Hunters, Predators, & Technology in Idaho with Nick Fasciano

0:00Nick Fashiano, God bless it, sir. How are you? Good, man. How you doing? Good. I have to tell you, um, the double interview that I was able to do with your help with Idaho fishing game. One, not only did I love it, but it actually helped me set up a different format for, um, for having two people on at once. And a lot of people want to do that. I've been very skeptical of it, but because of that interview, I was like, okay, okay, it was 80% of the way there. I know what I need to tweak, but man, you might have opened like a whole new world. It was great. You did a great, and it was the, it looked great. Jacob and Sierra are brilliant. They were great putting in experts and putting experts in front of a camera and letting them talk about the work that they do. Oh, fantastic. It can be fantastic. Yeah, man. It was a good time. Um, you are again, the executive director of Idaho Wildlife Federation. God bless you, sir. Yes, I am. You are kind of an umbrella organization that helps bring together and align priorities for a lot of different conservation

1:00and, um, you know, preservation, you know, not, not, not, not preservation. Yes, conservation sport groups. There it is. Um, hit me with a legislative update. Obviously, I had Tal Samson on from the Hat Committee twice. Do that guy drove out from Poca Tella twice? Yeah. And I was like, dude, and he came out with his buddy Gary, who's also awesome and apparently Gary's dad, yeah, was like huge in the, or conservation. And anyway, oh, yeah, really, really appreciate those guys. I also just had Tom Snyder on from stuck in the rut up, up north, and he, he has to be in town for stuff. So he very kindly agreed to come on. He's, and his concern was very much with the Hat Committee, you know, wolves and things of that nature, because they're very, you know, he works really hard on predator management up there. Um, you know, so there's that going on right now. But there are other things as well. I know that one's kind of sucked the oxygen out of the room for the legislative session, but talking to me about kind of legislation, this, uh, at this time with, uh, with fishing game. Yeah. Sure. It's, it's, it's been

2:01spicy. So I mean, from, so, so I mean, a lot of my job is spent trying to understand what the sporting community feels about any issue that's going on the legislature and then helping to try and reflect that, right? And sportsmen by our nature are a very opinionated, not unanimous perspective, right? I mean, there's, there's a lot of different opinions that go on. I mean, the Hat Committee is a, is a great example, right? I think, and, and I try and parse it out to, to some degree, like, fishing game on, on that Hat Committee, due to very good job, getting sports and perspectives, you know, getting 23 sportsmen to agree on the color of the room is hard, let alone, you know, on, on technology regulations that we need to implement. Sure. There's broad agreement that we are going to have to have a serious conversation about technology in our hunting seasons. And if we want to maintain the opportunity that we've got, right? There's the trade-off between success and opportunity that as technology gets better, success rates go up, opportunity eventually goes down, right? There's fair chase considerations. There's also you want to make sure that hunting doesn't become, um, where the people with,

3:01who can afford better technology are more successful than just the average, you know, John Keywell, right? So there's broad consensus around that. There's some concern from some folks on, sort of when the Hat Committee made its original recommendations, it was for ungulates only, eventually got changed to all big game, which includes wolves. You know, everyone wants to make sure that we can, we have all the management tools we need to get down to the target population of around 500 wolves that fishing game is targeting. Predator management's very hard wolves are extremely hard to hunt, you know, right now we have a, sort of a gap in trapping, because of an injunction from the legal side over the threat of grizzly bear bycatch. So people have strong feelings about this. I mean, like, from the data perspective, it doesn't look like that little, the little 77 day gap where you wouldn't be able to utilize that technology in, uh, in the pursuit of wolves. This is thermals. This is transmitting trail cameras, drones, et cetera. And may I ask a question? Yeah. Uh, the concern over grizzly bear bycatching you said. Mm hmm. That was essentially, hey, we're worried that you're going to set up these traps for wolves and like grizzly bear cubs are accidentally going to get trapped in a

4:04stumble into one. Yeah. But there was never any evidence of that happening, right? That was like a hypothetical concern. It has never happened in a legally placed wolf trap. No, but okay, we've still lost wolf trapping in about half the state and about 80% of the wolf habitat. So it's causing a real problem. So this is, this is, this is where a lot of the, the friction lies. Grizzly bear is a different conversation too. Yeah, it overlays, but yeah, it's similar. So, yeah. So that created a lot of the tension around the rules. Um, and it got heard in committee on, um, this past week in Senate resources, Tal and a lot of other folks drove up to say, like, listen, we understand the, the, there haven't been that many wolves taken with these technologies. I think only seven wolves over the period of, you know, that they, that they measured several, several years. And so we need to maintain, or we, we cannot be the last state standing where we allow thermals and transmitting trail cameras and hunting elk and deer, right? This is, it's clearly a fair chase violation. So it's not perfect. But if the, if the rule went

5:07through, then the commission can iterate. And if we need to back it off from, from the wolf perspective, we can't, we had a bill go through this year or it's going through that would allow transmitting trail cameras over wolf traps, for example, making trapping more accessible. So there's, there's ways to tweak this. Um, but yeah, so it got heard in, in committee, ultimately held at the call of the chair, which basically means like they didn't officially take a decision. And so it'll now be heard on the house resources side. And we'll see what happens there. But kudos to all the sportsmen who drove out, sportsmen of women who drove out to, to give testimony on that. People put a lot of effort into these rules. Um, I think we'll get there where we end up having, you know, just some of these more advanced technologies, ultimate, ultimately, you know, not included in fair chase hunts. Um, but the wolf considerations one that's just being ironed out. When, when you have a fair chase violation, who determines the violation? Is it the state or is there a federal body? There's not a federal body. So like the Boon and Crocket Club, you know, came around to basically the idea, but basically if, if an animal cannot utilize its senses to detect

