BuzzH
Well-known member
http://wyofile.com/dustin/hunters-anglers-restore-wyoming-game-and-fish-budget/
I wish I would have been able to attend the latest TRW interim meeting...sounds like the committee got an earful.
Approximately 30 members of the public addressed the committee. Many of them said that while they appreciate the cost-cutting exercise that the legislature has imposed on the Game and Fish Department, the department has been forced to slash so much from its operations that it can no longer appropriately manage wildlife resources in the state.
The department was forced to trim some $2 million from its 2013 budget, another $4.6 million from its 2014 budget, and it is preparing to trim millions more for 2015 and beyond. Lost are public access programs, youth education and recruitment programs, along with some game wardens and field biologists. Fish hatchery upgrades worth approximately $463,000 have been postponed. The department will cut back on fishery stocking in 2014, and $350,000 was eliminated for conservation easements and land acquisitions to expand public access for fishing and hunting.
Seventeen-year-old Haley Powell, a Rock Springs High School student, told lawmakers that blocking investments in wildlife management today will have serious repercussions for her generation. Powell said she’d planned on participating in a Wyoming Game and Fish youth program this summer, but the program was recently cut. She asked how Wyoming Game and Fish can expect to draw support from hunters, fishermen and others if the industry is not successfully recruiting the next generations? “In order to really benefit our future we really need to have a fully-funded Wyoming Game and Fish,” Powell said.
Trevor Stevenson, executive director of the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, said that a budget-cutting-only approach is no long-term solution to concerns that Wyoming Game and Fish may have grown too big over the years. He said that wildlife management must be based on sound biological science or the state will not be able to properly manage wildlife species. “Defunding wildlife biologists is not going to help the situation,” Stevenson testified.
Neil Thagard, western outreach director for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Alliance, was pointed in his criticism of legislators’ actions regarding the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. “In the last legislative session, our elected officials chose to cut one of the state’s best revenue streams, and by doing so you failed us,” said Thagard, underscoring the fact that hunting and fishing generates $1.1 billion in annual revenues to the state. “If you were my financial advisor, I’d fire each and every one of you.”
Thagard then took aim at the motives of the legislative committee. He said the committee’s deliberations on this budget discussion have been scheduled for times and places — during a weekday in Teton Village, for example — where average, working hunters and anglers are unlikely to attend. Thagard said he’s spoken with a former Game and Fish employee who said the committee didn’t want to hear from former state employees or non-governmental organization representatives on the Wyoming Game and Fish budget matter.
Committee cochairman Sen. Bruce Burns (R-Sheridan) took offense to the comment. “I’ve been on this committee for 10 years, and the notion that this committee has worked to exclude anybody — NGOs or anybody else — I find insulting. This committee has never done that,” said Burns.
I wish I would have been able to attend the latest TRW interim meeting...sounds like the committee got an earful.
Approximately 30 members of the public addressed the committee. Many of them said that while they appreciate the cost-cutting exercise that the legislature has imposed on the Game and Fish Department, the department has been forced to slash so much from its operations that it can no longer appropriately manage wildlife resources in the state.
The department was forced to trim some $2 million from its 2013 budget, another $4.6 million from its 2014 budget, and it is preparing to trim millions more for 2015 and beyond. Lost are public access programs, youth education and recruitment programs, along with some game wardens and field biologists. Fish hatchery upgrades worth approximately $463,000 have been postponed. The department will cut back on fishery stocking in 2014, and $350,000 was eliminated for conservation easements and land acquisitions to expand public access for fishing and hunting.
Seventeen-year-old Haley Powell, a Rock Springs High School student, told lawmakers that blocking investments in wildlife management today will have serious repercussions for her generation. Powell said she’d planned on participating in a Wyoming Game and Fish youth program this summer, but the program was recently cut. She asked how Wyoming Game and Fish can expect to draw support from hunters, fishermen and others if the industry is not successfully recruiting the next generations? “In order to really benefit our future we really need to have a fully-funded Wyoming Game and Fish,” Powell said.
Trevor Stevenson, executive director of the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance, said that a budget-cutting-only approach is no long-term solution to concerns that Wyoming Game and Fish may have grown too big over the years. He said that wildlife management must be based on sound biological science or the state will not be able to properly manage wildlife species. “Defunding wildlife biologists is not going to help the situation,” Stevenson testified.
Neil Thagard, western outreach director for the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Alliance, was pointed in his criticism of legislators’ actions regarding the Wyoming Game and Fish Department. “In the last legislative session, our elected officials chose to cut one of the state’s best revenue streams, and by doing so you failed us,” said Thagard, underscoring the fact that hunting and fishing generates $1.1 billion in annual revenues to the state. “If you were my financial advisor, I’d fire each and every one of you.”
Thagard then took aim at the motives of the legislative committee. He said the committee’s deliberations on this budget discussion have been scheduled for times and places — during a weekday in Teton Village, for example — where average, working hunters and anglers are unlikely to attend. Thagard said he’s spoken with a former Game and Fish employee who said the committee didn’t want to hear from former state employees or non-governmental organization representatives on the Wyoming Game and Fish budget matter.
Committee cochairman Sen. Bruce Burns (R-Sheridan) took offense to the comment. “I’ve been on this committee for 10 years, and the notion that this committee has worked to exclude anybody — NGOs or anybody else — I find insulting. This committee has never done that,” said Burns.
