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Published February 28, 2009 Tom Paulu NASELLE — Meet Miranda Wecker, environmental lawyer, spartina eradication expert, enthusiastic mountain biker and skier— and new chair of the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.Six weeks into her position as leader of the group that sets policy for the Department of Fish and Wildlife, Wecker talked about commission politics, the struggles over spring chinook — and successes in the fight against spartina in Willapa Bay.The soft-spoken Wecker, 58, is a big city native who ended up living in the small towns of Southwest Washington.Wecker, who grew up in Chicago, earned a degree in psychology from Pomona College in California and then spent three years sailing a 40-foot boat to the South Seas.She worked in the Olympic National Forest for a few years before getting two law degrees from the University of Washington, one of them an advanced degree in marine law. Then came six years in Washington, D.C., explaining multilateral treaties to the Council on Ocean Law.Wecker came back to the other Washington in 1991, doing consulting work for several non-profit natural resources groups including the Willapa Alliance. As she put it, her job was working to try to find solutions “through a combination of law and policy.”Since 1995, Wecker has been the marine program manager for the UW’s Olympic Natural Resources Center, which has offices in Forks. She spends much of her time working on Willapa Bay issues and lives near Naselle.One of her major efforts is the control of spartina, the non-native grass that has threatened to take over the bay’s mud flats. Extensive spraying and other weed-control methods have beaten spartina back in recent years.It’s spartina, not salmon or steelhead, that brought Wecker to the Fish and Wildlife Commission.When Gov. Chris Gregoire first took office in 2005, Wecker decided to apply for the commission. “My motivation was I saw the agency performing well in some areas, some not so well,” Wecker said. “I wanted improvement in controlling spartina in Willapa Bay.”Wecker applied on Gregoire’s Web site — and was appointed.At the time, Wecker said, “I knew nothing about the commission. I had very little understanding of how the agency was managed. It was obscure to me. It’s a complex agency.”The fish and wildlife commissioners are supposed to focus on the big picture, rather than day-to-day operations of the DFW, she learned. “The number one job is preservation and protection of our natural heritage, the land that we manage, and allowing uses that are consistent with conservation,” she said. “There are a number of audiences we serve — the general public is one,” as opposed to hunters or anglers.After four years of attending commission meetings, however, Wecker is well aware how contentious the nitty gritty of agency management can be, as sport and commercial fishermen lobby for bigger shares of the catch and hunters vie for special permits.“I am one of the two (commissioners) who has never really hunted much,” Wecker said. But the other five are hunters, as is her husband. “We have no trouble finding expertise” on hunting issues, she said.Her own recreational pursuits include mountain biking on logging roads, cross-country and downhill skiing and fishing coastal rivers. She hasn’t lost her love of urban landscapes, fine art and Shakespeare. “I love the city,” she said. “I love Chicago.”Wecker has gotten a crash course in fishery issues by serving on one of the committees that tried to come up with a framework for allocating spring chinook between sport and commercial fishermen.The Washington commission adopted a plan advanced by a later bi-state committee, but the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission wants a bigger share of the spring chinook for commercial fishermen.“We lost some trust in this process,” Wecker said.She said Gregoire hasn’t taken sides on spring chinook. “The governor has never expressed a preference for one group or the other,” Wecker said. “She would like us to find ways to expand the pie.“She said she appointed us to represent the interests of the state, not to be beholden to one group or another.”One of the ideas that has come up during spring chinook discussions is moving Columbia River commercial fishing to so-called SAFE areas in side channels, where few upriver endangered fish stray. However, Oregon has more viable SAFE areas than does Washington, Wecker said.“We don’t have a Youngs Bay on our side” of the river, she said.She’d like to explore whether commercial spring chinook fishing could be moved to Willapa Bay, though it would take years to put such a program into effect. “You can’t do it in a year or two.”Wecker said the current makeup of the commission, with two fisheries Ph.Ds, an ecologist and an environmental lawyer, has more people with natural resource backgrounds than in years past.“There’s been a real effort to be to be fair, to have a conservation emphasis. Maybe that’s come off as being reform-minded,” she said.Commissioners are appointed by the governor and supposedly confirmed by the state senate. However, only one of the current seven commissioners has been confirmed. After four years on the commission, Wecker is not yet confirmed.She had no comment on the implications of the senate’s non-confirmation of most of the members.A bill introduced in the legislature this year would weaken the commission by returning the authority to appoint the DFW director to the governor, as it was before 1995.The commission opposes the bill, Senate Bill 5127. Wecker said the current system, approved by voter referendum, is designed to insulate fish and wildlife management from politics.Wecker’s views on other issues facing the commisison:Search for a new directorWhen former DFW Director Jeff Koenings resigned in December, sport fishing groups said they thought he favored commercial fishermen.Wecker said the commission and Koenings “were not always on the same page,” but emphasized that he wasn’t fired.Wecker is on the commission’s executive committee, which is working on a job description before it conducts a nationwide job search. “We hope to have a new director in place to start the new biennium” in July. “I’m not sure we’ll make that timetable.”Budgeting and layoffsThis week, the DFW sent out notices that more than 100 of the agency’s 1,580 employees might be laid off as a result of the state’s budget deficit. “The reductions are huge,” she said.Despite the dire budget, Wecker said the commission doesn’t favor raising license fees, though it supports allowing anglers to fish with two poles if they buy a second license.Enforcement mergerAn idea making the rounds of Olympia has been merging DFW enforcement officers with the State Patrol.The commission is opposed. “Wildlife management is not like traffic control,” Wecker said. “There are more subtleties. Most of our officers have natural resources degrees... They are a top-notch force, well educated.”She added that there are about 130 DFW enforcement agents now, fewer than in the mid 1990s, when the departments of fisheries and wildlife merged. Spirit Lake troutWecker said she isn’t familiar with the DFW’s long attempt to allow fishing in Spirit Lake, though she recently got a letter from the Forest Service opposing it. The commission hasn’t take a position on the issue, she said, though she’s asked the board’s fisheries committee to have a look at it.
Enforcement mergerAn idea making the rounds of Olympia has been merging DFW enforcement officers with the State Patrol.The commission is opposed. “Wildlife management is not like traffic control,” Wecker said. “There are more subtleties. Most of our officers have natural resources degrees... They are a top-notch force, well educated.”She added that there are about 130 DFW enforcement agents now, fewer than in the mid 1990s, when the departments of fisheries and wildlife merged.
QuoteEnforcement mergerAn idea making the rounds of Olympia has been merging DFW enforcement officers with the State Patrol.The commission is opposed. “Wildlife management is not like traffic control,” Wecker said. “There are more subtleties. Most of our officers have natural resources degrees... They are a top-notch force, well educated.”She added that there are about 130 DFW enforcement agents now, fewer than in the mid 1990s, when the departments of fisheries and wildlife merged.I think it might be a good idea to merge State Patrol and DFW agents. I don't think it would take very long for some State Patrol agents to get up to speed on wildlife laws........especially if they can find some State Patrol officers that are hunters.
Isn't that kind of what Alaska does. Aren't they troopers/DFW agents?
Quote from: bowhuntin on March 02, 2009, 01:04:01 PMIsn't that kind of what Alaska does. Aren't they troopers/DFW agents?I'm not sure about Alaska, but I'm fairly sure that in Oregon that's the way it is.
Game WARDENS shoiuld be just that...not "officers" (as in "police")
