Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission
Regulations Committee
January 19, 2000
Commission Hearing RoomTexas Parks & Wildlife Department Headquarters Complex
4200 Smith School Road
Austin, TX 78744
7 BE IT REMEMBERED that heretofore on the 19th
8 day of January 2000, there came on to be heard
9 matters under the regulatory authority of the
10 Parks and Wildlife Commission of Texas, in the
11 commission hearing room of the Texas Parks and
12 Wildlife Headquarters complex, Austin, Travis
13 County, Texas, beginning at 10:17 a.m., to wit:
14
15
APPEARANCES:
16 THE PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION:
17 REGULATIONS COMMITTEE:
Chair: Lee M. Bass
18 Carol E. Dinkins
Dick W. Heath (absent)
19 Nolan Ryan
Ernest Angelo, Jr.
20 John Avila, Jr.
Alvin L. Henry
21 Katharine Armstrong Idsal
Mark E. Watson, Jr.
22
THE PARKS AND WILDLIFE DEPARTMENT:
23 Andrew H. Sansom, Executive Director, and other
personnel of the Parks and Wildlife Department.
24
25
.0002
1 JANUARY 19, 2000
2 *-*-*-*-*
3 REGULATIONS COMMITTEE MEETING
4 *-*-*-*-*
5 CHAIRMAN BASS: Okay. We'll now
6 proceed with our regulations committee meeting.
7 And I think our first order of business will be
8 approval of the minutes from our earlier meeting
9 which have been distributed. Does anybody have
10 any comments or a motion for approval?
11 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Move
12 approval.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: I have a motion.
14 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: Second.
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: All in favor?
16 (Motion passed unanimously.)
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: Motion carries.
18 Thank you.
19 AGENDA ITEM NO. 1: BRIEFING - CHAIRMAN'S CHARGES.
20 Briefing on the chairman's charges.
21 Mr. Sansom, would you please speak to that.
22 MR. SANSOM: Mr. Chairman, I would
23 only note that the Sunset process is proceeding.
24 We have, fortunately, some members of the team
25 are here with us today. They have completed a
.0003
1 trip through the Trans Pecos last week. And we
2 have a meeting scheduled with the Sunset
3 Commission, our first meeting, February 3rd.
4 Currently the public meeting to
5 examine the recommendations of the Sunset
6 Committee staff is proposed for May 18th. You
7 will see on your agenda this morning a proposed
8 licensed management system for Finfish, which is
9 a direct follow-through on the charges. And
10 Doctor McKinney will also discuss an accelerated
11 opportunity for -- to accelerate the buyback
12 program in the bay shrimp fishery.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: Andy, do I
14 understand correctly that the 18th is the day of
15 the public -- or the meeting where it will be
16 appropriate for the Commission to appear in front
17 of the Sunset Commission?
18 MR. SANSOM: Yes, sir.
19 COMMISSIONER WATSON: February the
20 18th?
21 MR. SANSOM: May.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: May the 18th.
23 MR. SANSOM: Now, our first meeting
24 before the Commission will be on February 3rd.
25 At that meeting I have been invited to appear and
.0004
1 present the issues which we all discussed and
2 appeared in our self-evaluation report, to
3 comment about the process a little bit, and to
4 take any questions or comments that the members
5 might present. And I would be remiss if I did
6 not indicate to you-all that any of you would
7 certainly be welcome and most helpful at that
8 meeting as well. The crucial meeting will be the
9 May 18th meeting.
10 CHAIRMAN BASS: And also we're
11 scheduled for availability to meet with the
12 representatives of the work force --
13 MR. SANSOM: Tomorrow afternoon.
14 CHAIRMAN BASS: -- tomorrow
15 afternoon after the public session. Thank you.
16 Anything else?
17 AGENDA ITEM NO. 2: ACTION - 2000-2001
18 STATEWIDE HUNTING AND FISHING PROCLAMATION.
19 MR. SANSOM: No.
20 CHAIRMAN BASS: All right. We have
21 three items on the agenda, all of which will be
22 action items under consideration of the full
23 commission meeting tomorrow. The first one that
24 we'll review at this time is the statewide
25 hunting and fishing proclamation. And I believe
.0005
1 Doctor McKinney is going to lead off this portion
2 with some information for us on the license
3 buyback program.
4 DR. McKINNEY: Thank you,
5 Mr. Chairman. For the record, I'm Larry
6 McKinney, senior director for aquatic resources
7 and joining me will be Hal Osburn, our director
8 for coastal fisheries.
9 I've been asked to lay out in front
10 of you is something for your consideration that
11 we would seek your input on and some direction of
12 considering this idea as we go through our public
13 hearings as -- to judge support or interest or
14 concerns about the possibility of accelerating
15 our buyback programs in our commercial fisheries,
16 particularly in the shrimp.
17 Certainly one of the important
18 issues for us in our coastal management and one,
19 I think, if you're going to lay out the top six
20 or ten issues, is the impact of shrimping on our
21 bays and estuaries. It's certainly of great
22 concern to us, and finding ways to address that
23 issue is an important one to us.
24 This picture was taken by Earl
25 Nottingham of our staff in Aransas Bay last year
.0006
1 and I think it pretty well illustrates the
2 concerns we're talking about of really too many
3 and too much from all perspectives, from the
4 commercial and recreational fisheries as well,
5 and that's what we want to talk about
6 addressing. And one way to do that is to look at
7 an accelerated licensed buyback approach.
8 Certainly accomplishing the goals of
9 our limited entry programs that our agency has
10 pioneered through the Gulf would be enhanced and
11 would be of benefit to both our recreational
12 commercial industries, if we could do that. And
13 accelerating that program has broad support in
14 both fisheries in general terms. The specifics
15 is, the devil is in the details, as always, and
16 that's what we want to talk about.
17 The status of our buyback efforts
18 today, of course in shrimp we've been underway
19 for some time. Of the 3,231 original licenses
20 we've retired about 15 percent. In the crab
21 fishery we had 287 original licenses when we
22 started that. We have not really begun that
23 process, and certainly Finfish has just been
24 passed this last legislative session with 970
25 licenses, and we have not begun to purchase there
.0007
1 either. So shrimp is the area that we've focused
2 on and continue to do so.
3 CHAIRMAN BASS: Larry, the 15
4 percent of the licenses retired, do we have any
5 way to measure what corresponding reduction in
6 effort that might represent?
7 DR. McKINNEY: I'm going to ask Hal
8 to kick in here a little bit. Not a great deal.
9 I'm going to say, in that there were of course
10 through speculators, people that had those
11 licenses and then held them. To some extent you
12 have to take those out of the market.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: Take those out
14 first.
15 DR. McKINNEY: Some boats have gone
16 with that. Hal, maybe -- please comment.
