OPINION: Idaho lawmakers should quit meddling in wildlife management
It’s always annoying when dealing with forestry and wildlife issues when you have politicians who believe their agenda or opinion about those issues are a viable substitute for actual knowledge of or expertise about them. This happens all the time when dealing with environmental activists and the judiciary on forest biology and wildlife concerns. But in the case of politicians, we have representatives who actually try to put their opinions into law.
Such is the case with a pair of bills currently working their way through the 2025 Idaho Legislature. Neither of these bills should ever have seen the light of day. But unfortunately each of them has a champion.
House Bill 196, sponsored by Rep. Josh Tanner, R-Eagle, calls for a five-year moratorium on mule deer doe hunting in 22 management units in southwest and south-central Idaho. That area encompasses all or part of 10 counties and is just over 20% of the total landmass in Idaho. His legislation supersedes the authority of the Idaho Fish and Game Commission and the Fish and Game Department to determine and set the seasons in those areas.
Now when you look at Tanner’s resume, it states that he likes to hunt but fails to show any wildlife degree or advanced knowledge of mule deer biology. It also fails to show how he has acquired enough intimate knowledge of the habitat conditions in that area to make such a wide sweeping moratorium. The numbers of deer and conditions of the habitats in that large an area usually takes a cadre of wildlife biologists, along with winter helicopter counts of deer numbers, to produce a real time report that shows what is occurring within that region. Unless Rep. Tanner has a direct pipeline into that information, one has to seriously question how he can determine that a doe hunting ban should be put in place — especially for a five-year period where future conditions can radically change because of natural and human-caused events.
Senate Bill 1078, sponsored by Sen. Doug Okuniewicz, R-Hayden, would change Idaho Code 36-106 and take the hiring of the director of the Idaho Fish and Game Department away from the Fish and Game Commission and make it a political appointment of the governor. That would be in direct violation of the 1938 citizen’s initiative that created the Fish and Game Commission. The portion of Idaho Code 36-106 that Okuniewicz wants to change reads: “The commission shall appoint a director of the department of fish and game, hereinafter referred to as the director, who shall be a person with knowledge of, and experience in, the requirements for the protection, conservation, restoration, and management of the wildlife resources of the state. The director shall not hold any other public office, nor any office in any political party organization, and shall devote his entire time to the service of the state in the discharge of his official duties, under the direction of the commission.”
The 1938 initiative was passed by more than 75% of all the total votes cast in that election. The commission was created to insure that it was independent of political influence. The commissioners themselves are appointed by the governor and confirmed by the Senate. In fact Idaho Code 36-102 (b) states: “The commission shall consist of seven (7) members, to be appointed by the governor of the state of Idaho, who shall hold office during the pleasure of the governor and who shall be subject to removal by him.” So our elected governor and senators do have influence on the composition of the commission.
The folly of both of these bills in ignoring the 1938 initiative is explained in Idaho Code 36-103 (b), which states: “Because conditions are changing and in changing affect the preservation, protection, and perpetuation of Idaho wildlife, the methods and means of administering and carrying out the state’s policy must be flexible and dependent on the ascertainment of facts which from time to time exist and fix the needs for regulation and control of fishing, hunting, trapping, and other activity relating to wildlife, and because it is inconvenient and impractical for the legislature of the state of Idaho to administer such policy, it shall be the authority, power and duty of the fish and game commission to administer and carry out the policy of the state in accordance with the provisions of the Idaho fish and game code. The commission is not authorized to change such policy but only to administer it.”
Looking further in Idaho Code 36-103 (b), we read that: “.... no person shall be appointed a member of said commission unless he shall be well informed upon, and interested in, the subject of wildlife conservation and restoration.”
It is very clear that the 1938 initiative and Idaho Code was passed and is in force to keep the day-to-day and year-to-year management of our wildlife and fisheries out of the hands of the Legislature. Tanner’s bill is in clear and undeniable conflict with that mandate. Okuniewicz’s bill would introduce an element of political influence into that management since a director hired by the governor could easily consider himself to be more indebted to that individual than to the commission that he is supposed to answer to.
Fish and game management is a complex and extensive process that involves multiple disciplines. It is not something that can be undertaken or determined by one individual or political appointee. The 1938 initiative was passed to eliminate those possibilities and it has worked well for 87 years now.
This isn’t the time to fix something that ain’t broke.
Hassoldt is a field forester who lives in Kendrick.