6:11that you are there, right? And the animal doesn't have a reasonable chance of escaping. That's not fair chase, right? It might be ethical, right? I mean, if you could, you could, you know, if you had satellite that could tell you exactly where an animal is and you get a perfect headshot on it, I mean, that might be ethical. He lights out and they don't even know. Sure, but it's not a fair chase, huh? Right? So, so fair chase ethics are very variable. Fair chase is more, um, more clear cut. Okay. Yeah. So for fair chase, then, is there, you shared a story from years ago when you went out and harvested an animal that was trapped in a frozen lake? Yeah. We're like, listen, the ant first off, the animal's going to die. Yes. Right? Like it's suffering. And you've got to go, you got to strip down your skibbies, break through the ice. You almost died because it's freezing. Yeah. Right. So like, you engaged in something like that. But the question was like, you had to engage in a lot of, of, of, you know, kind of philosophical musing. Yes. If you work quickly and figure out like, okay, is this writer is it wrong? Yes. Say somebody determines like, is,

7:11is fair chase like a legal terminology in a framework where somebody can be like, hey, like, is fishing game going to give like a fair chase violation ever? Or is fair chase just kind of a principle that is, is loosely observed and to be honored by countries and fishers? I mean, it's a sportsman ethic. Okay. There's no, there's no clear cut rule you can put in place that says this, you know, no one's, you're never going to get a ticket from a CEO saying fair chase violation, right? But the rules that we have in place reflect that ethic. So when people are, when Tal is essentially saying, hey, man, this is like, people don't think this is fair chase, right? And that's people largely hunters. And then also, uh, civilians, there's a, you know, like non hunter, the non hunter population, because by the way, they, this fishing game, these animals belong to them as well, right? Yes. So it's like, okay, yeah, but that's just like your opinion, man, right? Straight out of the big Lebowski. Yeah, for sure. So it's not really something that was like, yeah, Idaho could stay the last man standing and we could have things that offend people sense of fair chase all day long. There's no legal ramification. No, I mean,

8:16again, there's the, there's that trade up between what's ethics and what's fair chase, right? Somebody can think that something's ethical because that it's a clean harvest. They're, they're able to get the meat. But the, you can overstep the line of fair chase and everyone kind of knows where that is. So yeah, but it doesn't even matter though. If it's not, no, I mean, legally, no. Right. So I mean, I could be the sleasiest, lamest hunter ever. And it's like, all right, but like, that's just your opinion. Like, I don't agree with you and I don't care. Right. But again, if the animal cannot utilize its natural senses to evade you and doesn't have a fair chase of getting away, then by and large, people are going to pick up on that. You know, we've been doing this for a very long time. Technology has never been evolving this quickly. But we as hunters who we are a minority and we thankfully, there's a lot of us in Idaho. But part of what gives us the support of the public is the fair chase ethic that we hold ourselves to. And we do need the support of the public to be able to continue on our lifestyle long term. Yeah. So holding ourselves to a reasonably high standard is important. Yeah.

9:19And most hunters will acknowledge and agree with that, right? There's, there's, there's arguments at the margins. So there's it seems that this is kind of a similar policy. There's a problem with labor in the country. Sure. Okay. Right. Legal labor, illegal labor, totally fine. The problem with writing a rule to resolve it is a second, you say something about AG, the construction industry is like, hey, hey, we need help too. The second, you say something about construction, hospitality is like, hey, man, we need help too. So once you and then each of these industries have different considerations and different needs. So then all of a sudden, you're writing a bill for like these three different people and they're like, if they're getting this, we want this and blah, blah, blah, blah, back and forth, right? It seems like that's one of the problems that has kind of pushed this sideways, which is originally it was this very specific scope of ungulates. And now it's all big game, which also includes predators that are very difficult to manage in the state and are also attributed with with causing a large decline in

10:22certain areas of big game. So it's like, you have this big conflict with if you had just kept it here, perhaps, maybe it would have been okay. Maybe who knows? But the fact that now it's this entire umbrella over all these things and you have these competing forces, now it seems less favorable. Yeah. And again, hundreds of opinionated folk, you know, were it way managing and restrictions on our seasons is never going to be an easy thing to push through, right? I do think that fishing game did as good a job as you can expect a state agency to do through the majority of the process, right? We do have this, this wrinkle to iron out. I do think most of it's going to get done though. I think that the service that the hat members put in was excellent. I think the ability to come to something close to consensus is something close to a miracle when it comes to sportsmen and women. So, but and it clearly needs to happen. We need to have a conversation about technology. I think we're going to get there. You might not get to this session, but we're going to get there. Do you, and again, I know that we're not just talking about heck to me, but one more question regarding it. Somebody, I think it was Tom this morning, was bringing up raining back on the

11:25actual seasons. Now, again, Tal, Tal, I think it mentioned this specifically that if given the decision between restricting technology or shortening the season, I believe he said 90% of people responded. So it's not all people, but 90% said, no, no, restrict the technology. Keep the season longer. Yeah. Other people have have said, yeah, but like in Utah or some places, they've they've restricted the seasons and they've gotten, you know, better numbers, but the season is like five days or something. What do you, what do you think about that tool? By and large Idaho Hunters have repeatedly said we want opportunity, right? The ability, like I can, I can archery hunt elk every year in my unit from the end of August, August 30th, basically to the end of September, right? It is an incredible blessing to be able to do that. The more, the more you tighten that up, I mean, if you asked someone, okay, would you like to be able to use a thermal optic, then it was a yeah, right? Even just forgetting fair chase questions. If you say, would you like to be able to use a thermal optic, if it means we're going to have to cut the seasons in half or