17 MR. OSBURN: Well, every license is
18 a potential effort in the future. When we return
19 our stocks to the shape we want them to be in,
20 and if those licenses are retired, then that
21 potential effort is eliminated. We know that the
22 first half of our buyback or the first portion of
23 our buyback is going to include speculators. So
24 the amount of effort and, of course, the ones
25 remaining in the fishery can choose to shrimp
.0008
1 harder, as well. So it's going to -- it's not
2 the only solution, is buying them back. That's
3 the status.
4 CHAIRMAN BASS: I guess it's safe to
5 say we have a reduced effort by 15 percent. But
6 do you think we have reduced effort by -- would
7 you even have any way to speculate whether five
8 percent would be a reasonable number or --
9 MR. OSBURN: I think in an average
10 year we would have reduced effort actually closer
11 to the ten percent range. This last year,
12 however, mother nature helped us reduce effort by
13 having a very poor shrimp crop. Of course, our
14 overcapitalization has contributed to that. But
15 the low shrimp yield produced a side effect of a
16 lot of shrimpers just not going out there. So we
17 actually had a fairly significant reduction in
18 effort. But on the average, I think the 15
19 percent did have -- did contribute in a
20 measurable way to our effort of reduction.
21 CHAIRMAN BASS: Thank you.
22 DR. McKINNEY: Towards that line,
23 one of the options which we want to focus on
24 today, talk about is how to accelerate that
25 program. The option that we're -- laid out on
.0009
1 the table for discussion is possibly increasing
2 the saltwater fishing stamp, adding a fee to it
3 that would be dedicated to buyback.
4 What we have not included in this
5 discussion, for example, is increasing the fee
6 that the commercial fishermen already pay. They
7 do contribute to the buyback fund about $140,000
8 a year. That's another option that can be looked
9 at. And we've kind of held back on that in that
10 that whole issue is being reviewed under Sunset
11 and also by an audit by the comptroller's office
12 to look at commercial fisheries. So I think that
13 will be addressed in that way.
14 But looking at this particular
15 option, we certainly have some experience in this
16 area. And with -- have laid out some criteria
17 for success in doing that. For example, clearly
18 if we were going to increase that saltwater stamp
19 amount, it needs broad constituent support to
20 make it successful. People really need to do --
21 would want to support it. We would certainly
22 want to have very clearly defined goals and
23 measurable goals that we'd want to set so we
24 could say, here's what we want to accomplish,
25 here's how we can measure if we're accomplishing
.0010
1 that. And the third element there is basically a
2 defined sunset on an activity like this. People
3 are always concerned, well, if you increase the
4 fee for a particular reason, you're just going to
5 keep that fee and you'll just keep on going with
6 it. One way to allay that fear is to say, we'll
7 set a goal at what we think we can achieve and at
8 that date the program would basically end, and it
9 would take proaction on your part to continue
10 it. But we would have measures and go at it. So
11 that's kind of the premises that we've proceeded
12 on.
13 So the first thing we looked at in
14 the buyback is, let's say we -- let's set a goal
15 of retiring 50 percent of those original
16 licenses. And we picked that goal. One is
17 because it translates into some efforts back and
18 basically trying to reduce efforts to something
19 that we saw perhaps back in the '70s. And that's
20 an important point that I know Hal is probably
21 going to make some comment on. But in setting
22 goals, you have to be careful. Our goal is not
23 necessarily just to buyback licenses. I mean,
24 that's a benefit to the commercial industry. It
25 helps them reach a sustainable fishery, which we
.0011
1 want to do.
2 But the other objective from impacts
3 on other parts of ecology of the coast and
4 recreational is effort. As the chairman referred
5 to, our real goal is reduced effort. And how can
6 we measure that, how do we combine it? That's a
7 little bit more difficult. We know, for example,
8 that for every three licenses, there's probably
9 two boats. For three licenses, there's two boats
10 associated with those licenses, so as you reduce
11 in that term, you can have an effect that way.
12 But making a very clear -- setting a very clear
13 goal of what we think we can achieve and reducing
14 effort will be key to this. But difficult, too,
15 as we just discussed.
16 So here are the options that we laid
17 out. We looked at three pricing options, an
18 increase of $3, $2, and $1. We further split
19 that out into an overall increase of the
20 saltwater stamp, basically saying, if you buy our
21 super combo, it basically says that super combo
22 would increase by $3 because of the additional
23 figure.
24 Now, we've had some concern, we'll
25 talk about perhaps, or if you want to, that that
.0012
1 super combo is a really -- it's a good selling
2 item, it's right -- the price at $49 is under
3 50. Do we have to -- what happens if you kick
4 that over to the 52 or 3? There's some issues
5 there.
6 So we also looked at an option of
7 just selling -- increasing the saltwater stamp
8 itself, not with combo. But when you buy your
9 individual fishing license to fish on the coast,
10 you have to buy a stamp. It would be only
11 increased for those people that only buy fishing
12 licenses, not the combo, to kind of look at it.
13 And that has some advantages and that type of
14 thing, but that's how it was set out. And then
15 we did the same across those dollar ranges.
16 So you can see that the amount of
17 money that would be generated, that's the next
18 line, under each one of those scenarios. And our
19 projection on the third -- on the middle line of
20 how long it would take us to reach our 50 percent
21 goal if, for example, we just increased our
22 saltwater stamp $3 across the board, for both
23 combos and so forth, we feel we could hit our 50
24 percent goal in three years. If we only dealt
25 with the super -- nonsuper combo stamps, it would
.0013
1 take us five years, and so on. And a projection
2 of the amount of money we would spend over that
3 period of time to do that.
4 Unless there's any questions, I'll
5 go on to another table, that's basically what
6 that would look like.
7 We looked at another option, and
8 that basically says, well, what if we wanted to
9 address all of our commercial fisheries? What if
10 we wanted to try to accelerate buyback not only
11 in shrimp, certainly shrimp is the focus, but can
12 we do so in crab and finfish? And so we came up
13 with an option and looked at trying to hit our 50
14 percent goal in shrimp, but let's dedicate 30
15 percent of the monies to crab and finfish over
16 this period of time and see what would happen.
17 And this is the chart on that. That
18 bottom line there just basically shows that, for
19 example, using the first two on the table, if we
20 added $3 across the board, that in that period of
21 time we're talking about, that we would retire 50
22 percent of the shrimp licenses, we would also
23 retire about 36 percent of all those others
24 licenses as well. And then you can follow the
25 scenario across the board.
.0014
1 What that does, I want to make sure
2 we point that out, is that if we try to be more
3 broad and not just look at shrimp alone, you can
4 see -- I pulled this number off that first
5 chart -- that it does increase the amount of time
6 it takes to reach our 50 percent goal in shrimp.
