News & Commentary
New Mexico and wildlife — still more work to do
By Chris Smith
On April 1st, Roxy’s Law, which bans traps, snares, and poisons on public lands, went into effect in New Mexico. Despite this progress, New Mexico isn’t the beacon of wildlife management that it should be. The state still opposes Mexican wolf restoration in the Southern Rockies, and the governor appoints and fires commissioners at her whim, creating instability within the primary wildlife decision making body. “Let’s take the next step and push for a state wildlife agency that serves all the people and wildlife of New Mexico.”
Read more in the Santa Fe New Mexican
Roxy’s Law a win, but wildlife governance needs reform
By Charles Fox
Last year, New Mexico passed Roxy’s Law, which will ban traps, snares, and poisons on public lands. The state Legislature also recently banned coyote-killing contests. However, the Department of Game and Fish allowed these cruel practices to continue for years despite massive opposition. New Mexico state wildlife management lacks accountability, inclusivity, responsiveness, and transparency. “The Game Department’s backward policies are badly out of step with mainstream society and show little sign of improving. There is no excuse for repeating the mistakes and abuses of the past, no matter how longstanding.”
Read more in the Albuquerque Journal
Stop the slaughter of predators: Reform wildlife management
By David Stalling, author of “From The Wild Side”
In the most recent post from his blog “From The Wild Side: Wild Thoughts from an Untamed Heart,” David discusses the immediate need for wildlife governance reform, citing the specific atrocities happening right now in the state of Montana.
“So while the state of Montana is working to enhance some nonnative species, it is simultaneously carrying out a war against other native species. This sums up the flaws to our current system of wildlife management, and why it must change.”
Read more at From The Wild Side
Press Release: Game of Groans – Fossil fuel lobbyist appointed to New Mexico Game Commission
For Immediate Release
March 1, 2022
Contacts:
Chris Smith, WildEarth Guardians, 505-395-6177, csmith@wildearthguardians.org
Mary Katherine Ray, Wildlife Chair, Rio Grande Chapter Sierra Club, 575-537-1095, mkrscrim@gmail.com
Kevin Bixby, Executive Director, Wildlife for All, 575-649-7260, kevin@wildlifeforall.us
Erik Schlenker-Goodrich, Western Environmental Law Center, 575-613-4197, eriksg@westernlaw.org
Game of Groans: Fossil fuel lobbyist appointed to New Mexico Game Commission. Wildlife advocates decry extractive industry’s disproportionate representation
SANTA FE, NM—Today, an oil and gas lobbyist appointed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham joined the New Mexico Game Commission. In a move that only intensifies the conservation community’s frustration towards the Commission and the Lujan Grisham administration, the governor selected a senior ExxonMobil employee, Deanna Archuleta, to serve on the public commission that oversees wildlife policy in the state. Archuleta previously worked for XTO Energy, a Texas-based fracking company.
The earth is currently undergoing a mass extinction event and biodiversity collapse largely driven by the climate crisis. Fossil fuel extraction and consumption is the largest contributor to climate change. And ExxonMobil is among the corporations that have covered up the impacts of fossil fuel burning, successfully lobbied against fossil fuel regulations, and delayed meaningful action to slow devastating global warming.
“This appointment is disappointing to conservationists and wildlife advocates who want to see New Mexico’s biodiversity protected in the face of the fossil fuel-caused climate crisis,” said Chris Smith, southwest wildlife advocate for WildEarth Guardians. “My only source of optimism is that Commissioner Archuleta might be able to undo or mitigate some of the monumental damages caused by her employer over the past decades.”
In addition to fueling the global climate crisis, oil and gas development in New Mexico, with an associated 60,000 oil and gas wells, has directly harmed state wildlife. Oil and gas extraction in the Permian Basin has fragmented the shinnery oak habitat of the lesser prairie chicken, a once-abundant grouse now awaiting listing under the federal Endangered Species Act. In 2017, a ruptured pipeline spilled 18,000 barrels of “produced water”—the toxic byproduct of fracking—into the Delaware River, wiping out a population of endangered native mussels called the Texas hornshell. ExxonMobil subsidiary XTO–Archuleta’s previous employer–operates 1,507 oil and gas wells in New Mexico and was recently fined by the New Mexico Oil Conservation Division for failure to comply with reporting and operating conditions at five underground injection wells in Eddy County.
“The highest duty of a member of the New Mexico Game Commission is to ensure that the state’s wildlife is protected as a public trust on behalf of all people, now and for future generations,” said Kevin Bixby, executive director of Wildlife for All. “It is hard to imagine that someone could fulfill this responsibility while working for an industry that is busy making the planet uninhabitable for all species, including humans.”
“This appointment is further evidence of the governor’s far-too-cozy relationship with oil and gas industry leadership,” said Erik Schlenker-Goodrich, executive director of the Western Environmental Law Center. “With a challenging November election looming where she very much needs to boost enthusiasm amongst conservation voters, I’d suggest her administration needs an immediate and rapid course correction to ensure that her number one priority is New Mexico, not the oil and gas industry. This decision to appoint ExxonMobil’s senior director of federal relations to the New Mexico Game and Fish Commission certainly does not constitute that course correction–it comes across as precisely the opposite.”
