NEWS
Game Commission Postpones Antelope Decision
The New Mexico State Game Commission postponed a decision on the controversial A-PLUS system at its Ruidoso meeting last week. The commission will take up the issue again Thursday, December 9 in Clovis.
The A-PLUS system is the main reason that New Mexico has one of the lowest percentages of antelope hunting opportunity going to residents of any western state.
Few sportsmen attended the Thursday meeting, but New Mexico Wildlife Federation delivered petitions and letters signed by over 6,000 New Mexico sportsmen like you asking for substantial improvement to the lopsided allocation of hunting licenses. NMWF asked commissioners to reject the only option presented to the commission because it did little to improve resident hunting opportunity and also took two important steps backward from the status quo.
The option presented on Thursday would have changed antelope hunting for the worse in two ways:
First, the proposal would have changed all transferable “landowner” authorizations from ranch-only licenses to unit-wide licenses after the first hunt day, creating a new monetary incentive for landowners without good hunting opportunity to enroll in the A-PLUS program: The valuable unit-wide licenses could be used on any public land after the first day of the hunt.
Second, the proposal would have changed trespass rules for antelope so that antelope hunters could be cited as poachers for accidentally crossing an unmarked, unfenced boundary—and would have also created a confusing and inconsistent system of determining whether access roads are public or private.
A majority of ranchers and outfitters present at the lightly attended meeting spoke in favor of the department’s proposal. The only other sportsmen organization representative to speak at the meeting on Thursday was Robert Espinoza, Executive Director of Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife. Espinoza spoke in support of the department proposal that included the changed trespass rules and provision to make all landowner authorizations unit-wide. Espinoza also told the commission “a majority of sportsmen now support this option.”
Unfortunately the department did not disclose to the commission how many comments it had received for or against its preferred option, but at the Albuquerque game commission meeting in August department data showed that a majority of comments did not favor their proposal.
Following public testimony, Commissioner Kent Salazar made a motion to both remove the provisions that would have changed trespass rules and keep transferable landowner authorizations as ranch-only, while still allowing big game draw hunters who did not harvest an antelope to move within the hunting unit on the second and third day to other public lands or private land with written permission.
The commission then passed the department’s A-PLUS rule with those changes.
After a short break, however, the commission re-convened and Commissioner Tom Arvas announced that he thought the commission should reconsider its earlier motion because of “confusion about what we are doing and what we have already done.”
The department had not clearly explained that its new proposal changed trespass rules and made all licenses unit-wide in either its online documents or in presentation to the commission. Those changes had only been explained through NMWF action alert. Apparently some members of the commission and audience were not fully aware of what the department’s proposal contained even after the rule had been approved.
After several failed attempts to make the correct motion, the commission voted to rescind its action and postpone any decision until the next commission meeting.
Antelope License Allocation History
The resalable license system for antelope began decades ago as a way to incentivize private landowners to allow free public hunting access. The system used to be guided by law and offered licenses to landowners who entered into an agreement with the department to permit free public hunting access on their ranch. The law allocated the landowner one (1) antelope license for the first five (5) draw licenses sold by the department, and one additional license for every 10 licenses sold. The law also ensured that resalable licenses could not exceed 20 percent of all antelope hunting opportunity. The year before the law was repealed, more than 81 percent of antelope licenses were sold through the big game draw.
Colorado and Utah today have systems similar to that old New Mexico system.
Several decades ago the law that guided New Mexico’s system was repealed, however, and it was left to the NM Department of Game and Fish and Game Commission to administer the resalable licensing system in any way it saw fit. The department never developed any rules to guide the allocation of resalable hunting licenses, and over time the department even stopped publishing the total number of licenses it allocated as resalable permits.
Over the last 30 years, the proportion of antelope hunting opportunity allocated through the big game draw has fallen to just 29 percent of total hunting opportunity.
It was not widely known until recently—even by many who worked for the department—that the transferable license system had quietly grown to encompass about 70 percent of all antelope hunting licenses. The system has also changed over time from an incentive program that traded public licenses for public access to an entitlement program that essentially privatizes access to most antelope hunting licenses.
New Mexico Wildlife Federation began looking into current and historical license allocations after receiving many member complaints that they could not draw a license and thought something was wrong. Our analysis clearly shows a historical trend of declining opportunity for resident hunters as an increasing percentage of licenses for both elk and antelope are given out as transferable “landowner” authorizations, bypassing the big game quota.
When the game department last year announced its intention to formalize the A-PLUS system, it could have prioritized a reversal of that trend. New public awareness and widespread desire from hunters for a better system presented the department with good reason to analyze other western states and present the commission with a suite of viable options.
Although the current director and assistant directors at the department chose to allow just one additional alternative to their “preferred option” or no rule at all, the third option presented at the August game commission meeting was a straight draw. A straight draw is the standard in most other states and was used for deer in New Mexico without problems for years. But instead of allowing staff to develop a plan detailing to the best of their professional ability how a straight draw would work for the public and the commission, the directorate focused on maintaining the status quo and revenue from non-resident licenses.
The straight draw option still received the most comments of support—largely from license-buying sportsmen and a few landowners, but it was not even presented at Thursday’s meeting.
Despite this current director’s unwillingness to tackle the issue proactively, the system will need to change if resident hunters are going to get a fair shake.
Bear and Cougar Limits Increased
The commission also voted on Thursday to substantially increase harvest limits for bear and cougar from previous levels. The commission changed bear harvest limits little from the department’s proposal, changing only the Sandia and Manzano populations from a goal of reduction of the population to a stabilization of the population. The commission also voted in favor of the experimental spring bear hunt in the Valle Vidal, but ordered the department to study the impacts to cub and calf survival.
Cougar harvest limits were decreased from 996 to 742 by the department the day before the meeting, roughly splitting the difference between the current level of 490. Commission Chairman Jim McClintic said he asked department staff to make the downward revisions, in violation of the commission’s public notice policy, to address public comment they had gotten. It was not made clear nor did any commissioner ask why the changes were not made in time to meet the 30-day-notice policy. Department Director Tod Stevenson said the number (almost exactly halfway between the current and originally proposed harvest levels) was set using science as the basis.
Read more in the Albuquerque Journal: www.abqjournal.com/news/state/2902182124newsstate10-29-10.htm (You may have to watch a brief advertisement.)
Temporary Trapping Ban Passed for Gila
The commission approved a ban on trapping in the Gila region to coordinate with an executive order made by Governor Richardson. The ban will be in place for six months while the department conducts a study on ways in which trapping could be conducted to minimize impacts to Mexican Gray Wolves. The department clarified that the temporary ban does not apply to coyote trapping, or any trapping on private land.