7 And, again, I'll use those first two columns,
8 where if we focused only on shrimp and not the
9 other fisheries, it would take us three and five
10 years under the $3 scenario, to reach our goal.
11 Whereas if we rolled in finfish and crabs, it
12 would take us five and six years. It would
13 basically add two years to the first scenario,
14 one year to the others to reach our goal. So it
15 adds some time.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: Larry, just to be
17 sure I understand your chart correctly. Your
18 column that $3 with combo, and under that
19 scenario the combo license would go from 49 to
20 52.
21 DR. McKINNEY: $3 addition.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: In addition to that
23 the fishing-only license would also increase $3.
24 If you only bought a fishing license, not a
25 combo, would that license --
.0015
1 DR. McKINNEY: No. It's associated
2 with the saltwater stamp. Anytime you buy a
3 saltwater stamp --
4 CHAIRMAN BASS: The stamp would go
5 up --
6 DR. McKINNEY: -- it's $3.
7 CHAIRMAN BASS: If you bought a
8 fishing license plus a stamp. Okay.
9 DR. McKINNEY: If you just bought a
10 normal fishing license and didn't go to the
11 coast, no change.
12 CHAIRMAN BASS: If I bought a
13 regular fishing license and a stamp, I would also
14 be paying $3 extra?
15 DR. McKINNEY: Additional $3.
16 Right.
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: The second column,
18 $3 without combo, the combo would stay at 49 but
19 the separate stamp would go up?
20 DR. McKINNEY: The separate stamp
21 would go up.
22 MR. SANSOM: You would also expect
23 in that scenario that you would drive people more
24 to the combo. So the percentage of combo would
25 go up to this program as well.
.0016
1 DR. McKINNEY: And that's a formula
2 we'd look at to see if it did. Because you
3 would, you'd think it makes that combo even a
4 better deal because of that.
5 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: Does monies
6 from the combo go to this program?
7 MR. SANSOM: Not now.
8 DR. McKINNEY: Not now. There's --
9 only -- we have a fund, a buyback fund that's
10 supported solely by the commercial fisheries. A
11 portion of their license fee goes to that fund,
12 about $149,000.
13 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: Well, to the
14 extent that the saltwater stamp might flush
15 people over into the combo, would that be an
16 appropriate source for some funds?
17 DR. McKINNEY: Well, we would have
18 to look at it. We'd have to come up with some
19 kind of formula because we hope those sales are
20 going up. And it may go up regardless. We'd
21 have to sit down and try to figure out a formula
22 that would be acceptable to apportion that out.
23 But certainly it can.
24 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: What's the
25 explanation of the dollar spent column? I don't
.0017
1 know that I understand that. Those numbers don't
2 actually go under the upper heading or do they?
3 DR. McKINNEY: On the bottom, the
4 third?
5 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Right.
6 DR. McKINNEY: That is, if we hit
7 our goal in that five-year period, for example,
8 in the first one, we will have expended 8.8 --
9 our calculations would be that over that
10 five-year period we would have expended $8.8
11 million in the program. That's the total amount
12 of dollars generated over that period to hit 50
13 percent of the licenses.
14 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: What -- how
15 does it get to be 22.3 million on -- am I reading
16 that right? I don't think I understand the rest
17 of the table.
18 DR. McKINNEY: Over the --
19 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: I'm looking at
20 the shrimp license.
21 MR. SANSOM: He's back one slide
22 from where you are.
23 DR. McKINNEY: Okay. Let me go -- I
24 think I can go back.
25 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: On the one
.0018
1 you're looking at, it goes to 29.5.
2 DR. McKINNEY: Over 55?
3 COMMISSIONER WATSON: That's 54
4 years.
5 DR. McKINNEY: Over that period of
6 time. If it took us that long, we'd continue
7 to --
8 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: It costs that
9 much more if you do it over that period of time?
10 Is that what you're saying?
11 DR. McKINNEY: If you're only buying
12 a few licenses at a time.
13 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: So it costs
14 that much more to do it.
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: And he's putting a
16 ten percent inflation --
17 MR. OSBURN: Right.
18 DR. McKINNEY: There's a ten percent
19 inflation on there. That does --
20 MR. OSBURN: That's the primary
21 reason, is the inflation.
22 DR. McKINNEY: It does drive that
23 up. I guess that's why we fight inflation so
24 much.
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: As they become more
.0019
1 scarce, you would expect the price to outpace the
2 basic inflation.
3 DR. McKINNEY: What we're doing is
4 finally creating a real market. There will be a
5 point where they will be too valuable for us to
6 actually buy.
7 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: So the point
8 of that is, it's a shorter time that you can get
9 them is. It would be --
10 CHAIRMAN BASS: From a pure business
11 point of view, I would think the shorter time
12 that we could buy them back, we might be able to
13 get -- to pull more out of the --
14 MR. SANSOM: The cost per unit is
15 more efficient?
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: Yeah. Pull them out
17 of the marketplace at a faster rate than the
18 industry recovers, than the actual competing bids
19 from people wanting to enter the industry would
20 raise the price.
21 MR. SANSOM: And that's particularly
22 true, given the conditions in the fishery, you
23 know, at the present time.
24 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: So that you
25 need to do it faster, for that reason, too.
.0020
1 DR. McKINNEY: If we were to address
2 more than shrimp, for example, if we were to
3 include all of those, both finfish and crabs,
4 we'd try to maintain some flexibility in where we
5 put our money in any one year. Because one year
6 we might be able to buy lots of crab licenses or
7 shrimp. So you want to take advantage of the
8 market that you've created.
9 CHAIRMAN BASS: There would need to
10 be more guidelines than --
11 DR. McKINNEY: Yeah, I mean, you
12 just want to maximize your dollar's return within
13 the goals that you set.
14 COMMISSIONER RYAN: What's the going
15 price of the buyback license?
16 DR. McKINNEY: About six, 6,000.
17 COMMISSIONER RYAN: 6,000?
18 DR. McKINNEY: In that range. I
19 think. It hasn't changed?
20 DR. McKINNEY: Yes.
21 MR. SANSOM: And that's accelerating
22 pretty rapidly in the years that I've --
23 CHAIRMAN BASS: We've spent how much
24 money to date, Hal?
25 MR. OSBURN: About two and a half
.0021
1 million dollars.
2 COMMISSIONER RYAN: How much do we
3 have in the fund?
4 MR. OSBURN: We've spent the fund
5 down to -- we've only got like $150,000,
6 $200,000, which is this year's license monies.
7 Normally we've had enough money because we got
8 some grants the last couple of years. We had a
9 $1.3 million grant that has been allowing us to
10 have a buyback twice a year. We don't have
11 enough to have but one buyback this year. And it
12 won't have as much money as any of the previous
13 license buybacks.
14 CHAIRMAN BASS: We've also been able
15 to use some funds from litigation settlements, I
16 guess, the environmental fines that were imposed
17 on the coast. Some of that money flowed into
18 this fund, did it not?
