Wildlife

The recent and controversial wolf-hunt announcements in Idaho, where officials plan to allow hunters to use electronic calls and traps, and the proposed doubling of the quota in Montana’s hunt are getting plenty of play throughout the Rockies.

But hunts in both states still await a decision by U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy in Montana.  He’ll be making a ruling this summer in the lawsuit brought by Defenders of Wildlife to restore wolves to endangered status in both states.

In t he meantime, Montana will start selling wolf tags on Aug. 23 with a quota of 186 wolves. Dates for Idaho have not been set.

With the number of wolves estimated at 835 in Idaho and 524 in Montana, wolf hunters and ranchers see greater opportunity to cull a threatening killer of livestock and Elk. Pro-wolf activists see those numbers as low and want wolves back on the Endangered Species Act.

The gulf between zero and 800 is wide, and there have been years of hot words exchanged between opponents.

column

Congress last had a pay cut in April 1933, during the worst of the Great Depression.

A bill to end that 77-year-long era, H.R. 4720, sponsored by Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Ariz. and co-sponsored by a bipartisan group of lawmakers was introduced in the House of Representatives in March.

If the bill becomes law, salaries for all senators and representatives would be cut by 5 percent, which would save $4.7 million, and block automatic increases in congressional salaries for 2011.

“The American people have had enough of Washington politicians refusing to live up to their responsibilities,” said Rep. Kirkpatrick. “If elected officials are going to say that this country is facing its most difficult economic times in generations, then they need to act like it.”

VILSACK TO MAKE ANNOUNCEMENT JULY 8

Updated July 7, 1 am: Baucus Continues to Support Open Fields.

Nobody ever accused the federal government of moving rapidly, even with congressionally mandated programs. And the long-ago approved new hunting access program called Open Fields is excellent testimony to that axiom.

After an extensive lobbying campaign by the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, Pheasants Forever, Ducks Unlimited and many other conservation groups, Congress included $50 million in the 2008 Farm Bill for Open Fields, a new, innovative program to help fund dwindling public access to private lands, perhaps the greatest threat to the sport of hunting in this country. 

Political Influence

The Western Governor’s Association meeting in Whitefish, Mont., ended Tuesday, with the near half-milllion dollar cost of the conference mostly paid for by sponsors that include corporations –British Petroleum among them --- as well as trade associations and other special interests.

The event included a “Sunset Train Ride” paid for by Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway but which was “not an official WGA sponsored event,” the agenda notes in small type. WGA chair Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer and the event’s communications director, Karen Dieke, spun the concept that taxpayers didn’t have to pay for the three-day meeting because of the generosity of sponsors.

But high levels of mistrust of politicians – and corporations like BP - shows we are not fooled by that sort of thing anymore.

State and national politics

Trap shooting and horse sense still move the Party of Obama in Idaho.  So does the need to protect public education and jobs. 

“We are taking the low road in education,” said Democrat Keith Allred, the party’s gubernatorial nominee. 

Allred, in western hat and boots and his 12-gauge shotgun in hand, blasted Republican incumbent Governor C. J. “Butch” Otter at last weekend’s state Democratic convention in Worley near Coeur d’Alene. 

At the party’s trap-shooting fundraiser, the candidate wove his personal story into support for Idaho schools. “Over the past 20 years we have decreased spending in education while increasing spending on prisons,” said Allred.  “If you look at surrounding states that have done well, the key has been investment in higher education.”

A Ph.D. from UCLA, Allred briefly taught government at Harvard’s Kennedy School. Boise State University’s John C. Freemuth, who taught college with Allred, describes the candidate as “centrist” with multigenerational Idaho roots. 

Column: Election 2010

The money horse in Idaho’s 1st Congressional District Republican primary, Vaughn Ward, needed pickup men in the ring when he lost to state representative Raul Labrador on Tuesday.

Ward had more money, more connections, and a head start on latecomer Labrador, but his suicide grip on the reins – a series of blunders and some obvious plagiarism – threw him off.

It was an undignified landing. After the polls closed, Jay Leno sent in the clowns by showing side-by-side video of Ward and President Obama delivering, it seems, the same speech. Only Obama delivered it first in 2004 at the Democratic National Convention.

Anyhow, it hadn’t been shaping up to be a good day for Ward when a national publication headlined, “Vaughn Ward: Worst Candidate Ever?”

internet technology

Following up on its statement from the first round of broadband stimulus funding, Idaho’s Department of Administration has filed an application for more than $6 million in federal funding to help develop the Idaho Education Network (IEN).

According to the application, the money will be used for 24 “anchor sites” in 15 rural communities, but the summary form of the application printed in the directory did not specify where these sites or communities were, but said that it would make broadband available to 5887 unserved households.

The wording is crucial.

Building a brand

A few years ago North Dakota erected some clever signs at its border with Montana. One sign advised anyone headed west to remember what happened to a certain long haired cavalry commander who left North Dakota in 1876 and ended up in a sorry state on the banks of the Little Big Horn in Montana.

With all due respect to North Dakota, given a choice, does Montana sound like a lot more interesting place - to visit, to live, to work?

George Custer didn’t live to contemplate what I think of, and many others think of, as the allure of Montana. It has always fascinated me that the land of the Big Sky has a certain “brand” that states like Idaho, Wyoming and Colorado - not to mention North Dakota - never seem able to match. Maybe its because Montana has been building the brand since that fateful day in June of 1876 when the tourist from North Dakota misjudged his welcoming committee.

I got to thinking about what the Montana “brand” means to the economics and, perhaps more importantly, the image of the state while reflecting on two recent pieces of information.

The first was a program at Boise’s City Club a while back that focused on the “creative economy,” often identified as the critical mass in an area of artists, cultural non-profits and cutting edge businesses. Amoung the laments before the City Club was that 30-to 45-year olds are in danger of - or actually are - picking up and leaving Idaho, while an emphasis on developing home-grown entrepreneurs is waning.

Fee Repeal and Expanded Access Act

Now, it’s four out of four in Idaho and Montana.

On Friday, Senator Jim Risch (R-ID) joined Senator Mike Crapo (R-ID) and Montana’s Senators Max Baucus and Jon Tester, both Democrats, in co-sponsoring S. 868, the Fee Repeal and Expanded Access Act, which would repeal most provisions of the Federal Lands Recreational Enhancement Act (FLREA), the law federal agencies use to charge fees for accessing public lands.

Guest Opinion: Wolves

Recently concluded public wolf-hunting seasons along with federal predator-control killings resulted in the shootings of over 500 gray wolves in Montana and Idaho, leaving the combined wolf population in those two states and Wyoming at around 1,700 animals, close to what it was last year.  Under state management future wolf mortality can be expected to climb significantly unless last April’s removal of wolves from the endangered species list is overturned in federal court and federal protections are restored.

According to the wolf delisting rule that was promulgated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and is challenged in court by the Center for Biological Diversity and other conservation organizations represented by Earthjustice, the states of Idaho and Montana may reduce wolf numbers to 100-150 individual animals in each state.  Idaho has been particularly adamant that it intends to drive wolf numbers as low as possible.  Montana’s open-ended authorization of predator-control actions will subject wolves to almost unlimited persecution.  Wyoming’s wolves, also subject to federal killing, are still on the endangered species list and thus not yet publicly hunted – but when delisting finally occurs in Wyoming, it too will be authorized to eliminate all but 100-150 wolves.