Smelly State Budget Tidings Wash Into WDFW’s North Of Falcon Salmon Forecast Reveal

There was a stomach-upsetting moment early on during yesterday’s North of Falcon salmon forecast reveal in Olympia.

Before any of this year’s decent to record Chinook, coho, sockeye, pink and chum predictions could be detailed, WDFW Fish Program Director Kelly Cunningham stepped to the podium and warned the gathered anglers that his agency was looking at some “pretty significant reductions” in its budget and, unlike past seasons where resources have been set aside for it, that might affect the ability to monitor salmon fisheries held over constraining stocks.

A constraining stock is typically a poorer-performing component of a wider Endangered Species Act-listed population that requires extra creel sampling, test fishing and/or enforcement to ensure that agreed-upon impact limits aren’t exceeded during fisheries held on them or for more abundant species swimming in the same waters.

As alarming as Cunningham’s words were, they were not altogether unexpected for close watchers of Washington’s current fiscal situation. Thursday, Governor Bob Ferguson announced a plan to narrow a projected $15-plus billion budget shortfall through $4 billion in cuts, including $21.5 million at WDFW.

But a subtle tempering could also be heard from Cunningham, and that flowed out of a Thursday all-staff memo from WDFW Director Kelly Susewind that reminded biologists, game wardens, managers and others, “The recommendations the governor announced today are not final decisions.“

The bolding is in Susewind’s original message, and it serves to underline the fact that at this point nothing is really set in stone. The legislature could disregard the governor’s thoughts as they attempt to produce a balanced budget later this spring.

“My comments were meant to let people know that there is a lot of uncertainty right now,” Cunningham explained in an email Saturday morning. “In the past few years we’ve been able to expand some fisheries with additional monitoring. Given the uncertainty in where we land on the agency budget, I’m worried about being able to do that this year.”

BUT AT THE VERY LEAST, Ferguson’s plan shows what may be on the table for salmon anglers as well as Washington hunters and other sportsmen this legislative session, and not just in terms of the proposed license fee increase I’ve been covering.

The potential hit list includes:

• $1.3 million reduction for Columbia River fisheries monitoring and enforcement.

“That monitoring is tied to the Endangered Species Act and the terms and conditions of multiple NOAA biological opinions, allowing for recreational fisheries,” Susewind stated.

According to Ferguson’s plan, the state General Fund has been footing that bill since the $8.75 Columbia endorsement sunsetted back in 2019.

• $4.5 million reduction for WDFW hatchery operations and administration.

In response to questions at North of Falcon yesterday, Cunningham said the possible cuts were not very well defined by the governor’s plan but at the very least would shelter salmon production meant to help feed southern resident killer whales – the prey increase program that both the state and feds operate and fund. (It released a combined 19 million hatchery-marked Chinook and other salmon in 2022.)

Susewind’s memo didn’t offer much more detail on the matter either, except that it “would mean reducing or ceasing hatchery production, at multiple hatcheries … indefinitely.” 

Hatcheries power a significant portion of Washington’s consumptive fisheries and, as you might expect, they consume a significant portion of WDFW’s budget, so they’re always going to be under threat when money becomes tighter – even as they provide vast and widespread economic benefits to the state. In the 2021-23 budget biennium, 23 percent of the agency’s operating budget went to hatcheries – $116 million to produce salmon and steelhead, $40.9 million to produce trout and spinyray species, and $13.6 million on hatchery infrastructure, an agency one-page outline shows.

Along with that reduction, $210,000 would also be cut from former Governor Jay Inslee’s proposed funding for a Kitsap Peninsula summer chum conservation hatchery.

• $1.8 million reduction in General Fund dollars “provided to subsidize licensed fishing and hunting activities.”

That line item is not very well defined in the governor’s spending plan either, but according to Susewind, “would impact hatchery production and recreational opportunities for hunters and anglers.” 

• $320,000 reduction in General Fund support for the Western Washington pheasant program.

This one “would mean closing our own pheasant production facility and severely reducing or eliminating pheasant hunting in Western Washington, beginning in July 2026,” Susewind warned.

There is little if any natural pheasant production anymore on the rainy side of the Cascades, and so hunters rely on birds raised at WDFW’s Bob Oke pheasant farm near Centralia and stocked at various release sites such as Vancouver Lake, JBLM, Cherry Valley, Lake Terrell and other wildlife areas or open private lands. To hunt them requires a special Western Washington ringneck license ($84.50).