19 COMMISSIONER RYAN: And we've
20 depleted that?
21 CHAIRMAN BASS: Yes. That's not to
22 say that another industrial user or something
23 might not incur a fine in the future that
24 would --
25 DR. McKINNEY: And contribution from
.0022
1 the private --
2 CHAIRMAN BASS: But we can't budget
3 it.
4 DR. McKINNEY: And that's kind of a
5 bonus. If we get the cooperation with CCA or --
6 that would be additional monies that came in.
7 And, for example, what we're talking about, we
8 got almost a million dollar infusion from that
9 kind of source. That really accelerated our
10 efforts. So those come along, that helps cut
11 time off. A million dollars, you cut a year off
12 the program, basically, we've generated and
13 reduced.
14 The last one and I think we've
15 already discussed them, is just some
16 considerations that you've discussed, that
17 certainly we have the legislative authority. As
18 we move forward, we'll have to deal with the
19 appropriations authority to make sure that it's
20 covered. If we were to move into this program
21 very quickly, then we have some limits. We only
22 have about $2 million over our existing
23 appropriations authority. Market issues. We've
24 discussed those. That basically is it and kind
25 of where we are on --
.0023
1 MR. OSBURN: Let me just add one
2 final thought. Our shrimp rule review, which we
3 have in progress now, that we hope this summer to
4 have some -- a restructured set of fishing rules
5 for you that would be more ecologically sound,
6 sustainable. This buyback is complimentary to
7 that. So that as we change the dynamics in the
8 fishery and folks don't want to be a part of the
9 new, you know, ecologically responsible fishery
10 that we need to create, that gives them an option
11 to move out, kind of painlessly. And that helps
12 the fishing communities along the coast. But
13 without money in the buyback, we don't have a way
14 to do that.
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: It gives them an
16 exit option that they would not have if there
17 wasn't money in the buyback.
18 MR. OSBURN: Right. Buyback can't
19 solve the problem alone. New means and methods
20 can't solve the problem alone. But complimentary
21 to each other, they can.
22 DR. McKINNEY: I call this Hal's A &
23 M strategy. Highway 6 runs both ways. We'll buy
24 you out, but if you don't -- you know, and set
25 the rules. But we can get you that.
.0024
1 CHAIRMAN BASS: How many saltwater
2 license do we sell a year, approximately, now,
3 separate from, you know --
4 MR. OSBURN: Stamps, I think is
5 about 450, 500 thousand, about 500,000.
6 CHAIRMAN BASS: And out of each
7 commercial license, what, $50 goes into the
8 buyback fund?
9 MR. OSBURN: 25.
10 CHAIRMAN BASS: $25.
11 DR. McKINNEY: Not much, really.
12 MR. OSBURN: We're getting about
13 $200,000 a year from all of our commercial
14 licenses.
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: Well, there is some
16 symmetry to the sports fishermen putting some
17 dollars in alongside the commercial people,
18 because that's -- certainly the benefit flows
19 both ways.
20 What you're really asking from us or
21 intending to do with our consent is to go forward
22 with these ideas and bounce them around in the
23 constituent of groups and see what level of
24 support there is or alternative ideas that might
25 grow out of --
.0025
1 MR. OSBURN: Yes.
2 DR. McKINNEY: What questions come
3 up.
4 MR. SANSOM: A lot of it boils down
5 to whether the anglers proceed if there's -- you
6 know, there's value to them.
7 MR. OSBURN: I will tell you that we
8 have done, in conjunction with Texas A & M
9 University, some mail surveys a number of years.
10 And we have asked, do you feel like you're
11 getting value from your saltwater stamp. And the
12 ratings are very, very high, that, yes, folks are
13 getting value, the law enforcement and management
14 both. And so there is certainly a core support
15 for the saltwater stamp. Whether it remains with
16 license increases is something else we want to --
17 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: What does that
18 stamp cost day?
19 MR. OSBURN: $7.
20 DR. McKINNEY: I would echo the
21 Executive Director's comment. I think it's an
22 important one, that whether we can do this or
23 not, we have to have our fishing constituents,
24 recreational fishers comfortable that -- what
25 they're going to get for that. That there's
.0026
1 going to be a reduced effort dealing with
2 by-catch. And I think we can demonstrate it, but
3 how we do, and make sure will be -- that will be
4 the key. That's all from me at this time, sir.
5 CHAIRMAN BASS: I'd encourage you to
6 go forward and let's find out. There's a lot of
7 discussion up and down the coast and inland, as
8 well, about ways to try to accelerate this. I
9 personally wouldn't be too worried that 49 plus
10 three doesn't -- there's not a 52 dollar bill,
11 there's a 50 dollar bill, but I wouldn't worry
12 about that in terms of the price of the combo.
13 It's such a good deal in terms of the discounted
14 value already, that I don't -- I wouldn't get too
15 worried about that.
16 But I'd also -- I rarely if ever
17 have seen anybody say that they think that the
18 price of what they do should go up. So if
19 there's not overwhelming support to increase the
20 pricing, I -- that wouldn't necessarily scare me
21 off in and of itself, either.
22 DR. McKINNEY: There is that factor,
23 sir. We will report back to you on what we find.
24 And appreciate the opportunity to present it.
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: How long do you
.0027
1 think it will be before we hear something back?
2 DR. McKINNEY: We're going to put
3 this in our regular hearings process that we do.
4 At any time, we can give a report. But certainly
5 next meeting we will give you an update on where
6 we are and on from there.
7 CHAIRMAN BASS: I would think this
8 might be something that one or two targeted
9 scoping meetings, with both the commercial and
10 the recreational industry, would potentially be
11 helpful, too.
12 DR. McKINNEY: We'll make sure that
13 they are aware and can participate. I believe
14 that concludes, then, Mr. Chairman. I'll turn it
15 over to -- Hal, are you --
16 MR. OSBURN: I think Phil is next.
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: Thank you.
18 MR. DUROCHER: Good morning, Mr.
19 Chairman, commissioners, I'm Phil Durocher, the
20 director of inland fisheries division. Spend a
21 few minutes this morning going over the
22 recommended changes or the changes that we'd like
23 to ask the commission to allow us to go to public
24 hearing with for this year. Most of these
25 changes deal with the black basses. On a
.0028
1 statewide change that we're recommending, the
2 current limit on spotted and Guadalupe bass is a
3 12-inch minimum length limit, five fish, daily
4 bag, of course this is in combination with other
5 black basses.
6 What we're recommending is to change
7 this to a no minimum length limit and five fish
8 daily bag. Justification for this change is --
9 of course, both of these species remain
10 relatively small in size. In a majority of our
11 waters, these fish never exceed the minimum
12 length limits of 12 inches. Because of this
13 we've got some buildups in some of our lakes of
14 these populations and it's causing an increase in
15 competition with other species for the forage.
