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June 15, 2010
Working Ranch Cowboys Present $50,000 to Clarendon Foundation College Ranch Program hen a representative of the Working Ranch Cowboys Foundation called Laban Tubbs, director of the Ranch & Feedlot Operations Programs at Clarendon College in Clarendon, Texas, and told him that the Foundation wanted to give the program some financial help, Tubbs was exited. He immediately began to think about the things the program needed, such as a few supplies, a jacket sponsor for all the students, and maybe some scholarship help. That’s when the Foundation representative told him that all that was fine, but they were talking about a significant grant, maybe $50,000. Then, Tubbs really got excited. The working Ranch Cowboys Foundation is the benevolent arm of the Working Ranch Cowboys Association, which is headquartered in Amarillo, Texas, and produces the World Championship Ranch Rodeo each November in Amarillo. The Foundation has as its goal to provide assistance to ranch cowboys and their families in times of need. This has been carried out through the Foundation’s crisis fund, which, to date, has distributed more than $275,000 to ranch families in need, and through the scholarship fund, which provides financial assistance to family members of the working ranch cowboy who wants to attend a college or university, or a vocational program. To date, more than $160,000 has been awarded in scholarships. “The association was started years ago with the intent of furthering our western heritage and helping the working cowboy on the ranch,” said Dan Daube, president of the Foundation. “Then we started the Foundation, and it has the duty of dis-
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persing the funds that the WRCA generates. Through our scholarships, we’ve had lots of kids graduate and go back to the ranch with a college education, and through our crisis fund we’ve been able to help some families through some really bad times. Now, we’re able to make a bigger impact with this grant to the Ranch & Feedlot Operations program. They are educating kids to work on a ranch, and by making a grant to that program we are able to help a lot of people.” The Ranch & Feedlot Operations program is a work force educational program that is structured to help young people get an introduction into the ranching and feedlot industries. “Clarendon College was seeing a lot of rural kids who weren’t going to college but needed some sort of education to help them get started with their lives and their careers,” said Jason Green, an instructor with the program, “we start out with basic animal health, basic nutrition, basic feeds and feeding, marketing, anything that you would probably learn while working for an operation for a year or two. “Probably 80 percent of the students coming into this program have what you would call a cowboy background,” Green said. “They grew up on a ranch, and they know that working on a ranch is what they’re going to do the rest of their lives. Some of them already have jobs. Sometimes the ranchers pay their tuitions so they will come here and learn something and then go back to the ranch and go to work. To complete the Ranch & Feedlot Operation program takes two semesters. However, Clarendon College also offers an RFO Associate Degree, where the student takes math, English,
and science courses in addition to the agriculture courses taken in the RFO program. The student graduates with an associate degree after two years of course work, and this provides a good basic program for a student who wants to transfer to a major university and obtain a bachelors degree. Green said that each student pays, in addition to his tuition, a professional services fee that goes toward artificial insemination schools, training clinics and things like that. He says that they always run short of funds for those services before the end of the year, and they plan to use part of the WRCF grant to supplement that. “There are also lots of travel expenses,” Green said. “We have two vans that hold 14 passengers each, and this year we went 6,500 miles. So we can use some help on those expenses, and we’re also going to use some of the money to help boost our scholarship fund. We give 13 scholarships a year, and we need some help in that area right now, too.” Daube says that the grant is actually a matching grant. In order for the program to receive all of it, the school must raise another $50,000. “I know they plan on matching that grant,” he said, “and that will give the program $100,000 to work with. “The number one thing we want this money to do,” Daube said, “is directly impact those students and get them as good of an education as possible, and we want to make sure the program continues and grows. And, of course, we want people to understand what the Working Ranch Cowboys Foundation is doing, so they will continue to support it.”
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Congressman Seeks to Expand EPA’s Control of Water by BRIAN WILSON, FOXNews.com
Democratic congressman is seeking to strip the word “navigable” from the 1972 Clean Water Act to allow the Environmental Protection Agency to surpass the limits imposed by a 2001 Supreme Court ruling on the kinds of waterways the agency can regulate. That word typically is interpreted to refer to any body of water that is “deep enough and wide enough to afford passage to ships.” But Rep. James Oberstar, D-Minn., who worked on the 1972 legislation as a Capitol Hill staff member, said he is trying to restore the original intent of the law. “I know what it means and it says the purpose of this act is to establish and maintain the chemical, biological and physical integrity of the nation’s waters,” Oberstar said. Some Republican advocates of land rights are wary, fearing that striking the word “navigable” from the Clean Water Act will bring every lake, pond, creek or mud hole under the EPA’s control.
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“It potentially puts government in charge of all waters, including mud puddles, irrigation ditches,” said Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash. “If you take out ‘navigable’ in this bill, it could potentially lead to the federal government usurping state laws as it relates to water and regulating, therefore, mud puddles. I just think that’s bad policy.” And that, he says, could place onerous burdens on farmers, ranchers and some small businesses. Not all Republicans are aligned against Oberstar’s bill. Some feel his bill strikes the right balance. “The bill is seeking to protect all the waters of the United States from pollution,” said Rep. Vernon Ehlers, R-Mich. “That’s the goal. The question is where do you draw the limit.” Oberstar tried in vain in 2007 to pass his water bill. Back then, the legislative waters were not “navigable,” so to speak, because the Bush White House issued a veto threat. But when Democrats control Congress and the White House, chances for passage appears more likely.
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