Merrigan Seeks to Clarify Pork Vote Status

January 11, 2000

Kathleen Merrigan, administrator, Agricultural Marketing Service, has issued a statement to clarify the process AMS is using to determine if a vote should be held on the future of the pork advertising, promotion and research program. The statement read:

"There is some confusion about the number of valid signatures that USDA must receive before a decision can be made on whether to conduct a referendum on the pork checkoff program. We need 14,986 signatures -- 15% of pork producers and importers. Rather than trying to reach every single petitioner, the Agricultural Marketing Service chose instead to draw a random sample of petitioners to double check whether they indeed signed the petition and were qualified to do so. It is down to the final hours. We've reached most but not all of the people in our sample. There were 428 individuals who did not confirm when reached by our phone survey that they signed the petition. We sent these 428 people letters, asking that they return our questionnaire to us by Jan. 10. We need 253 of these individuals to return the questionnaire indicating that they signed and are qualified.

"No names were thrown out for handwriting problems. The issue over illegibility relates to timeliness. AMS explained, in great detail, at our meeting with interested parties on Jan. 5 how illegibility and missing data contributed to the time needed for verification."