16 This change, we believe, would allow
17 additional harvest, would allow anglers to remove
18 some of the surplus fish and allow some harvest,
19 and of course it will reduce the competition for
20 the forage.
21 On lake specific changes one
22 recommendation we have at Lake Jacksonville,
23 Cleburne State Park, and Meridian State Park, the
24 current regulation on largemouth bass is a
25 14-inch minimum length, five fish daily bag. And
.0029
1 the staff is recommending that be changed to an
2 18-inch minimum length limit, five fish daily
3 bag.
4 Both of these state parks, Meridian
5 and Cleburne are relatively small in size, 116
6 acres and 73 acres. And we've been working with
7 the State park staff, our staff has been working
8 with the State parks to increase the angling
9 quality in these lakes and hopefully increase
10 visitation. Currently the bass populations on
11 these lakes are relatively low density. There's
12 not many bass there for anglers to catch or
13 harvest. And we believe the regulation will
14 protect additional quality size bass from harvest
15 and allow their populations to build up.
16 Lake Jacksonville is a little
17 different situation. It's a relatively large,
18 1300-acre reservoir. Again, though, the bass
19 above 14 inches are at low density. And we have
20 a lot of small bass, especially spotted bass are
21 abundant in this lake. And we believe the
22 removal of the spotted bass length limit will be
23 beneficial, will help reduce some of the pressure
24 on the forage and allow the quality of the bass
25 population to improve in Lake Jacksonville.
.0030
1 In the Austin area, Lake Austin,
2 Town Lake and Buescher State Park, the current
3 regulation on largemouth bass in these waters is
4 14-inch minimum length limit, five fish daily
5 bag. We're looking at a change to a 14- to
6 21-inch slot limit, five fish daily bag, with
7 only one bass over 21 inches or greater.
8 Buescher State Park, again, we've been working
9 with the State park staff. It's a relatively
10 small lake, 25 acres. It has a fairly good bass
11 population currently and it's a high-use
12 situation. And what this regulation will do is
13 allow us to maintain the quality fishery, protect
14 the quality size fish, and allow harvest on the
15 lower end, so people that are utilizing the lake,
16 fishing off the bank, the fish below 14 inches,
17 they'll be allowed to keep five of those. So we
18 can increase harvest and still maintain the
19 quality of the fishery.
20 Town Lake in Austin is a little
21 different situation. It hasn't -- it has an
22 excellent bass population, which has developed
23 because of several factors. Primarily -- the
24 primary factor has been a fish consumption
25 advisory which has been in effect on this lake
.0031
1 for the last four or five years. And, of course,
2 it has limited boat access. No gas motors are
3 allowed on the reservoir currently.
4 The consumption advisory has been
5 lifted. So harvest is -- the potential for
6 overharvest and reduction in angling is there.
7 We saw what was happening on the lake prior to
8 implementation of the fish consumption advisory
9 and the fishery has really improved. And we're
10 concerned that once this advisory was removed,
11 that the potential for overharvest is really
12 going to increase.
13 Lake Austin, it's a little different
14 situation. Lake Austin has produced numerous
15 ten-pound bass in recent years. And we ask our
16 biologists not only to look at the situations
17 that they currently are with regard to bass
18 populations, we ask them to look into the future,
19 try to project what's going to happen and try to
20 be proactive in their recommendations.
21 The biologist here was concerned
22 about the increasing Central Texas population,
23 could increase the harvest and perhaps affect
24 that population. We went out and sought public
25 input on these recommendations. Primarily we
.0032
1 held two public meetings in the two areas where
2 we felt like it would be the most controversy, at
3 Jacksonville with regards to Lake Jacksonville
4 and here in Austin for the Austin proposals.
5 Only two people showed up at the scoping meeting
6 we had in Jacksonville. And they supported the
7 regulation.
8 Here in Austin we had 17 people that
9 attended the meeting of -- seven people spoke and
10 all of them opposed the regulations. There was a
11 lot more opposition in Austin. And it was
12 primarily concerns about -- we have a population
13 that is in good shape and why, why mess with it,
14 and concerns from some of the bass club people
15 about the effects this would have on
16 tournaments.
17 We -- the staff has received that
18 input and there were some really good comments
19 made. And we're certainly taking that into
20 advisement and we're asking the Commission to
21 allow us to go to public hearings and get more
22 input before we make a decision. But some of the
23 comments were really good, and we're taking those
24 in.
25 Mr. Sansom also asked that I address
.0033
1 several other issues while I was here, to give
2 you a brief status on the study that we're
3 conducting at Lake Fork. Of course, you know, we
4 had one tournament. And I gave you the report on
5 the results of that at the last commission
6 meeting in November. That tournament was held on
7 October 9th and 10th. We don't have any dates
8 set for the second tournament. The problem there
9 now is, the sponsors -- the people that are
10 putting on the tournaments are having trouble
11 getting sponsors because of the threats of the
12 lawsuit. We have asked the Attorney General to
13 set up a hearing, which has been set for February
14 3rd, try to get a summary judgment to get that
15 lawsuit removed so we can move on. So we're
16 going to have that hearing. And before we get
17 back together, we'll know more about what's going
18 to happen.
19 There's also been some inquiries
20 from the Commission about what our authority is
21 with regards to regulating fishing tournaments.
22 Let me just say that the Commission currently has
23 no regulatory authority over tournaments. If it
24 was the desire of the commission to begin looking
25 at regulations of fishing tournaments, then
.0034
1 legislation would be needed.
2 Let me just say that in 1993 we
3 introduced a bill to create a no-cost permit for
4 fishing tournaments. Our intention at the time
5 was to gather information on how many tournaments
6 are being held, potential impact over how many
7 fish they're catching. And that bill was
8 defeated by tournament organizers. They were
9 concerned at the time that this was a move by the
10 agency to begin controlling fishing tournaments.
11 That was not our intent at the time. Our intent
12 was to find a way to gather information to know.
13 Because right now we don't know how many
14 tournaments are held, where they're held, how
15 many people are involved. We were looking for a
16 way to gather that information. But before any
17 move could be made to regulate or anything on
18 tournaments, there would have to be some
19 legislation passed.
20 And with that, I'd be glad to answer
21 any questions about the regulation proposals or
22 any of these other subjects that we've
23 addressed.
24 COMMISSIONER WATSON: What is the
25 basis of the lawsuit against the sponsors?
.0035
1 MR. DUROCHER: It's not against the
2 sponsors. It's primarily against the agency.
3 They're contending that the agency didn't have
4 the authority to allow these tournaments to take
5 place under a scientific permit. And our
6 contention is, we certainly do have that
7 authority. We do it quite regularly.
