Inslee names Ferry County woman to Fish and Wildlife Commission

A Ferry County woman has been named to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.

Lynn O’Connor, of Kettle Falls, was appointed by Gov. Jay Inslee to replace outgoing commissioner Molly Linville. It was one of Inslee’s last acts before leaving office.

O’Connor ran the Colville Sign Company for 20 years and has been involved in the regional Rotary Club. She lives with her husband on a ranch southwest of Kettle Falls, where she made headlines last fall after being attacked by a black bear during a hike.

In an interview, O’Connor said she’s excited to join the nine-member panel, and that she thinks commissioners have a hard job to do in considering the interests of hunters, anglers, environmentalists, landowners and others while making decisions about fish and wildlife management.

“There are so many things to think about,” O’Connor said. “The commission has a challenge in balancing all of that, and I think that’s kind of exciting to get involved in.”

Her appointment came alongside the reappointment of commissioner Tim Ragen of Skagit County. If confirmed by the Senate, both would serve six-year terms.

The pair were the last wildlife commissioners appointed by Inslee, who left office last week after serving as governor for 12 years. Inslee did not make a decision on the seat occupied by Jim Anderson of Chelan County, whose term expired on Dec. 31.

The appointments drew strong criticism from sportsmen’s organizations who wanted to see Inslee leave all three appointment decisions up to Gov. Bob Ferguson, who took office Wednesday.

Dan Wilson, co-chairperson of the Washington chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, said in a statement that the appointments lacked transparency, and that they’ll only serve to further controversy over the commission.

“These actions aren’t just disappointing; they’re an affront to the very principles of accountable governance and responsible wildlife management,” Wilson said. “What Gov. Inslee has done is ensure that the public, Tribes, and essential communities are ignored in these appointments — again.”

Mike Faulk, an Inslee spokesperson, said in an email that the governor’s office had been working on the appointments “for months,” and that the office consulted with “various Tribes, recreation and conservation groups.”

The Fish and Wildlife Commission oversees the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife and has the final say on species protections and fishing and hunting seasons, among other policies. It also has the power to hire or fire the WDFW director.

In recent years, the panel’s decisions on predator management have proven divisive, such as ending spring bear hunting, limiting cougar hunting and rejecting a proposal to reduce protections for wolves. There have also been heated debates over more procedural items, such as its stalled conservation policy.

Last month, a report from the William D. Ruckelshaus Center found that observers feel the panel is “dysfunctional, politically polarized and caught up in conflict.” People interviewed for the report also raised concerns with the appointment process and the way the panel works with tribal governments.

O’Connor said she hasn’t watched the commission closely in the past, but that she thinks WDFW is “a pretty amazing organization.” She added that the biggest takeaway she got from the Ruckelshaus report was that the commission is “contentious,” and that she thinks that’s to be expected with the issues the panel deals with.

O’Connor grew up in Chicago and lived in California for a time before moving to Washington. She and her husband live on property that’s been in her husband’s family for more than a century. They lease pastures to other cattle producers. While O’Connor herself is not a hunter, their family does hunt on the property.

She’s always loved the outdoors. She worked as a park ranger in California and at Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area before starting her business. For a few years, she served on the board of the Kettle Range Conservation Group. She has also worked on raptor conservation.

Her main passion for the past decade or so, she said, has been with the regional Rotary Club. During the pandemic, she served as a district governor and oversaw 57 clubs in Washington, Idaho and British Columbia.

She said that experience showed her how to work with people who think differently than she does, and that it will prove useful on the commission.

“There’s a lot of people with a lot of different perspectives on how things should be done,” she said.

Linville, the rancher from Douglas County who O’Connor was chosen to replace, was widely seen as one of the commissioners who was most friendly to sportsmen, and she was often on the losing end of debates over predator management. This past summer, she was one of a few commissioners who argued in support of WDFW’s proposal to reduce state-level protections for gray wolves, a push that a majority of commissioners ultimately rejected.

O’Connor said she doesn’t have any preconceived ideas about how wildlife should be managed. She said she’s interested in joining the panel’s habitat committee, and that she’s excited to learn more about fisheries issues in the state.

She expects to do a lot of listening and learning in her first year on the commission.

“Listening to people is probably the thing that excites me the most,” she said.