Interesting article in today’s Bozeman Daily Chronicle today – Under the Gun: FWP Feeling a Legislative Crunch.
Read it for yourself, though here’s what caught our eye today (emphasis mine)-
Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks is feeling the squeeze of a Legislature unhappy with its recent record.
In the first half of the session, FWP tracked 355 bills and testified on 114 of them. Seventy of those bills are still alive, at least half of which the department is opposed to, said agency spokesman Ron Aasheim.
“It’s been a challenging session,” Aasheim said. Bills have targeted “everything from land acquisition to wolves, bison, (FWP) commission authority, licensing issues.”
And, Aasheim said, the army of outdoorsmen that usually comes out in droves to oppose bills that appear to compromise hunting and fishing seem to be less of a force this year.
“The presence of hunters, anglers, outdoor recreationists has not been as evident this year as it has been in past years,” he said.
And……
“It looks like there is just a venting going on,” said Jim Posewitz, a former FWP biologist and active conservationist in Helena. “For some reason, a conservationist and a conservative don’t come close to having the same ideology.”
Several groups interviewed for the article note the legislature has turned a deaf ear to their testimony this year.
Betcha Bob Lane would echo those sentiments.