8 MR. SANSOM: The plaintiffs have
9 also asked to meet with us, you know. So it's
10 conceivable that there may be a break even prior
11 to the February 3rd.
12 COMMISSIONER AVILA: But that's just
13 stating like the Association of Building
14 Contractors can have a tournament but Texas Parks
15 & Wildlife cannot?
16 MR. DUROCHER: No. What we do, this
17 is a scientific study and we have to issue a
18 scientific permit which allows contestants in
19 this tournament to do something that everybody
20 else can't do. And that's to bring those fish
21 into the weigh-in so we can measure the impact of
22 bringing those fish into the weigh-in before they
23 release them. So it is a study and we're doing
24 it under the scientific permit statute.
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: In our tournament
.0036
1 you get to move the tee boxes.
2 COMMISSIONER WATSON: Do you have
3 other public hearings scheduled, you mentioned,
4 for input?
5 MR. DUROCHER: Well, we want to
6 bring these proposals to the public hearing
7 process. Yes, we're going to -- we'll bring them
8 to all of our regular public hearings and then
9 come back to you in April with a recommendation.
10 I don't know exactly how many public hearings we
11 have scheduled.
12 MR. KURZAWSKI: Around 15.
13 MR. DUROCHER: Around 15, we have
14 scheduled all over the state. We're certainly
15 going to have one here again in Austin.
16 COMMISSIONER WATSON: The bottom
17 line is, unless we can get some legislation to
18 put us in position to have some authority on
19 this, you're not going to be able to do very much
20 with your information.
21 MR. DUROCHER: Well, we can educate
22 people with that information. And that's what
23 we're hoping to do.
24 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: The key really
25 is whether we're going to give dispensation to
.0037
1 the tournaments in terms of what they can do and
2 not do.
3 MR. DUROCHER: Right.
4 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: And the fear
5 of the people that are opposing it is that that's
6 going to happen and that that's going to destroy
7 the fishery. Is that not the argument?
8 MR. DUROCHER: Right.
9 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: But I still
10 don't understand why the people that are opposing
11 it, if they're so sure that it's a bad thing,
12 don't want to let this study go through and prove
13 that it's a bad thing.
14 MR. SANSOM: That's our argument.
15 DR. McKINNEY: You succinctly put
16 our argument right there.
17 MR. DUROCHER: We're not afraid of
18 good information.
19 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: We shouldn't
20 be. And they shouldn't be either. Maybe they
21 figure we weren't going to get good information.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: They might be afraid
23 of the conspiracies.
24 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: That we're
25 going to stack the information or whatever.
.0038
1 CHAIRMAN BASS: We're going to cook
2 the books before we --
3 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: I don't know
4 why we would really want to regulate
5 tournaments. I mean, I think that would be
6 something -- you don't ever want to get into
7 that.
8 MR. DUROCHER: I'm not saying it
9 will never be needed but it's certainly not
10 something that we've spoken about.
11 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: If we succeed
12 in getting a summary judgment from the Attorney
13 General, then we would not need additional
14 authority; we could do this under --
15 MR. DUROCHER: We would go ahead and
16 try to complete the study. We want to complete
17 the study.
18 DR. McKINNEY: Which is a critical
19 thing, is getting enough information so that
20 decisions can be made.
21 MR. DUROCHER: Yeah. Our objective
22 is to get enough information so that if the
23 legislature decides to take this issue up again,
24 they will be basing the decision on some good
25 data. And we're concerned now -- the time slot
.0039
1 that we have to gather this information is
2 shrinking. So we need to get moving.
3 CHAIRMAN BASS: But in the grand
4 scheme of things, any negative impact -- or
5 impact on the resource in a reservoir caused by
6 tournaments that are happening in that resource
7 just goes into the overall management mix of what
8 we --
9 MR. DUROCHER: Right. We have no
10 data to indicate that tournaments have a negative
11 impact on our resource. I mean, they're just
12 fisherman, they're fishing. And if they're
13 fishing by the rules that everybody else is
14 fishing by, there's no indication that that's an
15 impact. Now, this is a different situation.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: They want one set of
17 rules for tournaments and one set of rules for
18 everyone else the rest of the year.
19 MR. DUROCHER: And we don't know
20 whether this is going to hurt anything or not.
21 But we need some information.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: Any other questions
23 of Phil at this time? We'll hear back from you
24 in April, I guess.
25 MR. DUROCHER: Yes, sir. Thank
.0040
1 you.
2 CHAIRMAN BASS: Thank you.
3 Okay. Hal, welcome back and we'll
4 do coastal.
5 MR. OSBURN: Yes, sir. Mr.
6 Chairman, commissioners, I'm Hal Osburn. I'm
7 division director of coastal fisheries. I wanted
8 to brief you on our proposals for statewide
9 hunting and fishing proclamation. These
10 proposals were generated by a request to provide
11 consistency with the federal rules established by
12 the National Marine Fisheries Service in federal
13 waters. There are benefits of consistency,
14 increased spawning success, enhanced law
15 enforcement, reduced angler confusion; however,
16 we must also assure that those federal rules are
17 consistent with our Texas management strategies.
18 First proposals were increases in
19 the size limits on billfish, been established in
20 federal waters. Billfish are a recreational only
21 species, however, they have been impacted
22 significantly by by-catch on commercial long
23 lines which are allowed in federal waters.
24 Staff proposal is to adopt those
25 compatible size limits. That will help billfish
.0041
1 conservation. Long-lining in State waters is
2 prohibited, has been for a number of years, but
3 we want to help support now the reduction of
4 long-lining in federal waters.
5 CHAIRMAN BASS: Hal, it's my
6 understanding that the by-catch impact from the
7 long lines has -- on the bill fish has over time
8 been rather significant.
9 MR. OSBURN: Yes, sir. And it's
10 because the long lines are prosecuted for the
11 whole range of the species, from New Jersey all
12 the way around to Texas.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: And in waters that
14 are federally controlled or waters that may be
15 just, I guess, open water, so to speak.
16 MR. OSBURN: Most of all of it is
17 going to be federally controlled, out to 200
18 miles.
19 CHAIRMAN BASS: Is there any effort
20 that you're aware of to -- that's imminent to do
21 anything in that regard?
22 MR. OSBURN: Yeah. Actually there's
23 two things that are happening. There is federal
24 rules proposed right now which would ban
25 long-lining, pelagic long lines, I believe from
.0042
1 like March through September in those portions of
2 waters off Texas, Louisiana, some other areas off
3 Florida. Those are proposed right now. We're
4 going to go to a public hearing next week and
5 participate in that. Those could happen by this
6 summer. Kind of in tandem with that was a bill
7 by Senator John Breaux from Louisiana which also
8 bans some long-lining in those same areas. I
9 think it was just for the summer period. But it
10 included a buyback, some monies from the federal
11 government and some monies from the commercial
12 industry, long-line industry itself, to actually
13 buyback some of those long liners. And they
14 negotiated a deal with those folks so that they
15 could actually extract them from the fishery.
