A controversial proposal that could help Wyoming landowners make money from elk, deer and pronghorn that use their property has passed muster with a legislative committee and will be up for debate when lawmakers convene February in Cheyenne, WY.
At issue are reforms that would make Wyoming’s landowner licenses “transferable,” or able to be sold. Landowner licenses, which date to 1949 in Wyoming, are special hunting tags awarded for elk, deer and pronghorn if property owners possess at least 160 acres and can demonstrate certain thresholds of animal use.
Some other western states have already made landowner licenses transferable to varying degrees. The change has led to non-residents paying top dollar for the hunt of their choice, at the expense of diminished opportunities for locals. The website Huntin’ Fool, for example, is currently marketing a $30,000 Nevada elk hunt alongside a $12,000 Colorado mule deer hunt.
There have been previous efforts to follow suit in Wyoming, including during the last legislative session. Sen. Laura Pearson, a Kemmerer Republican, brought but then withdrew a bill that she hoped would create a new revenue stream for ranchers. In early November, she helped talk the balance of the Joint Agriculture, State and Public Lands & Water Resources Committee into sponsoring a similar proposal, arguing the bill would allow landowners to generate “a small but meaningful income stream to help offset the costs of supporting wildlife.”
The proposition of making Wyoming landowner licenses sellable has been met with stiff resistance from public hunters each time it’s come up.
In 2022, the Wyoming Wildlife Taskforce took on the issue, aiming to address what one member described as “outright abuses,” including landowners subdividing property to acquire more tags. No changes were agreed to then. Related reforms considered by the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission were also unpopular with landowners and pulled back. Attempts at making some landowner licenses transferable, meanwhile, have met overwhelming public opposition since at least 1998.
“Those were some of the most contentious meetings that we had in the last 25 years, when we started talking about landowner licenses,” Wyoming Game and Fish Department Chief Warden Dan Smith told members of the Agriculture Committee. “When they presented that idea, they got over 2,100 comments from the public that were adamantly opposed to having transferable licenses.”
Judging by some recent public comments, sentiments haven’t changed much.
Sabrina King, a lobbyist for the Wyoming chapter of Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, asked members of the committee what public hunters stood to gain from the proposal. In Wyoming’s complicated hunting license lottery system, landowner tags are distributed first, leaving rank-and-file sportspeople vying for a diminished pool of opportunities.
“There is nothing about creating this kind of a program, the way this bill is written, that generates good feelings between hunters and private landowners,” King told the committee. “This is not a solution. This is going to create a pay-for-play system that is going to hurt the public hunter.”
Game and Fish Director Angi Bruce also expressed concern that creating a private market for Wyoming licenses could diminish opportunities and hurt hunter recruitment. Currently, many landowners don’t hunt, she said, and therefore don’t apply for a landowners license—about 3,600 are issued annually.
“We anticipate that number going up,” Bruce said. “If they are able to transfer or sell a hunting license, we think that there will be more interest.”
Lawmakers also heard testimony from landowners eager to sell licenses.
Jason Thornock, who farms in the Cokeville area, complained about elk and deer numbers on his land, which he claimed eat $60,000 in alfalfa each year. He called landowner coupons that yield him cash for hunter-killed animals on his land “an insult” and the state’s damage program “a joke.”
“If you allow us to transfer these tags and get some compensation for them, yeah, use is going to go up,” Thornock said. “But so what? Let me get something out of that $60,000 that I’m putting into the wildlife.”
Members of the Agriculture committee voted seven to five to sponsor the bill.
Ayes included Pearson, Cowley Republican Rep. Dalton Banks, Cheyenne Republican Rep. Steve Johnson, Riverton Republican Rep. Pepper Ottman, Douglas Republican Rep. Tomi Strock, Thermopolis Republican Rep. John Winter and Casper Republican Sen. Bob Ide.
Opposing were Buffalo Republican Sen. Barry Crago, Cheyenne Republican Sen. Taft Love, La Barge Republican Rep. Mike Schmid, Baggs Republican Rep. Bob Davis and Laramie Democrat Rep. Karlee Provenza.
Lawmakers will also consider two other competing bills—one from the Agriculture Committee, another from the Travel, Recreation, Wildlife and Cultural Resources Committee—that concern caps on landowner licenses. Currently, Game and Fish doesn’t have the statutory authority to impose a cap. — Mike Koshmrl, WyoFile
Republished from WyoFile.
