giving special leeway to the Big Boys that stuff the politicians pockets- but we've seen before where USDA actually broke the law and was caught giving permits to allow the Big Packers to import in Canadian beef that was banned by the law- makes all their actions very questionable.....

 

[mwj]

Oldtimer
Those inspectors that are there every day are the ones most likley to be in bed with the culprits!!!! My memory fails me who the plant was several years ago that was selling ground beef to the school lunch program? The regular inspectors were treated to lunch while the plant workers were dragging in dead cows from the lots to be processed!!!!!!!!! Stanko packing sticks in my mind but I could very well be wrong. Sometimes the good old boy network crosses the line and it takes a person from outside the plant to see it. I guess on the bright side the dead cows must have been bleached and hosed because there were no peports of dead kids :P