“How dispiriting that the governor has chosen a person to serve on the Game Commission with such a clear conflict of interest when it comes to wildlife conservation,” said Mary Katherine Ray, wildlife chair for the Sierra Club Rio Grande Chapter. “Moreover, this appointment represents such a lost opportunity to choose someone instead with the background and education to champion wildlife and conservation needs.”
Last April, after the sudden death of Commissioner David Soules, eight leading New Mexico wildlife groups and scientists sent a letter to Gov. Lujan Grisham recommending three highly qualified citizens to fill the conservation seat left empty by Soules’ tragic passing. The letter prompted no meaningful response and appears to have been effectively ignored.
Former Gov. Susana Martinez also installed oil and gas lobbyists and other extractive industry representatives on her Game Commission.
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Click HERE for more information on the issue
Kevin Bixby of Wildlife for All featured on Ahi Va podcast
Wildlife for All’s Executive Director, Kevin Bixby, and Andre Miller, Western Lands Policy Analyst for Western Resource Advocates talk with Jesse Duebel on the Ahi Va podcast about the greatest threats to wildlife and what a more robust funding model for conservation can do to mitigate those threats.
Opinion: Wildlife running for their lives
By Deborah Slicer.
This opinion piece talks about the ongoing wolf hunts around Yellowstone and the dysfunctionality of Montana’s wildlife management system. The article examines Montana’s Fish, Wildlife, and Parks commission, which primarily consists of campaign donors for the current governor, and whose interests represent the oil and gas industry, privatization of wildlife and public land, agriculture, and hunting. There are no seats for Tribal nations and no one representing the majority non-consumptive wildlife community.
This article can be read at the Missoulian.
Latest dismissal reveals need to reform Game Commission
By Kevin Bixby, Executive Director of Wildlife for All and Jesse Deubel, Executive Director of the New Mexico Wildlife Federation.
Following the governor’s latest dismissal of one of her appointed members, there are currently three empty seats on the 7-member New Mexico State Game Commission. This op-ed, published in the Albuquerque Journal, talks about the commission’s history, the dysfunctional way in which members are selected and how the commission operates, and explores the need to either abolish or reform the commission.
This article can be read at The Albuquerque Journal.
Experts propose new methods for managing Wisconsin wildlife
This radio story from Public News Service features Wildlife for All Executive Director Kevin Bixby and Board member Adrian Treves. This story covering the gray wolf relisting decision looks beyond the immediate ruling to the systemic problems with wildlife management today. It introduces the concept of the public trust doctrine as an alternative paradigm for wildlife governance, addresses the idea that commissions ought to be reformed, and raises the issue of financial dependency of wildlife agencies on license buyers.
You can read more at Public News Service.
Press Release: Gov. Inslee Listens to Wildlife Advocates, Fills Commission Seats with Individuals Who Take Their Public Trust Duties Seriously
For Immediate Release: January 25th, 2022
Wildlife for All commends Governor Jay Inslee for appointing three qualified Commissioners with substantial professional expertise in wildlife science and policy to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission. As in most states, the Commission sets wildlife policy for the state.
- Melanie Rowland is a retired environmental attorney, who spent 15 years as a senior attorney for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
- Dr. Tim Ragen is the retired director of the U.S. Marine Mammal Commission. He has a Ph.D., in oceanography.
- Dr. John Lehmkuhl is a lifelong hunter and angler and a retired research biologist with the U.S. Forest Service. He has a Ph.D. in forest science and an M.S. in wildlife ecology.
These appointments by Governor Inslee reflect Wildlife for All’s mission to reform wildlife management in the U.S. to be more ecologically-driven, democratic, and compassionate. On January 11th, 22 organizations from our coalition sent a letter to Governor Inslee urging him to immediately fill the vacant seats on the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission with individuals who “understand and value science, work for the environment, and are responsive to the broad public interest in wildlife.”
“Our wildlife and ecosystems cannot sustain the traditions of the past. Governor Inslee’s appointments are a breath of fresh air into a system that has long been dominated by privileged special interests. I am hopeful that Washington state will now be a strong leader in much-needed wildlife governance reform.” – Brenna Galdenzi, President of Protect Our Wildlife (VT)
“We applaud Governor Inslee for appointing Fish and Wildlife Commissioners with such superb backgrounds. We look forward to seeing these well-qualified candidates address the ongoing issues faced by the agency including bullying by some members of the Commission and Department management, illegal and unethical activity by Department staff, and the failure to make policy recommendations based on the best available science.” – Samantha Bruegger, Executive Director at Washington Wildlife First
“The extinction crisis is real. Wildlife everywhere is under threat. With these appointments, Governor Inslee has demonstrated that he takes the responsibility to protect Washington’s wildlife seriously.” – Kevin Bixby, Executive Director of Wildlife for All
By making these appointments, Governor Jay Inslee has shown that he is committed to protecting wildlife as a public trust in the state of Washington. We encourage other governors to follow his example and put people who value wildlife, democracy, and science in charge of state wildlife management.
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WA State Senate introduces several bills that aim to reform Fish and Wildlife Commission
Members of the Washington State Senate introduced several bills that would make changes to how and who selects the members who serve on the state Fish and Wildlife Commission. One bill would give authority to the Legislature to fill empty commission seats if the Gov doesn’t act within 12 months. The other bill would take away the power of the fish and wildlife commission to hire the Department director and give it to the elected State Lands Commissioner. It would also take away the power of the governor to appoint commissioners, and give it to the State Lands commissioner.
You can read more in the Peninsula Daily News.