12:26cut them in half earlier than we would have or go to controlling cap zones, the answers all change, right? We want the ability to hunt every year, right? It is, there's not many places where you can do that. It is enormous blessing in Idaho to be able to. So yes, by and large, Idaho Hunters won opportunity. And so keeping keeping that and you're getting more and more resident hunters, there's more, there's more pressure on the resource, you know, figuring out how to do that. One of the only levers to pull is to help lower success rates, which is largely technologically based. Can I ask you, I don't understand why this is a thing. Why don't they just increase the cost for out of state residents, for the non-residents, right? Why not ratchet up the cost there? Because one of two things will happen, either you will have a decrease in number of people coming, but you'll have more money for those coming. So you'll probably come out in the wash, or you won't have a decrease of non-residents, and you'll have more money. Like both of those things I like very much. Yeah, well, you just run into a very controversial topic. So I mean, there's this is discussed all

13:29the time, right? Idaho is comparatively one of the cheaper states for non-residents. We still charge a lot for non-residents, and they went to a draw, so it's going for the first time. We could charge, we could, and we probably, a long term, we probably will. But once you start to get a certain percentage of the entire department's income relying on non-resident hunters, right? If you have a bad year, then it's a real problem, right? And so there's a balance that you have to do. Also, there's some financial considerations to this. There's some, who do we want in the woods, right? Do we only want the people who can afford a $2,000, $3,000 tax? Yeah. How much do you care about somebody from Southern California right now? Not somebody from Southern California who lives here. I'd be giving you a different example. Yeah. But how much do you care about the dude living in a new part beach with his yacht? And as, you know, like, hot girlfriend and his wife, like, how much do you care about that guy and worrying? Like, I don't care. I get it. And a lot of people would say the same thing, but the idea is that do you only want the yacht guy from out of state to be able to come? Or would you like somebody who's, you know, just works a regular

14:32job to have a chance at hunting in Idaho too, right? So it's a balancing act. Overwhelmingly, we want to make sure we're focused on resident hunting. Like, the experience for residents that is by far the majority of the country. That's what I care about. The balance of non-residents and how much we charge them long term. It's, you know, we probably will need to raise the fees on non-residents. We probably, like, long term, absolutely, right? We don't want to be just the bargain state when it comes to non-resident fees. But there's a variety of considerations there. And, you know, with the draw system, you know, you have to buy a license now to be able to apply. So they're raising revenue that way. They're incrementally making sure that this happens. The thing that when you talk about people that are well healed, you know, coming out to take advantage, I always think about like the giraffe hunter. Yeah. It's like the dentist who paid $10 million to hunt one giraffe, right? Yeah. Not that much. But yeah, whatever it is, right? And, yeah, you lived in Africa. You would know. But my point is, like, that drives, obviously, safe, like, game services and anti-poaching initiatives. So it's like, charge them up the

15:33wazoo, charge them, like, get the most, because I don't care who hunts the giraffe. If it's a plumber from Michigan or the dentist from Southern California, if I'm living in Africa, and I need funding for a fishing game and, you know, like anti-poaching mechanisms, like spend as much money as I don't care who it is. And the Africa model is different because they don't have the middle class to pay for their own license fees to support conservation, right? So you have to have these very high dollar hunts from out of country hunters, right? That is what fuels anti-poaching efforts. That's what enables them to convince people to live next to dangerous game and have a value on that resource, so that they are able to perpetuate it, right? And in different country, it's different country by country, but some of them do a fantastic job of making sure wildlife resources are there. And, and Africa hunting can be some of the best stuff in the world. Good. Locally, I mean, we have more of a every man ethic, right? And this is not me advocating for not raising non-resident fees. We need to do that, right? But you just advocated for it. No, we're raising. We need to do it. One hundred percent is not what I'm saying. We are going to need

16:34to raise non-resident fees. But when it comes to the conversation overall, right? What resident fees or anything like that, the trying, making sure that hunting is an every man's sport, not just for the Uber rich, is something that we do consider, not we, I mean, the fishing game and just departments across across. We want to make sure that this is something that everyone can do. Well, I'll tell you what, the fishing game people, they're a lot nicer than I would be. Yeah. Well, that's just me, though. Yeah. They've got a lot of, they've got a lot of different pressures on them. Yeah, but they do. Okay, got it on that. Now, again, that's that, the Hat Committee, it's effectively kind of stuck right now. And there are a lot of reasons why it's stuck a lot of different opinions, even the best of legislation that could have been proposed. There are probably like a lot of different decisions engaged. Okay, got it. What else is going on right now? So there's one bill, this is Senate Bill 1300. This would make the director of fishing game along with the directors of Parks and Rec and the transportation department, governor appointees, rather than pointed by the commission. I'm just going to talk about sort of fishing game on this one. So currently, the director of fishing game is appointed by the

17:36fishing game commission, right? It's been like that for a long time. The voter initiative in 1938 created an independent fishing game commission in part to make sure that to take some of the politics out of wildlife management. Now, the commission itself, those are appointees by the governor. They are appointed by the governor and they are confirmed by the Senate. Okay, so the governor appoints the seven people and the Senate's like, okay, yeah, we're good with this. And then it's those seven people get together. It's like, okay, who do we think the best experts to lead this would be? They're like, get Jim Fredericks. That's a great idea. I call Jim. They're like, Jim, what are you doing tomorrow? And he's like, well, I was going to stop what you're doing coming. Now you're the director. Yeah. Now, how many other departments are like that? So there's, right, this bill would affect fishing game parks and rec and transportation department. And all of those have independent boards? Yes. So and importantly, decision making boards. So that the fishing game commission is mandated in Idaho statute to manage and control the department. Got it. Right. From our perspective,

