‘Thanks’; ‘Pleasantly Surprised’ – More Reaction To WDFW Commission Appointments

The reviews continue to roll in on yesterday’s pleasing appointments to the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.

“Thanks to Gov. Ferguson and his team for doing the right thing to keep fishers from having to sit on the banks and watch the fish swim by,” tweeted Northwest Treaty Tribes, the news service of the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission, just before noon. “#treatyrights #salmonrecovery“

Ferguson reappointed Jim Anderson, the retired NWIFC executive director and a longtime hunter and angler, to the commission, as well as brought Douglas County rancher and former federal biologist Molly Linville back on board, and seated Anacortes school teacher/Alaska commercial fisherman Victor Garcia on the citizen panel that oversees WDFW policies. Their terms began April 5 and all run through December 31, 2030.

“The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation is very pleasantly surprised by Governor Ferguson’s re-appointments of Fish and Wildlife Commissioners Jim Anderson and Molly Linville, and we are optimistic that new Commissioner Victor Garcia will prove to be a reasonable and balanced presence on the commission,” stated Ryan Bronson, RMEF director of government affairs.

Bronson added that “thousands” of the venerable conservation organization’s members had expressed frustration as “former Governor Inslee appointed activists beholden to a radical agenda that ignores and undercuts the professional wildlife managers at WDFW. Governor Ferguson’s appointments are a positive first step in getting wildlife policy in Washington back on the rails, but we all have a lot of work left to do.”

In a pair of “midnight appointments” just days before the end of his third and final term, Inslee reappointed Tim Ragen of Anacortes and appointed Lynn O’Connor of Ferry County to the commission, an attempt to cement a preservationist/reformist bent to the body and which I’ve been covering voluminously for several years now.

But in early February and with the support of the state Senate, Ferguson rescinded those nominations. Ferguson then launched an in-depth vetting process, “utilizing a diverse interview panel to evaluate all of the 14 eligible individuals who applied for the commission over the past year,” a vast improvement on Inslee’s suspect searches, before announcing Monday that Anderson, Linville and Garcia had received the nod.

For former Commissioner Kim Thorburn of Spokane, Monday’s appointments confirmed Ferguson was taking the joint UW-WSU Ruckelshaus Center’s study findings on fish and wildlife governance dysfunction “very seriously.”

“Molly and Jim have a long track record of respect for both staff expertise and diverse stakeholder community values in their decision making. I am very encouraged that the governor is demonstrating such an interest in improving the governance of Washington’s outstanding wildlife management,” Thorburn said.

Ironically, the Ruckelshaus report was part of fish and wildlife reformists’ bid to steer the commission and WDFW away from its traditional moorings and/or turn the agency into a cabinet agency under the governor’s thumb. But now that effort and the Conservation Policy are symbols of bridges stretched too far, too fast, and without regard for integral partners in critter and habitat management.

Last week, with Ferguson’s appointments poised to come down, one of the lead authors of the Conservation Policy, Chair Barbara Baker, twice spoke about it in the past tense (though she also talked about rebranding it as an “ecosystem management” policy). Since its September 2021 public surfacing, there had been pushback to the Conservation Policy from sportsmen and – more effectively – a number of tribes around the state, culminating in its sudden backburnering in January 2024, a lesson that still has not been taken to heart by some on the commission, if comments at last week’s meetings were any indication.

Today, in a WDFW press release, Baker stated that she was “pleased” to see Linville and Anderson back on the commission and said she was “excited for the new perspective that new membership brings.” She added that she looked forward to working together on the conservation of the state’s fish and wildlife.

The Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation was also among the organization’s heralding the governor’s “careful and thoughtful consideration of WDFW Commission candidates, along with his willingness to consult a wide variety of constituent groups during the process.”

“The Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation is looking forward to meeting Commissioner Garcia and continuing our work with Commissioners Anderson and Linville,” said Marie Neumiller, CSF’s Spokane-based Northwestern States assistant manager. “These appointments represent a significant step forward for the WDFW Commission, reinforcing its dedication to the North American Model of Wildlife Management.”

Ron Garner, state board president of Puget Sound Anglers, gave “special thanks” to a pro-hatchery coalition comprised of the Lummi Nation, Tulalip Tribes, Upper Skagit Tribe and Squaxin Island Tribe and PSA and the Ilwaco Charterboat Association, as well as NWIFC for working to retain Anderson and bring back Linville.

Former protagonists, sport anglers and tribes had long been moving toward common goals, but an unexpected side effect of fish and wildlife reformists’ work in Washington was to accelerate that, which I wrote about on the 50th anniversary of the Boldt Decision.

Garner was also quick to thank Senator Mike Chapman (D-Port Angeles), the Senate, and Governor Ferguson. “His office was great to work with on this, and so was Senator Chapman! A huge win for Washington State!”

It can be said that serving on the commission is essentially a full-time job, and Commissioner Linville is now back up to two of ’em. Working on her and her husband’s 6,000-acre cattle ranch in lower Moses Coulee yesterday, she got a large boulder stuck in the bucket of her backhoe. Rather than try and whack it out of there and possibly damage expensive equipment, she just swapped buckets.

“I have lived rurally my entire life, mostly in Lincoln and Douglas Counties in Washington State. The rural and agricultural communities in Washington make up a small portion of the state’s population yet house a disproportionately large portion of the flora and fish and wildlife populations in the state’s trust. I am thrilled and honored to be asked by Governor Ferguson to help keep this important voice at the table. I strongly believe in private and public entities working together to ensure there is enough intact habitat to maintain functional and vibrant wildlife populations into the future,” Linville said.

“I’m also excited to continue my personal understanding of the needs of the urban population around fish and wildlife in a thoughtful and respectful way. This state is amazing! I’m ready to get to work in a collaborative way to do my level best to meet the needs of all the critters with a heart beat (two-legged or four-legged), everything that photosynthesizes and the all-important soil biome that supports it all. That should be pretty easy, right?”

Nobody knows better that that won’t be easy whatsoever, but it is critical and vital work.

Best of luck, all.