West Slope lawmaker tries to pump the brakes on Colorado wolf reintroduction
Democratic
Sen. Kerry Donovan’s bill would delay wolf management to study and fund
compensation for lost livestock. It would also cancel a plan to bring
back the predators if a “self-sustaining population” is confirmed.
Sen. Kerry Donovan’s bill would delay wolf management to study and fund
compensation for lost livestock. It would also cancel a plan to bring
back the predators if a “self-sustaining population” is confirmed.
Outdoors Primary category in which blog post is published
@jasonblevins
State Sen. Kerry Donovan wants to slow the roll on wolf reintroduction.
The Vail Democrat, who represents seven Western Slope counties, has crafted legislation she hopes to submit on Friday that allows Colorado Parks and Wildlife to manage wolves, but would postpone any reintroduction effortsuntil money is found to reimburse ranchers who lose livestock to
wolves. The bill would cancel reintroduction outright if wildlife
officials determine that the state already has a “self-sustaining
population” of gray wolves.
The bill is a detour around a question on November’s ballot that asks voters to direct Colorado Parks and Wildlife to reintroduce about 10 wolves a year
into Western Slope wildlands starting in 2023. Donovan’s legislation
delays possible reintroduction until the last day of 2025, after state
agriculture and wildlife officials work together to measure potential
damage caused by wolves and determine how to pay for lost livestock.
It also comes as wildlife officials have confirmed a pack of six wolves roaming Moffat County in northwest Colorado.
state Sen. Kerry Donovan, D-Vail, speaks on Feb. 1, 2019, at a town
hall meeting in Frisco. (John Ingold, The Colorado Sun)
Donovan said Friday. “But with an issue as complex as this, which seems
to be in flux with a pack moving into the northwest, I think it’s
appropriate to take the deliberative process the general assembly allows
and apply it to wildlife management in Colorado.”
“This bill should give us a forum for a discussion,” she added, “and I
don’t know if we are having that level of dialogue around what is a
very complex issue for the Western Slope. I don’t think that happens with two opposing campaigns,
which does not always provide the right forum for the discussions and
compromises that these kinds of complicated issues require.”
Donovan’s bill calls for a study group convened by Colorado Parks and
Wildlife and the state’s department of agriculture to develop a report
on the impacts and costs of wolves by Jan. 1, 2022.
Under Donovan’s plan, a “sustainable reintroduction, recovery and
management plan” would include a wide variety of methods — including the
issuance of hunting permits — to promote a sustainable population of
wolves, and minimize damage to livestock and provide compensation to
ranchers who lose livestock to the predators.
“Whatever the method is, we want to make sure the department has full
capability to manage the population with the tools they think are best
suited,” she said.
The compensation issue is tricky for Donovan. It’s an issue that concerns her constituents on the Western Slope, she said.
Her bill, she said, allows cattlemen and wool growers to work with
wildlife officials to craft a system that not only identifies a funding
source for compensating ranchers who lose livestock to wolves but
outlines how ranchers can be reimbursed.
“I could easily see a concept where you take a picture of your cow
that has been killed and send it to us and we’ll send you a check for a
couple hundred dollars. That sounds incredibly reasonable to people who
haven’t run animals in the mountains. But it’s not that easy,” she said.
“I want to make sure we get very realistic scenarios from people who
work in these landscapes, the cattlemen and wool growers.”
George Edwards, the executive director of the Montana Livestock Loss
Board, has spent 11 years paying ranchers in Montana for livestock
they’ve lost to wolves, grizzly bears and mountain lions.
In 2008, when Montana estimated there were 497 wolves in the state,
his board paid $87,317 to ranchers who lost 238 animals to wolves,
including 74 cattle, 149 sheep and four llamas. In 2019, with wildlife
officials estimating Montana’s wolf population around 900, he paid $76,108 to ranchers
for 53 cattle, 20 sheep and two horses. For the last three years, his
office has paid record amounts to ranchers as losses from grizzly bears
grow.
Last year the Montana legislature increased his budget to $300,000 from $200,000.
Edwards has visited several states across the West to explain his
state’s compensation program, which pays ranchers market value for each
animal his team confirms was killed by predators.
“It’s interesting to hear ranchers’ perspectives in places like
Northern California. I hear the same thing regardless of where you go.
Once wolves move in, ranchers feel limited in what they can do to
prevent loss,” Edwards said. “Once you have wolves, ranchers know their
losses will grow.”
Donovan’s bill comes the same week that Colorado State University researchers released the results of an online survey of 734 state residents
spread across the Western Slope, the Front Range and Eastern Plains
that shows overwhelming support for wolf reintroduction. Supporters of
the wolf ballot measure say the survey, which compensated people for
participating, shows that wolves unite both urban and rural residents.
But that’s not what Donovan is hearing from the Western Slope. Opponents of the measure have collected resolutions from 29 rural counties across the state opposing the reintroduction of wolves.
“One of the concerns I keep hearing about is that a bunch of city
folks are going to vote to approve wolves and we are going to have to
deal with them,” she said.
Donovan’s bill says reintroduction efforts would be cancelled if
wildlife officials determine there is a “sustainable population” in the
state. So how many is that?
“I’m not going to define that because there are people who are better
versed for that,” Donovan said. “They are going to do the work to find
out what a sustainable population is. We will let science determine what
a sustainable population is.”
Rick Enstrom, a former wildlife commissioner who worked with a wolf study group that crafted a management strategy for the Colorado Wildlife Commission in 2004 that did not support reintroduction, applauded Donovan’s legislative strategy for wolf management.
“It seems pretty sensible to me. These issues are too complex to
solve with a simple ballot measure,” he said. “Hopefully this will calm
everybody down.”
Passage of legislation and a ballot measure could set up a conflict.
Legislation does not automatically override voter-approved initiatives.
“I think we can say history has shown that when a compromise is
reached inside the (Capitol) building that often results in initiatives
being pulled off the ballot,” Donovan said.
Organizers behind the ballot initiative applauded Donovan’s effort to
balance wolf reintroduction with the needs of Colorado’s ranchers, but
they will not support the bill. Rob Edwards with the Rocky Mountain Wolf
Action Fund said they are happy to discuss compensation plans and
proactive measures ranchers can take to prevent predation of livestock.
“What is not acceptable is delaying reintroduction until everything
is worked out,” Edwards said. “We already have this scoped out to the
end of 2023. There is plenty of time for everybody to figure out how to
do this. We don’t need a delay beyond that.”
Not surprisingly, his group doesn’t like the notion that
reintroduction could end if biologists conclude the state has a
“self-sustaining population” of wolves. So how many does he think
qualifies as a sustainable number of wolves?
“North of 500 animals across the western portion of the state,” he
said, suggesting that could be achieved with reintroducing 30 wolves
over three years. “We have a very clear vision for what reintroduction
looks like and how it can be done and what it would result in. Accepting
ambiguity is not our idea of a good way forward.”
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