18:41it's difficult to figure out how you do that if you cannot hire and fire the boss. Right. And this is absolutely nothing like no, no disrespect to any, any current legislator. Right. I mean, our concern is if this were to happen is what might happen down the road. Right. Sportsmen are always looking at different states and seeing risks. Right. Like Colorado, as we speak, is trying to ban commercial first sales. Right. Washington has gone to a state where or a situation where, you know, hunting rights are legitimately threatened. You know, there's a saying in the private sector, you don't go bankrupt in the good years. You go bankrupt in the bad. I'm sorry. Sorry. The other way, like you don't go bankrupt in the bad years, you go bankrupt in the good years. Right. The decisions we make right now when we're in a pretty good situation will set us up for successor failure when things change. Right. And so, you know, our, our, the risk is what happens in 15, 20 years if we introduce more politics and to wildlife management. If we get a situation that's less friendly to sporting values. And so that's the concern. Right. Right. And also it's worked. You know, it's been, it's comparatively been working since, you know, as with our current system. We're

19:44not quite sure what it is that we're trying to fix. And so I know there's, there's frustrations with the commission and because they're, you know, there's already political oversight there. So that's the concern. And so, and from your standpoint, you're saying, look, essentially the anxiety is if we have a fishing game, a fishing game board that hires a director and that director goes wonky, then it's still the only people that can affect that and oversee that are the appointed board. And if the governor doesn't want to ditch the appointed board or the Senate won't confirm somebody the governor would like to replace somebody with, then that director will likely stay in place and do wonky things. That's the anxiety. It can't happen. If you have, if you have a, you know, a commission and a, and a governor that are really at odds, but again, the governor, that the commissioner served the pleasure of the governor. Right. So that, that, that, there is a level of oversight there. Right. But what we are concerned about is not just the potential

20:49for legitimate hunting rights being threatened down the road, but just shifting political priorities. Right. Wildlife management is a long-term game. You know, we want to make sure that hunter surveys are considered that the long-term priorities of wildlife management are as science-based as possible. And we're never going to get that perfectly. Right. But as we introduce more of more of the political landscape into wildlife management, you can get more variability and concern. Again, no disrespect to any of the current legislators are concerned is really more what might be coming around the corner. Got it. And you said parks and rec also have a, so who is it? Again, a direct governor appointment of the parks and rec board and then they hire Susan Buxen? I can't speak to that as cleanly, but Susan does have a sort of a management board on parks and rec. I had a fantastic set of board members and the, and there's concern of the parks and rec side because the agreement that was made when Idaho, when Haramon, what is now

21:55Haramon State Park was conferred to Idaho, stipulated that it not be led by political influence. And so there's some concern that if this goes through, the Haramon, which is fairly rich family, could have a lawsuit to try and get that park back or something that the state wouldn't want to see. So there's, there's real concern about that as well as if this would trigger legal action. So again, not very clear. Like this complex. It's complex. Yeah. It's always complex. I can't just be cut and dry. I know. I know. That's all the easy stuff has been done. Yeah, so yeah. Okay, that Senate built 1300. Yes, that Senate will 13. Okay. Has that gone through the past? The Senate will now sort of is, we'll move towards the House. And is IWF supporting this? No, not this legislation. We're against this legislation for the reasons outlined. Again, this is, I understand from the Senate side, the desire for additional oversight. Because they confirm, if this were to go through, it would be a point about the governor

22:58confirmed by the Senate. The Senate sees its job as the people's representatives to make sure that directors of important agencies go through that oversight process. I totally understand where they're coming from. The, just the concern is, is what could be coming down the road, right? When we see, I did not, if you would ask me 20 years ago, would Colorado be trying to ban mountain lion hunting? Would they be trying to outlaw commercial first sales? I would have said probably not, right? But that's what's happening today. So the things change, we want to make sure where as future proof is possible. And that's, you know, our, the next generations have as many opportunities we've got now. And so that's where the concern comes from on our side. So not, not supportive of this legislation, but again, that's, that's nothing to disparage the good, the good working done by the other side. Yeah, I got you. I got you. Okay, that's 1300. What else you got? So, I mean, there's a, there's a number of them. And there were the public lands, constitutional

23:59amendments that were going through. There was the one on the house side. That was house joint resolution 10, I think, that would have updated the constitutional mandate for endowment lands from a pure focus on financial returns to, to one that prioritized income and recreation, like hunting and fishing over sale. That was when we were watching pretty closely, hundreds spent a lot of time on endowment lands and public land in general. Obviously, that's where we, that's kind of where we live our lives. Right, right. That ended up dying in committee. Could I, could I ask you something about this? Okay, so people have brought up very notable examples of the department of land selling off like, I don't know, like 800 acres than like that. I can't remember exactly what the number is, but they always fail to mention that there's been a net capture of acreage, like 50, 60,000 acres purchased in the same time frame. Like, guys, look, if you got something over here that's worth a dumb truck of money that doesn't have one, like, harvestable resources, or it doesn't have like great environment for, you know, elk or

25:04something, and like, it's not really valuable to anybody from an outdoor and recreation standpoint, but it's really valuable to this one person who wants to build a big house on it. Why not sell that and trade that revenue for like 10,000 acres of timber and like all of the stuff? Nobody focuses on the, I shouldn't say nobody, very few people. It took me a lot of digging to start figuring out what the net gain of public lands are. Everybody just talks about the loss, even if it's like 100 acres, they're like, we lost 100 acres, but nobody says we picked up 20,000 acres. Sure. And there's no reason to say this, this, this amendment would not have prohibited situations like that, right? The, the, they are very reasonable cases. This happens with federal land too, through the flip my project. There are cases where it is in the public interest to sell or exchange land, right? And when the land board makes these sales or exchanges at that scale, you know, that's that very often is all to the good. I think what this, what this legislation