16 Because one of the -- the NMFS proposal doesn't
17 have a buyback. And what can happen there is,
18 the fleet just moves on to another species or
19 starts fishing in a different way. And you may
20 help billfish conservation but now you've got a
21 problem with something else. So kind of like
22 with our limited entry programs and our buyback
23 that we just talked about, we recognize that you
24 can't just make a rule on paper, you have to
25 extract the effort in real terms from the
.0043
1 fishery.
2 CHAIRMAN BASS: And is most of that
3 industry U.S. based or is a significant part of
4 it foreign?
5 MR. OSBURN: The best I can tell, it
6 is mostly U.S. based fleet out of Florida, fleet
7 out of New Orleans. There's about a dozen or so
8 long-line vessels out of Texas. But those
9 vessels can move -- do move very long ways. And
10 they also serve the foreign markets. So whether
11 they're owned by the foreign entities is not
12 always clear, but they certainly serve them.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: And is enough known
14 about the range of these fish to know that if
15 they are -- the pressure is relieved in U.S.
16 waters, that that will -- that that will really
17 relieve pressure on the population, or will we
18 simply be saving them to be caught in Mexican or
19 Canadian waters?
20 MR. OSBURN: Certainly they can go
21 down into Mexico, that would be our concern. But
22 I think that the area out to 200 miles in federal
23 waters would have to have a significant effect.
24 I think the biology says we would certainly
25 reduce the overall mortality. They would spend
.0044
1 time in Mexico waters, still be subject, but they
2 would move out during most of their life history.
3 And as long as there is some place that they
4 have sanctuary from long-lining, they would
5 benefit.
6 CHAIRMAN BASS: And one last
7 question. What's the main target species of
8 these long-liners today?
9 MR. OSBURN: Mostly tuna, tuna
10 fleets, swordfish, shark. Those are the three
11 primary.
12 CHAIRMAN BASS: And how healthy are
13 those populations?
14 MR. OSBURN: Unfortunately I'm
15 getting ready to tell you about some fairly
16 unhealthy shark populations. The swordfish are
17 also in trouble. The tuna not quite as much.
18 But all of those reductions in long-lining effort
19 were designed not just to help billfish
20 conservation but also for the conservation of
21 these other species.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: It's hard to find a
23 restaurant today that doesn't serve tuna. I've
24 always wondered where it all comes from.
25 Okay. Thank you. I'm sorry for the
.0045
1 diversion.
2 MR. OSBURN: You bet. No problem.
3 As we said, federal rules have also been
4 established in -- for shark, for the recreational
5 angler. It formally was no bag limit, no size
6 limit. It is now one Atlantic sharpnose per
7 person and one other shark over four and a half
8 feet.
9 The commercial rules are much more
10 complicated. But they can be summarized by
11 noting that they allow over 5 million pounds of
12 harvest each year of Gulf shark species. Once
13 again, that's taken, much of that, by the
14 long-line fleet.
15 Current Texas rules. One of the
16 first to establish shark rules in the Gulf, five
17 shark bag limit, no size limit. But we do have a
18 game fish status, which means you can only take
19 them with a rod and reel. And those rules apply
20 to both sport and commercial fishermen.
21 And because of those restrictions,
22 we have had very little commercial harvest
23 through the years, at least legally. The sport
24 anglers take about -- one percent of their catch
25 is sharks. That's about 25,000 fish a year.
.0046
1 About half of those are caught in federal
2 waters. Atlantic sharpnose shark do dominate the
3 sport landings. You also get bonnetheads and
4 blacktips quite frequently.
5 And the size of the shark varies
6 considerably. Generally the further offshore
7 that you fish, the larger the shark you're going
8 to catch. You note there that about 21 percent
9 of the sharks are under two feet.
10 We've had our long-term sport creel
11 surveys in place coastwide and we have noted that
12 our Texas anglers are already practicing
13 conservative shark fishing habits. About four
14 out of five successful shark anglers only bring
15 in one shark per trip.
16 We do feel like conservation is
17 going to be needed. The life history
18 characteristics of shark make them vulnerable to
19 overfishing. We also have noted declining
20 populations throughout the range, particularly of
21 the deeper water species that are mostly in
22 federal waters. Staff proposal is to decrease
23 the daily bag limit to one per day per person,
24 establish a 24-inch minimum size limit. Also to
25 prevent a loophole, we're going to close our
.0047
1 commercial season when the federal waters are
2 closed. And once again, we also want to support
3 the reduction of long-lining in federal waters.
4 These measures should help rebuild the stocks,
5 increasing spawning success. I think our sport
6 landings are going to decrease by about one-third
7 with these rules, but we will still have a boat
8 and a shore-based fishery being allowed.
9 And because sharks are notoriously
10 hard to identify, we want to make that one shark
11 be of any species to reduce the angler
12 confusion. That concludes my presentation. I'd
13 be happy to answer any questions.
14 CHAIRMAN BASS: Hal, let me ask you,
15 when we first instituted the regulation on sharks
16 and the limits, et cetera, several years ago,
17 part of the -- what prompted us was that the
18 commercial value of sharks or shark fins in
19 particular was very healthy, primarily from
20 Oriental or Asian markets, as I recall, to the
21 extent that there were numerous instances that we
22 understood of the practice of catching sharks,
23 cutting the fins off, throwing a temporarily
24 still live carcass back in the waters and going
25 on their merry way.
.0048
1 Since that time the Asian economies
2 have fallen from their robust levels for quite --
3 a couple of years now. Do you have any idea
4 whether that's impacted the commercial value of
5 sharks, or is it still holding about the same
6 commercial value it did --
7 MR. OSBURN: There is still a demand
8 for shark fins. Unfortunately it's one of those
9 ceremonial-type dishes that folks will save up
10 for a long time to make sure they have the right
11 ingredients for their ceremonial dinner. Shark
12 fin soup has meanings that I can't describe. But
13 they're -- it's special. And we still have that
14 demand.
15 The rules have been changed in the
16 federal waters to require that folks retain the
17 carcass along with X number of fins. That makes
18 them less efficient because they have less
19 holding space. But it does not prevent them from
20 still targeting those. The price has remained
21 high enough. The Middle East, Egypt in
22 particular, also has a desire for some of these
23 products. So that's been our concern, that the
24 price keeps driving fishermen to go out there.
25 Even when their catch rates go down, their value
.0049
1 remains high enough to justify their trip.
2 CHAIRMAN BASS: So like a recession
3 in the U.S. provides no relief for turkeys in
4 November. Okay. Thank you.
5 Any other questions of Hal? Good
6 program. Thank you.
