Latest news with #NewMexicoGameandFishDepartment
Yahoo
20-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Gov. Lujan Grisham strikes game commissioner removal process from bill
Jesse Duebel, the executive director of the New Mexico Wildlife Federation, and Judy Calman, the director of policy for Audubon Southwest said they were disappointed with Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham's partial veto of a bill overhauling the New Mexico Game and Fish Department, when she signed the majority of the reforms into law on Thursday. (Danielle Prokop / Source NM) A legislative proposal to reform how members of Game and Fish commission can be removed 'unnecessarily complicates and lengthens the removal process,' Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham wrote in a message to the State Senate Thursday explaining her partial veto of Senate Bill 5, which reforms both the commission and the Game and Fish Department. Currently, the governor can remove members of the commission. The proposed change would require the State Ethics Commission to file an action in district court to remove a board member and created the potential for appeal at the New Mexico Supreme Court. 'Given the many pressing matters addressed by district courts and the Supreme Court, it would take years to remove even the most blatantly incompetent or corrupt individuals — allowing those individuals to continue to hinder or corrupt the Commission in the interim,' the governor wrote. She tied her approval for the rest of the bill to acceptance of her partial veto, and cited a 2011 advisory letter from the state Attorney General's Office regarding what types of bills are subject to line-item vetoes. 'As SB 5 appropriates money, it is subject to line-item veto pursuant,' she wrote. While lawmakers and advocates expressed skepticism about the governor's legal reasoning for striking the provision of the bill, one of the bill's main sponsors, Rep. Matthew McQueen (D-Galisteo) doesn't plan to challenge her, and noted that the governor's staff told him they would work with him on the issue in a future session. 'Signing a bill on a contingent basis doesn't mesh with my understanding of the [New Mexico] Constitution,' McQueen said. 'But that would only come into play if the bill was challenged, and I say we should move forward.' Senate Bill 5 passed the House along near-party line votes as Rep. Derrick Lente (D-Sandia Pueblo) joined Republicans in opposing it, while the Senate passed the bill with more bipartisan support. But while lawmakers heavily debated many provisions of the bill expanding the scope of the agency, the language for changing the process for game commissioner removal faced little pushback. 'That was the one provision that was completely noncontroversial,' Jesse Duebel, the executive director of the New Mexico Wildlife Federation, told reporters on Thursday. Duebel said the remaining language makes some of the most substantial changes to the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish in a century by raising its budget; increasing hunting and fishing fees; changing its name to the New Mexico Department of Wildlife to reflect a more broad effort to preserve declining species. Lawmakers again aim to reform New Mexico Department of Game and Fish 'We're very disappointed that the process for commissioner removal was vetoed from the bill,' Duebel said. 'The removal of commissioners from the state wildlife commission is one of the most important processes that exists for the hunting community in this state, and for too long that process has been purely political.' Duebel alluded to issues over multiple administrations when high turnover and sudden vacancies on the board have hampered its ability to meet, as the board did not have enough people to conduct its business. Two former commissioners, Joanna Prukop and Jeremy Vesbach, said they were forced off the commission during Lujan Grisham's first term over their positions on stream access issues – which a New Mexico Supreme Court order rendered moot. Judy Calman, the director of policy for Audubon Southwest, said the coalition of more than 20 groups, which includes hunting, wildlife and conservation groups, will pursue future legislation, even if the veto goes unchallenged. 'The vast majority of our coalition is committed to getting a removal process in place at some point, somehow,' Calman said. 'I don't think that that fight is over for us or that we will let that go because it's such a crucial part of this for us.' In 2023, lawmakers passed a much narrower bill, also sponsored by McQueen, which gave lawmakers picks for the New Mexico Game and Fish Commission. The bill passed both chambers but Lujan Grisham pocket-vetoed —aka didn't sign —it into law. Brittany Fallon, a policy manager with Western Resource Advocates, who advocated for SB5, said the governor's staff did not accept multiple proposals during negotiations for different types of removal processes, and did not put forward their own. 'The big picture is that she asked us to make multiple compromises and didn't make any of her own,' Fallon said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Deadline nears for big game draw application in New Mexico