26:06was looking to do was give the land board some more options and make sure there's appropriate oversight in the event of a sale like that. And certainly you could run into a situation where there's someone who comes in some tech zillionaire who's like, I'll pay you 20% above, over a praise value for this huge chunk of land. I don't care what it costs. I just want it. And that's not the best interest for the state necessarily. So having, having that mandate changed, I mean, there's there's arguments for it just to say like, let's just have some more options, right? Not not to say that they're not already doing a good job or not, or not getting a, you know, haven't historically gotten some net gains of of this land. Sure. Recent times. I mean, granted, we started when we became a state with 3.6 million acres. We've got two and a half million now, right? So that has reduced. And there's at least the other states where it's gone entirely away. So again, this is sort of in the future proofing thing, right? People got a lot of money now, right? How, how, how do a lot of Twitter bros? Yeah, exactly. How do we, how do we start to, to make sure that we're still able to hold on to what we've got? And what tools do we need to do that? So that the land board isn't a position where they kind of

27:09compelled to sell something even though it wouldn't be in the public, you know, it wouldn't be desirable from a public perspective. Got it. One thing. And again, I don't know all the nuances built. But one of the things that I did hear somebody say is like, look, one issue is right now, there's a clear, you know, like we have a clear objective to like, you know, fun public education and all these other things. The bill that again, I spoke with Representative Petsky and Rabel to be like, okay, awesome. And one person said the problem is it kind of changes the beneficiary profile. So it makes the average citizen of Idaho a beneficiary of these lands. Now they are tangentially a beneficiary right now, right? But if you make them like direct beneficiaries, then there's essentially you're setting up a legal framework where it's like, you're supposed to be benefiting me. I don't think you're doing that. And I think, you know, you should explain this to me. So you open yourself, again, this was somebody's concern. That's right. The bill would open it up to individual citizens going out and like, you know, going after the land board for, you know, them saying that they're not doing it correctly. So my understanding of the language is it

28:11wouldn't do that in a way that would open them up to legal risk. That's right. But when you're talking about, I mean, it's still had that the beneficiary's didn't change would or wouldn't have changed based on this. But, you know, when you're talking about the endowment kicked off like a hundred million dollars right now, right? That goes to the school system, right? The citizens of Idaho would have had to flip that bill if the endowment didn't do that, right? So when you're talking about like, there's benefits to the general public, even if they're not like a real beneficiary. But yeah, that's a concern you want to have ironed out is make sure you don't get sued over stuff, right? Right. So, so basically what happened with that legislation and the the Senate one as well, which, which deals more with if federal land were transferred into the city and a separate trust, the one that that Senator Ben Adams is working on, you know, that's that made it through committee. It's now to be heard by the Senate. No, there's there's can be people look at these languages. Okay. Do we go through with this? We put something together that, you know, kind of does the best of both worlds in a lot in a longer term fashion down the road? We'll see, right? But yeah, I mean, constitutional amendments are a big deal. So people want to be confident in the language. I mean, but I got to tell you, I'm happy to see

29:17people going around saying that people want public lands to say public, right? And that these are valuable and that they're intrinsic to Idaho's culture from a hunting perspective. You know, that's that's what I want to see our elected representatives doing is is and Senator Rich said this in the confirmation hearing on on steep peers who would be the BLM nominee to run the BLM. You know, this, this is a, you know, north of 90% of Idahoans want public lands to stay public, right? This is an incredibly important issue to us. How we get there? We can discuss. But that, that being reflected in the discussions, being how the legislature to me is a very positive sign. Yeah. Right. And then there's, there's another one, Senate joint memorial 111, which is going through right now, just past the Senate. It'll now move to the House. You know, reflects that sentiment as well, right? Public lands are intrinsic to the, to, to, to hunters, to recreational shooters, to just the outdoor way of life in, in Idaho. And we want to make sure that they stay public, right? This is, this is a good sign to see, to see, to see these, these types of legislation

30:20going through. Here's a question for you. And okay. So first off, thank you on that. Got it. And hopefully I'm, I'm not going to, I'm hopefully, well, I don't know, I'm not going to. I'm hopeful that I will be able to, I'm actually going back to DC soon. And I'm going to be able to connect with Senator, because I want to ask him specifically about that. But we appreciate his comments in that hearing. Yeah. And it was like, I was talking to, I think it was Alexis Pickering the other day about him too. Like it's great. Like fantastic. That's great to have that front and center. Like, hey man, this is really important. Yeah. Like let's be clear on it. Um, the, the, there is, something was telling me the other day about, um, there's a waterfall season that ends before the migration, South even starts. Mm hmm. Are you aware of what I'm trying to say? Well, screwing up. I, so, so basically, waterfall seasons are incredibly like, it's, it's an international discussion, right? I mean, fishing game can't turn this switch on and off the same way that they

31:21can. Some kind of juice or some of the things. I know what I'm talking about. Yeah. There's, I mean, there's, there's, yeah. I don't have the words. And, and there are people who are much better water fell hunters than I am. We've got snow geese seasons. We've got, you know, there is candidate geese. Yeah. Yeah. So, doesn't the, doesn't the season here end before the migration South even starts? Well, it depends on the year. Right. So like the, and, and waterfowers, you know, if I get this wrong, and again, I hunt waterfowl, but not not as, as much as I hunt big game, the, um, it can change year by year, right? In terms of, of when, when the, the weather starts to push them down. And for snow geese, I, it's, be harder for me to speak intelligently on that. But, but in general, you know, like, like this year, we had a very warm year, right? A lot of, when, when migratory waterfowl hit a point where they're pretty happy, right? They've got food, they've got open water. They can sit on it. It's not all froze up. There's not a huge temptation to keep flying South, right? And so you can, like a lot of complaints of a lot of waterfowl is across the country is like they just all hung up up North, right? Nothing pushed them down.