The list of cuts in the governor’s budget plan goes on, and again, who knows what gets axed or partially whacked in the end, but at the very least, the proposals reflect a mix of those WDFW identified in a budget exercise and new ones from Ferguson’s office the agency hadn’t seen before, the director told his staff.

“The governor’s initial goal was to generate cut options for the legislature before considering new revenue,” Susewind wrote in his memo. “However, even when combined with the other agency cuts, these do not add up to a complete solution to the state’s deficit. A ‘no new revenue’ budget would include more drastic cuts than the governor’s list.”

WHILE THE GOVERNOR’S BEING COY about raising taxes to cover the forecasted multi-billion-dollar deficit until spending cuts are made first, in the meanwhile, lawmakers are mulling a fishing and hunting license increase of a whopping 38 percent for most sportsmen. That bill, SSB 5583, was moved out of the Senate Ways and Means Committee Thursday on a 15-9 do pass/do not pass recommendation.

It would be the first license increase since 2011 and would raise $19.3 million every two years, though a fiscal note attached to the bill states it would probably also lead to an 11 percent dropoff in license sales and an estimated $350,000 decline in disbursements from the partially license-tied federal Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson Act disbursements.

As a reminder, Washington fishing and hunting license dollars go into the State Wildlife Account for fish and wildlife management activities. Due to state and federal statutes related to the PR and DJ Acts, they cannot be diverted into the General Fund. In the recent past, license sales and the acts have provided about a third of WDFW’s budget; after a significant biodiversity funding boost two years ago, the state General Fund provided 45 percent of the agency’s budget in the 2023-25 biennium.

While a license fee hike of 38 percent might be justified given that the costs of fish food and just about everything else has gone up since 2011, it’s also a lot all at once and might be better spread out over several years if it comes to pass. A state lawmaker I’m not, however.

But speaking of, legislators are also considering resurrecting the Columbia endorsement via HB 2003 for monitoring and more. It passed out of the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday on a 19-12 do pass/do not pass recommendation. It would provide funds to hold and monitor salmon and steelhead fisheries on the big river.

Both fee bills have been sent to the Rules Committees for second reading. The fees must past both chambers of the legislature and be signed by the governor to become law. License hikes would go into effect July 1; the endorsement would return next January 1.

As it stands, Cunningham said that WDFW’s legislative liaison would be touching base with state representatives and senators to talk about the importance of hatcheries and fishery monitoring as they write the budget.

That was echoed in Susewind’s memo.

“We have been working with the legislature to answer questions about potential cut options as well as possible new revenue. There are a couple bills related to our recreational fees and the Discover Pass that may offset some of the reductions if they were to pass. We’ll see the first versions of a balanced four-year budget come out in late March after the revenue forecast,” he wrote.

MOST OF FRIDAY’S DISCUSSION at North of Falcon, of course, was focused on the always interesting breakdown of environmental factors affecting Northwest salmon returns based on data from NMFS (“a lot of work that benefits us,” noted a WDFW staffer), actual run forecasts and how they compare to past years (potential record pink returns in Hood Canal and sockeye to Baker Lake), and initial thoughts on constraining stocks (the usual North Sound wild Chinook runs; Hood Canal coho).

But mixed in with anglers’ questions and comments was one suggestion for addressing how to maintain monitoring in fisheries held over constraining stocks: making more use of WDFW’s Voluntary Trip Report program.

In it, anglers record their Chinook and coho catches during hatchery-directed fisheries and then either relay it to a sampler back at the ramp or email it to an agency address that same day. It’s an idea, though there is hesitance among some fishermen to share that kind of info for fear it might lead to faster season shutdowns. The alternative might be to get shut out if the money for monitoring certain fisheries isn’t found.

Budget issues weren’t the only thing on Cunningham’s mind yesterday at North of Falcon. He noted that there had been staffing changes in WDFW’s intergovernmental salmon management team since last year’s edition of NOF and that the agency would not be able to be as nimble or able to work as fast with anglers on fishery proposals, crunching numbers and more during this year’s season-setting process.

He vowed to get the work done, but said it could cause frustration in the coming weeks.

What state lawmakers do or don’t do with the budget and fee bills could also cause frustration in the coming weeks, months and years.

Editor’s note: For more details on the salmon forecasts, see Mark Yuasa’s comprehensive writeup over on The Outdoor Line.