The Wyoming Wildlife Taskforce’s charge is to study top-priority wildlife policy issues facing the state related to the allocation of hunting opportunity, sportsperson access and other issues. The topics will be identified by the taskforce members for study over an 18-month period with the goal of presenting conclusions and recommendations to the Wyoming Legislature, Game and Fish Commission and governor to support decision-making on Wyoming’s wildlife resources. For information on previous meetings and minutes, please visit wyomingwildlifetaskforce.com
Next Task Force Meeting: September 1, 2021, Casper. Location T/B/D
Members of the Wyoming Wildlife Taskforce
• Tony Lehner - Converse County Commissioner, landowner
• Duaine Hagen - Park County landowner
• Representative Jamie Flitner - Big Horn County
• Representative Albert Sommers - Sublette County
• Adam Teten - Johnson County sportsman
• Joe Schaffer - Laramie County sportsman, President of Laramie County Community College
• Rusty Bell - Campbell County Commissioner, Taxidermist, Sportsman
• Sy Gilliland - President of Wyoming Outfitter and Guides Association
• Elissa Ruckle - Owner of Elevate Wyoming
• Senator Ogden Driskill - Crook County
• Senator Larry Hicks - Carbon County
• Liisa Anselmi-Dalton - Sweetwater County hotel owner
• Jen Scoggin - Director Office of State Lands and Investments
• Lee Livingston - Park County Commissioner
• Josh Coursey - Sweetwater County, Executive Director of Muley Fanatics Foundation
• Pat Crank - Laramie County sportsman
• Pete Dube - Johnson County, President of the Game and Fish Commission
• Brian Nesvik - Director of the Game and Fish Department
At this time, both lawsuits have been fully briefed and the matters are currently awaiting decision by the respective courts. The Wyoming Elk Feedgrounds, Chapter Two video is available on WYOGA’s website and YouTube. If you would like to make a donation to support the lawsuit and our fight to keep the feedgrounds open, donations can be made to WYOGA.
The 20th anniversary of the American Wildlife Conservation Partners was held August 1-3 in Missoula, Montana. This event was sponsored by the Boone & Crockett club. The Boone & Crockett club was also a founding member. The AWCP is made up of 51 national level NGO’s. The outfitting industry is represented by The Professional Outfitters & Guides of America (POGA). POGA is a member of the AWCP and Sy Gilliland is the current chairman of POGA. John Boretsky of SCI was the primary driver in getting POGA admitted to the AWCP.
The agenda covered many important conservation issues that affect our Wyoming wildlife, migration corridors, CWD, public access, highway crossings and fencing. The attendee’s of the conference are made up primarily of each organizations CEO or president or the organizations DC lobbyists. These issues were presented often from the 30,000 view-point. Keep in mind, most of the attendees are the ones working on these issues at the national level rather than the state level.
Our agenda on Wednesday allowed time to discuss additional items the members felt needed to be brought forth. Sy asked for time to discuss the issue many POGA states are fighting in regard to the disturbing trend of reducing non-resident hunters access to hunting licenses. Sy presented a little history about WYOGA’s fight and briefly touched on the other western states also embroiled in these license battles. This resulted in a very good discussion that lasted 45 minutes. It seems all of the groups have concern about their members having reasonable access to hunt in western states and Alaska. There is no doubt each of these groups will continue this discussion at an internal level with their boards.
The next WYOGA board meeting will be held on November 17th at the Hampton Inn Casper, 1:00pm-5:00pm. This board meeting is in conjunction with the task force meeting on November 18th. The WYOGA Board of Directors invite you to attend the board meeting to strategize for the task force meeting. WYOGA is currently working with Southwick & Associates to update the economic study we had done in 2016. The updated economic study will be presented to the task force on November 18th. Please watch for emails with updates for the board meeting.
The 2021 Wyoming Outdoors is in the works.
Below is the timeline for this project:
September 15th: Bios are due. Ad space reserved.
November 1st: Ad material due to Mark Schuler. Ad payment in full is due.
November 24th: Directory file will be turned over to printing company.
December 6th: The directory will be mailed to the non-residents.
WYOGA’s Annual Winter Retreat is scheduled for Thursday, December 2nd at the Ramkota Hotel in Casper from 9:00am-5:00pm. This one-day meeting is in conjunction with the task force meeting on Friday, December 3rd. This task force meeting will be the last meeting until 2022. Please watch for updates and your invitation to attend the winter retreat in November.