32:22There was enough food up there. You know, there was, there was, yeah, what it was, how to tell or whatever. Yeah. So, um, and, and they are, they're always trying to balance this with harvest, right? These are, these are treaties that, that, or, or seasons that are set in coordination with, um, with other countries and other states, where if there's a certain level of harvest, you know, it's the same reason why we can't hunt deer in the rut here, right? We, if we, if we let the harvest rate, you know, if you hunt them in the rut, when they're easier to find and they're easier to kill, then the harvest rate goes too high and it drops the population down, right? And that's often times the concern with other seasons as well is, you know, if, if one state, you know, just able to knock it out of the park because they hit them in prime time, then it's, you don't get as many flying below that. So the, uh, it's, I, I would not be, uh, shocked if it was, if the seasons weren't tweaked perfectly, but there's, there's, there's complicated, yeah. Okay. Oh, so it's complicated. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. So we have, oh, isn't, uh, Senator Ben Adams, his constitutional amendment bill is still alive. It's still alive. Yeah,

33:24passed out of committee six three and there's now going to the full center floor. Okay. What's IWF position on this? So I mean, like, again, like, I, we like the, the work that's happening towards, so, so the constitutional amendments, we didn't really take official positions on, on either, either one of these things are, they're so complicated, but I do want to, I always wanted to make sure to call attention to the real benefits of, um, you know, having land put into a, separate trust that cannot be sold has real benefits, right? Like the, yes, it could be transferred, it could be transferred to another endowment with two thirds approval of the legislature. Right? But, um, it's, there are legitimate upsides to say, no, I, again, I think transfer is a terrible idea for any number of reasons, right? Federal transfer from the states that in large quantities, the state will not be able to afford, right? The management cost will, would, would bankrupt the state. So, so that this was always my question. Yeah. We hold that to be true. Right. The management cost would bankrupt the state. Okay. Don't give it to us. Yeah. Like, and again,

34:27I don't know. I, I think I remember speaking with Senator Ben Adams about this, and he's like, no, we would be able to make like a bunch of money off of it. It's like, right. If we could make all of the money, then like, why do people say the management cost would cripple us? And, you know, I did have a representative filter on actually about this time last year. Yeah. And he's like, no, take it in small chunks, you know, because he's an advocate for, you know, bringing, and he's like, take in small chunks, and if you can't make money with it, and you can't do it in small chunks, like fine. But it's, it's too complex because, you know, some people say it's all of this wealth is in this land. Yeah. And then other people are like, we will never be able to afford to manage it. Yes. Now, now management on federal public lands absolutely needs to be improved. Right. Could we be doing more with it than we've currently got? Yes. And this isn't like a love letter to the feds because, you know, but really they're the only game in town with the pocketbook. Right. What we would need to be able to see is a can, can, can whoever is owned owns a land handle six bad fire years smack in the middle of a recession and still not to have to have to sell that land.

35:27Right. Idaho has to balance his budget every year. The federal government does not. Now, that might not be great as a citizen, but it's good. Like, but from a perspective of will we maintain the public land? The answer is yes. In that case. Right. If you have large scale transfer to the states, no way. Right. Now there's individual parcels that might make sense. Right. We have small scale transfers. We have small scale exchanges or exchanges and sale rather. But, you know, in large chunks, the management costs are so one can be so one time huge. And if they're, you know, six time huge stacked in a row, it'd be catastrophic. Right. And we would not be able to maintain. So what what what center Adams was trying to do with his amendment was saying, like, listen, if we get a land from the from the feds gets put in a trust that can't be sold, what you could see is creating a disincentive for Idaho to accept land that it knows it can't pay for. Right. Because you can't sell it. Yeah. So that, you know, you can you can see up sides to that. So, yeah, we appreciate that. Yeah. God bless it. Okay. Other bills. So, I mean, where we're

36:31there's there's a handful of them. There's there's 1326, which is the open fields bill. So, basically this is this would the currently the open fields doctrine basically says, you know, outside the, you know, certain cartilage, which is like, you know, around a home law enforcement officers can go on to private property to enforce the law. Right. And they say good conservation officers. It's going on to check for fishing game violations. Right. Sure. This is one of those, like I said earlier, a big part of my job is to figure out what or to work with the hunting community understand what the view is on these. Maybe provide some education, but then help reflect that as much as possible. Right. So this bill as written would include a thousand dollar fine that would, um, civil fine that doesn't apply to sheriffs or law enforcement, but would apply to conservation officers. Right. I do not like that. I don't, I don't like to see them treated as second-class law enforcement. They're certified, um, post officers like all other law enforcement. I don't think that they should see civil fines applied to them that aren't applied to others. Right. We're a law enforcement leans on CEOs all the time. And we want to make sure that they can

37:35collaborate, uh, as, as along with other law enforcement, you know, the conversation on open fields in general among hunters is much more nuanced. Right. There's our people who say like a fourth amendment is the fourth amendment. There's nothing else to discuss. Right. There's folks who'll say, listen, wildlife is a public resource. Right. Just because it's on private land doesn't mean that it stops being a public resource. That was the entire model that we, we changed when it came from Europe where, where the landowner's own the wildlife in America, the people on the wildlife. Right. So how do we make sure that that's not being abused? And you're not seeing bait stations on private land and, you know, non-residents flying in and, um, you know, just out of season and not, you know, not having to buy a tag. And, you know, these are, these are legitimate discussions. All right. That are being had back and forth. I, I, I had a, uh, uh, Chief Bester Shion from Meridian. Yes. The other day to talk about this. Is it accurate? And again, I may have misunderstood this, but is it accurate that the, so again, the, the curtallage is like inside your white picket fence. And that's where, hey, man, if you're going to have a, have to have a reason to come on here. Right. And, you know, like, and you're going to have to come to like the normal public area.