NEW MEXICO (KRQE) – The application deadline for the 2025-2026 Big Game Draw is fast approaching. Hunters can submit their application online, by calling the New Mexico Game and Fish Department's info center, or through walk-ins. Inmate work crew finds gun along Interstate 40 in Cibola County The info center will continue its extended hours on Monday and Tuesday until 6 p.m. The application deadline is this Wednesday at 5 p.m. For more information on how to apply, click this link. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
28-01-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Bill to rename New Mexico Game and Fish Department snags approval
Whether you shoot with a camera or a gun, anyone who enjoys the outdoors in New Mexico will want to pay attention to Senate Bill 5 during the 60-day legislative session. The bill, which cleared its first legislative committee Monday, represents the biggest proposed reform of the New Mexico Game and Fish Department since its inception, from renaming it the Department of Wildlife and expanding its mission to reflect its new name to raising fees for hunting and fishing licenses for the first time in nearly two decades. The proposal, which the Senate Rules Committee endorsed 6-3, also would change the way members of the New Mexico Game Commission are appointed by creating a nominating committee that would vet applicants and recommend a list of eligible candidates to the governor. "Perhaps not everyone is 100% sold on the bill," said Rep. Matthew McQueen, D-Cerrillos, who has been pursuing similar legislation for years. "But we have heard from different points of view, and we have tried to address those points of view, so I think the bill is in pretty good shape." Though three Republican members of the Senate Rules Committee voted against SB 5, a fourth member of the GOP caucus, Sen. Crystal Brantley, R-Elephant Butte, not only voted in support of the legislation but signed on as a co-sponsor. McQueen said he views the bill as a package with four parts. The first changes the name of the department and "clarifies" its mission, he said. "The agency already conserves and manages a broad range of species, so the agency already has authority over some nongame species," he said. "What we're trying to do is clarify that authority and make it so the agency has the authority to engage in management of any species in New Mexico but the discretion not to." The second part of the bill reforms the State Game Commission, which oversees the agency. "In keeping with the history of the commission, we maintain seven seats overall," he said, "three at-large seats that have geographic and political diversity requirements and four new positions. There's a rancher or farmer, a hunter/angler, a conservationist and a scientist." McQueen predicts the commission would end up with more than one hunter, as has been the case in the past. "There's a lot of overlap between these different positions," he said. "The ultimate commission will have a mix of people that we think adequately represents diverse interests." Critical to the process is creating a nominating committee, he said, adding a bill that distributed the appointments to different political leaders in state government was vetoed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham a couple of years ago. "What I realized in the process of working on that bill is that when I was trying to take the politics out of the commission, what I really was kind of doing was rearranging the politics," he said. "If you get an appointment from the speaker of the House, that's a fairly political appointment, and the governor, since it's an executive branch agency, also objected to having the Legislature make appointments." Members of the nominating committee, who would be appointed by different political officials, would review applicants' qualifications and send a list of eligible candidates for the governor, who would make an appointment with the consent of the Senate. "The governor will pick from a list of prescreened qualified people to be on the Game Commission," McQueen said, adding the new panel would have four advisory members, including the director of the state's Outdoor Recreation Division and the state land commissioner. Commissioners would serve six-year staggered terms "that will extend beyond a governor's term" to prevent a major shakeup when a new governor takes office. The third part of the bill would increase fees on 36 of 53 hunting and fishing licenses "and create a mechanism, using the consumer price index, for raising the fees in subsequent years without the need to amend statute," according to the fiscal impact report. "The fourth part of the bill, which actually isn't in the bill but is really important to the bill, is funding," McQueen said, adding the Legislative Finance Committee's proposed budget includes $3.5 million in annual funding for three years to help the department manage its "broader mission." "We've worked hard to accommodate diverse interests," he said. "I think we're in a good place." Supporters of the bill include the New Mexico Wildlife Federation, the Audubon Society and the New Mexico Soil and Water Conservation Districts. The only opposition was from the New Mexico Cattle Growers' Association, which raised concerns about expanding the mission of the department. While the association agrees license fees should be increased, President-elect Tom Paterson said they need to be "reasonable." He specifically called out the proposed increase for a junior trapper's license, which would jump to $50 from $9. "That's a problem for our rural kids," he said. "Regardless of your views on trapping, please don't punish rural kids."
