SB 160-DNR: HUNTING GUIDES, CONCESSION PROGRAM
3:31:24 PM
CHAIR GIESSEL announced SB 160 to be up for
consideration. She said the committee had received
letters both of support and opposition to it.
3:31:30 PM
CHAD HUTCHISON, staff to Senator John Coghill, Alaska
State Legislature, Juneau, Alaska, said there were
compelling reasons to pass SB 160. It's good for the
resource and the resident hunters and, to a certain
extent, it stops BLM and the federal government from
filling the void if the state does not act.
3:32:33 PM
CLARK COX, Natural Resource Manager, Division of
Mining, Land and Water, Department of Natural Resources
(DNR), Anchorage, Alaska, said he had been involved
with this program since 2007 and that issuing land use
and commercial recreation permits is one of those
commercial use activities that they authorize and it's
their primary interaction with the big game guides.
MR. COX said they had heard a lot about how both boards
regulate the industry and it's important to note that
they both support development of the guide concession
program (GCP). He said the Board of Game can deal with
conflicts and issues as they relate to wildlife, but
it's difficult for them to deal with land use issues
and overcrowding. It can affect the number of hunters
in the field by reducing the overall hunting
opportunity but not by regulating spacial distribution;
only the DNR can do that.
He said the Big Game Commercial Services Board has
rules in statute limiting and regulating guides and
where they register, and any changes would have to be
done through legislative action.
3:34:19 PM
He touched on a couple of the primary comments the
committee had heard, the first being about how new guys
can get into the industry. He explained that the
primary difference between the full and the limited
concessions is the number of employees that each one
could employ. The full concession holders are allowed
to employ up to six assistant guides and the limited
are allowed to employ only one assistant guide. This
allows for the selected full concession holders to
offer more hunts, employ more staff, and operate a
larger business while the limited concessioners run
fewer hunts and smaller operations, and this gives them
a chance to be able to compete for a full concession at
some point in the future by gaining experience in an
area.
3:35:23 PM
MR. COX said another common comment they had heard was
about transferability, and they do understand the
desire to be able to sell and transfer these areas, but
the Owsichek decision made it very clear that that was
one of the primary faults of the prior system. The
common use clause in the Alaska Constitution also makes
that "a pretty steep hurdle to climb."
They heard a lot about how a GCP will or will not
benefit the Alaska resident hunter. It is designed to
benefit hunters by reducing the number of big game
guides in the more controversial areas, thus reducing
conflicts in the field, and increasing the quality of
the hunting opportunity and wildlife conservation.
Additionally, the whole concession concept is based on
the competitive nature of the applicants who will be
scored on a number of factors, including their history
of user conflicts and their strategies to avoid future
conflicts. The GCP seeks to award concessions to those
guides with cleaner histories in the field and in the
court room.
3:36:36 PM
He said they also heard that problems are only in
certain "hot" areas, and they agree. They talked about
addressing this by staggering areas so as to not impact
the whole state at once, but then they realized that
just dealing with small areas would push unselected
guides into other outlying areas and create problems
there.
They have heard from the very outset about transporters
and believe this group can be addressed after
conducting further research and evaluation with them.
They heard that implementing this program would reduce
the number of guides by 50 or 60 percent, so he
provided a graph showing the number of guides who
actually ran a hunt and the number of available
opportunities there would be should this program exist.
In addition, 44 million acres of private land in Alaska
is available to use.
MR. COX said they also heard that the application
process was simply a test for guides to hire someone to
prepare a fancy application to win an area, but DNR
wants the operation plan and commitments made therein
to be incorporated into the authorization that will be
evaluated annually to assure that concession holders
are operating consistent with the terms they were
granted.
In closing, Mr. Cox said, they heard from many parties,
both in support and not, that problems exist in the
guiding industry and in the field and that those issues
need to be addressed. This program would be an
additional tool for DNR, the Board of Game, and the Big
Game Commercial Services Board to use to address
industry issues. The mission of the program is to
encourage land stewardship, support wildlife
conservation, and to promote a healthy guiding industry
for the benefit of the people of Alaska. He said this
is their first crack at developing a program like this
and they are remaining flexible to make changes to it.
CHAIR GIESSEL said she was waiting for a quorum and set
SB 160 aside.
3:40:20 PM
At ease from 3:40:20 to 3:40:27 p.m.
3:40:27 PM
SENATOR MICCICHE joined the committee.
SENATOR DYSON moved SB 160, version 28-LS1399\A, from
committee to the next committee of referral with
attached fiscal notes and individual recommendations.
There were no objections and it was so ordered.