38:38Like you're going to have to come to my front door. And, you know, if you're coming in, you could have like a warrant or some, like legal reason to be there. And as it stands right now, if that house and the white picket fence drawn 10,000 acres, well, it's like, okay, that applies to the house and the white picket fence area. It doesn't apply to, you know, the 10,000 acres area, right? So fishing game or local sheriff, police department, whatever it might be. But correct me for wrong. The, the bill as it's written right now would restrict only the fishing game and like federal law enforcement from going on to the open, going into the open fields without a legal reason. You could still go on if you're like the sheriff. So my understanding is that wouldn't be the case. Okay. There, there, there's certain exceptions for, um, for water to make sure someone's not violating the water rights of their neighbors for certain weed control things, things like that. God, I think it applies to, to other law enforcement. Gotcha. Okay. So again, it was probably a misunderstanding in my, on my part then. Um, okay. And like the, the water is a perfect example. Yeah. Like there could be things going on that

39:38you're not going to have, you know, like a missing persons report. If you're, and again, I don't know squat about how to manage this stuff. But when people are like, hey, there are individuals that, there, there are things that might be happening where you're not going to have like great evidence ahead of time. Like I have a missing persons report. Like I'm doing a wellness check, right? I was just like a suspect of crime. This is my evidence for a crime being committed. I don't know. Like I don't know how these things work. But something like somebody stealing water, that would be a very hard thing. Well, look, what do I know? Yeah. And the landing evidence. Maybe it's that easy. I mean, everything's case by case, right? There's things that you can't do. Right? You can't dam a river because it's on your, on your land, right? And take water from everybody else if you got, if you got varying water rights, right? You can't shoot a buck out of a season just because it's on your land, right? So you can't hunt without a license, all this sort of stuff, right? How you enforce that? It's a very nuanced question. Again, some people will say it's not nuanced, right? That the fourth amendment is, is restricts folks from coming onto your property

40:38without permission, without a warrant. And for some properties of property. For some folks, that's just, that's the end of the story, right? And I understand that perspective entirely, right? Other people say like, well, you know, we got public resources. We need to be able to, to check for them. And then, but you see bad examples as well of that. And it only takes a few bad examples before public sentiment starts to turn. Is that, are there notable bad examples where somebody abused the capacity to go on to somebody's broader property? Now, people will have some from other states and you'll see testifiers who have issue with something that other fishing game conservation officers does or some other kind of law enforcement on their property and, and in Jersey. Yeah. Again, this is, this is, it's a, it's a very nuanced conversation. People have very strong opinions about it. Again, like, I'd, I'd prefer to, to see a bill where conservation officers weren't subject to a fine that other law enforcement weren't. So that's something that I'd, I'd like to see addressed. But yeah, I'd say people are generally talked to hunters and you're not going to get the same answer depending on how many you talk to. Yes, one overall. Yeah. And again, I don't, I don't,

41:42I didn't know cartilage existed until like, you know, months ago. Yeah, I don't even know how you're talking about. So again, super complex. And bottom line is like I, I have, like, I have a very small property compared to like 10,000 acres, but I do have like, you know, an acre and a half. And if somebody, you know, people wandering around my property, I wouldn't be happy. I'd be like, what are you doing here? Like, well, it's not inside your dumb little like split rail fence. I'm like, I know, but it's still mine. Get out of here. Oh, yeah. I get it. Yeah, man. What's going on in the legislature session? It's been a, it's been a crazy one. Yeah. Yeah. Um, I wanted to close loop on the migration stuff. So again, the conversation with Jacob and Sarah was fantastic. Your initial conversation that we, that we got to have was fantastic. That, that technology is always evolving and always coming forward, right? Like this is an area of technology with, um, or centered around fishing game where it's like, God bless it. Yes. We need every last piece because again, the more data we get, the more appropriately we can develop, the more we could support

42:44populations in their free movement. And the better off, everybody is from that. Yes. Right. So, I mean, it's, it's one of those things where the more information you have, you can figure out what the solutions should be, right? I mean, we have very large, uh, swaths of land in Idaho, connected landscapes that critters move from, from, um, summer range to winter range across, right? The more detail we have around what they, um, what they need and what, what disturbs those migration patterns and how, how much fidelity they have to those migration patterns and how much problem it, it causes them when we can figure out how we develop the right way, right? We are going to grow as a state. Like, we, we want it, we want to see that happen, right? We can't just back to that sort of preservation conservation. So we can't just be hands off, right? We, we got to be on team people. We got to make sure that, um, everyone's living a good quality of life and growth isn't stymied, but we can do both, right? We, if the, if we have the information, we can make sure that we have the corridors that migrate that wildlife need, you know, deer elk, prohorn, in particular, as well as moose, move across the landscape in a way that we can see what they're doing, right? These are, these are historic routes. They, they utilize them year over year.

