Clik here to view.
Clik here to view.
CHEYENNE—Sen. Larry Hicks thought the statewide solution to a regional problem was problematic and half-baked.
The problem is there are too many elk in some areas, especially south-central Wyoming’s Laramie Mountains and Iron Mountain area. The solution, proposed in House Bill 60 – Excess wildlife population damage amendments, essentially was to compensate Wyoming ranchers for the grass and other forage that elk, deer and antelope eat while on their land.
“I held it back on purpose because it wasn’t ready for prime time,” Hicks (R-Baggs) told WyoFile. “There were many potential significant negative consequences — and I don’t even think they were unanticipated.”
Clik here to view.
Hicks exercised his power as the Wyoming Senate’s majority floor leader, which allows him to determine the order bills are heard on the floor. On Tuesday afternoon, he bumped HB 60 to the bottom. Legislative budget session scheduling rules said that the bill had to be considered by the entire Senate that day or it’d automatically die. And by the time the body wrapped up its discussion about allowing civilians to carry concealed firearms into places like elementary schools, the upper chamber was ready to adjourn.
The now-dead bill raised the ire of hunting and conservation groups, and some Cheyenne lobbyists had it in their crosshairs for dilution or defeat. The ranching industry, however, strongly supported the legislation. After 11 attempts at amendments — several of them successful — HB 60 passed the House by a 43-18 margin, sending it down the hall for Senate consideration.
The Senate’s Travel, Recreation and Wildlife Committee tacked on two more now-moot amendments: Sen. Mike Gierau- (D-Jackson) gave the Wyoming Game and Fish Department $5 million from the general fund to rectify an “unfunded mandate,” while Sen. Affie Ellis (R-Cheyenne) did away with language in the bill that made it a “presumption” for landowners to be eligible for payments.
Although worked up over the summer by the Legislature’s Agriculture Committee, longtime livestock industry lobbyist Jim Magagna was an architect of the legislation.
Clik here to view.
He was caught off guard by its sudden death on Tuesday.
“I was fully expecting that it was going to reach the floor of the Senate yesterday afternoon,” said Magagna, who represents the Wyoming Stock Growers Association. “I think we had support to get it on the floor and I was optimistic we could pass it in the Senate.”
Magagna wasn’t aware Hicks had beef with HB 60.
Hicks described that beef to WyoFile: He didn’t like how the bill relied on imprecise population estimates for herds of elk and deer in areas where they can be difficult to tally. The senator from Baggs took issue with how grass-loss compensation rates were based on U.S. Department of Agriculture figures that accounted for other factors baked into rangeland grazing leases, like fence management and stock water. And he wasn’t a fan of how an isolated issue was spawning wholesale changes to how ranchers are compensated for wildlife around the state.
“This was originally brought up to address overpopulation with elk in one region of Wyoming,” Hicks said, “and it was expanded into a statewide program without any input on how it would actually work.”
Clik here to view.
It’s unclear whether the proposed reforms will be revisited in the months ahead in anticipation of a bill in the Legislature’s 2025 general session. The Agriculture Committee met Tuesday morning to discuss its “interim topics,” before HB 60 had met its fate.
“We had no notion that [this issue] was going to remain,” Magagna said. “I think we’ll continue to look at [legislation], and we’ll continue to work with Game and Fish on more active management of those herds.”
Wyoming’s wildlife managers are in the early stages of a five-year plan to aggressively hunt down elk herds in south-central Wyoming. Landowners are being equipped with special “auxiliary” hunting licenses, more kill permits are being doled out, and the state agency’s even paying a technician whose job it is to kill elk. Stay tuned to WyoFile for an update on that effort.
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