43:49So there's places where it's like, okay, this is not the best place for a bike trail, right? You know, it's, it looks low impact, but you can see through the data that animals move quite a bit from there. So let's put it somewhere else, right? The same thing for other kinds of development, you know, whether it be energy or, or, um, uh, commercial, you know, all things being equal. Sometimes it's, you know, it's, it just, just helps us give the information. Um, and then, you know, highways as well. We have a lot of, a lot of deer elk and, and that get hit on the roads. This is dangerous for people. It's dangerous for wildlife, right? So there's places where it's going to make sense to, um, help facilitate movement across my ways in areas, and I think this is important to say, uh, where the local community supports that, right? This is one of the things you, you, we do not want to see large infrastructure projects like that happen where they not want it. I got one for you. Yeah. I got, I got to pull this thing up. Okay. So I have a, uh, I'm very excited about this. We have a, um, excuse me, I have a US Senator from, I think, Michigan coming in. Okay. Okay. Uh, this weekend, she happens to be in town for a big event, which is great,

44:52like awesome. And somebody's like, Hey, would you like to have somebody like that on show? I'm like, of course, like I, you know, love hearing from people like that. And the reason I'm fumbling on my phone, because she has one of the things I want to talk to her about was she has a plan to address housing, like the housing crisis in the country. I'm like, okay. So first off, Idaho's currently trying to figure out if they should enact some kind of like state level solution to this. And people are freaking out about the state level solution. We're not freaking out, but people are, some people are objecting to it because it's like, dude, if star wants to be star, let star be star. Like what are you doing? And she's proposing a national policy, like a law. And part of it, I really want to pull up the screen truck because I want to tell you about it. Okay. Here it is. Part of it is her ideas would, uh, push states and localities to cut red tape and make way for more housing at compel state and local government to change local laws, like allowing commercial properties to get turned into housing, eliminating single family zoning or allowing for accessory

45:56dwelling units in law units. Um, it also says during the emergency bill, uh, during the emergency, because she's trying to declare the housing and emergency bill institutes a freeze for states or localities for passing laws, rules or regulations that imposes a burden on the construction or rehabilitation of housing. And I read that. I'm like, I would love to talk to you about this because we have Middleton, who is obviously enact an ordinance because they're like, hey man, we can't fund schools and more people are moving in and we just can't keep building if we're taxing this resource. We have star that's currently experiencing very difficult position with its fire, its fire capacity. Um, we, we have places like Eagle that have these gigantic rural plots that are like, you know, five egg one to five acres, you know, everybody off beacon light is like one to five acres. And you're going to eliminate single family zoning, like how is that going to work? And then you have places like Elmore County that has an aquifer that's dropping

46:58every single year. And it's like, if, if you pass some law to like prevent the aquifer or to prevent additional housing and draws on the aquifer, then like, apparently that would be legal. And then of course, what if you have an area that looks fantastic for development, but is also a game corridor. Yeah, it's like, okay, you can't do that. And they're like, nope, we're in a housing emergency. We're putting up condos right there. And like, again, like, I don't know what the solution is, but I'd love to talk this is centered about it. It's like, it doesn't like, this seems to be something that needs to be intimately tied to the communities. And like, no one's happy that we have a high cost of housing that doesn't benefit anyone. Right. I understand that. But the solutions coming from on high also seem like it would open a can of worms. Like, I gave you like three or four examples. How are you going to parse that out with like national policy? Well, you, you, the first step is information. Right. Like the, the, you're not going to solve every problem with, and, and we're not going to be able to say that there, we never see development in any kind of migration corridor. Right. But when it comes to the, the, you know, all things being

48:03equal, we can do something in one location or another. Right. This, this, this kind of information gives us the ability to say, like, that place is better than this place. Right. And, and it's amazing how much you can have or how much you can do with just that. Right. Like in a real housing crunch. Right. We were like, Hey, we need to build right here. You know, and most of this stuff, you know, around here is winter range. Right. Where it's just like, we live in a valley, you know, you walk outside and you see the snow up in the, up in the hills. You don't see it down here. Right. Right. So it's, it's, this is where critters oftentimes will come to winter. And at least in worst winters in the one that we've had. Right. So there's, there's sometimes where you, you, you go to the hardest problems to solve. You know, housing is a very difficult problem. And sometimes there's nothing you can do. But when it comes to okay, where do we put, you know, large scale energy development, you know, like in the last administration, there was a real push for solar farms. Right. Where those went? Matter to me. Right. Because I don't want to see those things smack in the middle of like a migration corridor. If you can put that somewhere else, do it. Right. These are the kinds of decisions that we can have, but we need the information first.

49:05Right. And we need the public awareness of how important these things are. Right. They know it's, it's different from, from back east where you largely have resident populations of, of animals. Right. Our, our wildlife, we certainly have resident, herds, our migratory. And the more the understanding of that goes around, the more people think about it. And it's, it's not, it's not saying that we, you know, we're, we're trying to restrict growth of any kind. It's just that the education really helps to make a difference in terms of what we want to prioritize and whether that's in, you know, on or out somewhere or summer winter range and figuring out how do we make sure that we're not packing this so full of, you know, of recreational infrastructure, for example, that critters can't survive. Right. So it's, information is incredibly powerful all by itself. Yeah. And then when you have to get into a real discussion of, okay, what should go where? And let's step two. With step one is just, let's just get the information out there. Let's just make sure people understand how critical these migrations are, how much detail we have about them now, about where they are. And, you know, that's, we're not even there yet by and large in

50:10terms of just the public awareness. So let's cover off step one. This is really cool stuff. We have great graphics. We have great data. There's people out like Jacob and Sierra out there who, who know this stuff cold and are, and are learning more every day. Yeah, we're, we're, and, and get the information around stage right now. God bless, man. It's the best. Nick, I always appreciate you, sir. Thank you for coming in and giving me this breakdown. Is there anything else you want to hit here at the end? No, really appreciate it. Again, that's been an interesting legislative session. We're down there every day. We want to make sure that we're, we're reflecting sports and values and helping to future proof what we've got right now. We have some of the best hunting fishing in the world. We have a remarkable hunting culture. Our goal is to, is to keep it that way as we move along here as a state. God bless, man. Thank you for what you're doing for IWF. Thanks for coming in. We'll do this again. Thank you.