7 Doctor Graham.
8 DR. GRAHAM: Chairman Bass, members
9 of the committee, I'm Gary Graham, director of
10 the wildlife division and I've asked Jerry Cooke
11 to offer the wildlife statewide proposals for you
12 today.
13 DR. COOKE: Mr. Chairman, members,
14 my name is Jerry Cooke, program director for
15 upland wildlife ecology. And I'll be presenting
16 the specific proposed changes to the statewide
17 hunting and fishing proclamation from our
18 division.
19 Our proposals aside from those that
20 are specifically identified will also include
21 some housekeeping changes that I wanted to let
22 you know would be coming up. But these are of a
23 routine matter and mostly for clarification but
24 in the proclamation.
25 The eastern wild turkey restoration
.0050
1 program has been one of the most successful in
2 Texas, certainly within my career, and is
3 actually an accomplishment of our field personnel
4 in the wildlife division as well as the law
5 enforcement division. Many private
6 organizations, including the National Wild Turkey
7 Federation and the assistance of many states
8 across the Southeastern United States.
9 In red on this map you see the 24
10 counties that are currently open for spring
11 turkey hunting of eastern wild birds. This is a
12 very conservative season. It opens on a Monday
13 for 14 consecutive days, includes only one
14 gobbler per hunter. Bait is not allowed. The
15 only legal means of taking them is by shotgun,
16 lawful archery equipment, and crossbows. And
17 every bird taken has to be taken through a check
18 station so we get the maximum information from
19 the harvest.
20 We would propose to include Camp,
21 Franklin, Hunt, Morris, Panola, Rains, Shelby,
22 and Titus Counties to this proposal for the
23 coming year.
24 In red on the map are the counties
25 that currently have four doe days during the
.0051
1 whitetail deer season. These seasons begin on --
2 I mean these four doe days begin on Thanksgiving
3 day and run through the following Sunday. And we
4 would propose to include Cass, Marion, and
5 Harrison Counties to this regulation in the
6 coming cycle.
7 In red on this map are those
8 counties in Southeast Texas which have a four
9 deer bag, two bucks and two antlerless and 23 doe
10 days. The 23 doe days does not always include
11 the Thanksgiving weekend and we propose to reword
12 those doe days to allow it to begin the opening
13 day of season and continue through the weekend
14 following Thanksgiving, and to also include San
15 Jacinto, Trinity, and Walker Counties to this
16 group of counties.
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: Without trying to
18 figure out on a calendar, that means, at the
19 minimum it would be at least 23 days.
20 DR. COOKE: Currently it is 23
21 days.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: Right. But this
23 shift, making it the Sunday following
24 Thanksgiving --
25 DR. COOKE: In some seasons will
.0052
1 give it more days.
2 CHAIRMAN BASS: And the maximum
3 number would be -- it's always the third Thursday
4 plus --
5 DR. COOKE: Well, this would be the
6 Sunday following Thanksgiving each time. So I
7 could evaluate some calendars. I'm sorry I
8 haven't done that before now.
9 DR. COOKE: It would be 26, 27.
10 CHAIRMAN BASS: 26, 27.
11 DR. COOKE: But no less than 23.
12 On this map the yellow counties are
13 the ones who currently are within that 23 doe day
14 compartment with the four deer bag, and it has
15 been for several years. In evaluating the
16 population in those counties, our staff feels
17 comfortable in providing greater opportunity in
18 those counties, which would include a muzzle
19 loader season.
20 The muzzle loader season would open
21 the Saturday following the close of the general
22 season for nine consecutive days. And the bag
23 limit in that season would be two antlerless and
24 two spike, maximum. The 21 --
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: Are those reasonably
.0053
1 heavily hunted counties?
2 MR. COOKE: Traditionally they had
3 been heavily hunted. We gauged that primarily by
4 looking at the age structure of the buck
5 harvest. We have not found that percentage of
6 yearlings in the buck harvest to be substantially
7 increasing, which is why I feel relatively
8 confident. Clearly if you allow spike deer to be
9 taken during this season, it will place perhaps
10 more pressure on the younger animals. But that
11 regulation is primarily to allow spikes to be
12 retained when they were taken inadvertently as
13 antlerless deer. So in other words, it's not
14 focusing on spike deer, it's allowing them to be
15 retained if taken inadvertently.
16 The 21 counties of the Edwards
17 Plateau district makes up approximately 12
18 percent of the state of Texas but includes
19 approximately 38 percent of the total deer
20 population in the state of Texas. These habitats
21 have, from place to place, shown degradation
22 because of population levels, and the population
23 has historically been eruptive at times.
24 Our proposal for these counties
25 would be to increase the bag limit by one
.0054
1 antlerless deer. That would allow five deer, no
2 more than two bucks, in those counties, and to
3 also provide a 14-day antlerless and spike buck
4 late season to be used at the discretion of the
5 landowners in those counties.
6 This proposal, if adopted, would
7 necessarily remove the muzzle loader stamp
8 requirement during what is currently a muzzle
9 loader only season in those counties. It
10 wouldn't change opportunity but it would remove
11 necessarily the requirement for the stamp.
12 CHAIRMAN BASS: Approximately how
13 many of those stamps do we sell?
14 DR. COOKE: Approximately a thousand
15 statewide, aside from the combination license, a
16 special license.
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: So it's a nominal --
18 MR. COOKE: It's a nominal effect.
19 COMMISSIONER RYAN: Jerry, on that
20 not to exceed two bucks --
21 DR. COOKE: Yes, sir.
22 COMMISSIONER RYAN: -- and add
23 14-day antlerless and spike buck. But the spike
24 buck would count as one of your bucks?
25 DR. COOKE: It would. In other
.0055
1 words, it would not change the bag limit for
2 bucks and antlerless under the law. But they
3 would have to be spikes in that extent of the
4 season.
5 CHAIRMAN BASS: So basically, then,
6 what you're adding to the bag limit is one doe?
7 DR. COOKE: Yes. And --
8 CHAIRMAN BASS: And extending --
9 DR. COOKE: And extending the
10 period --
11 CHAIRMAN BASS: -- period --
12 DR. COOKE: -- in which they could
13 be taken.
14 CHAIRMAN BASS: -- in which the
15 antlerless spike could be taken.
16 DR. COOKE: Correct. Currently
17 under our managed land deer permits we have two
18 options of permits. One is the general season
19 antlerless only permit, which requires very
20 minimal effort on the landowner, essentially a
21 current survey and an approved management plan to
22 obtain.
23 We also had extended season enhanced
24 bag MLD permits, which essentially provides
25 greater flexibility for those landowners whose
.0056
1 habitat has been substantially improved and
2 populations substantially under control.
3 In our scoping meeting efforts we
4 had identified for us the fact that this is a
5 pretty broad gulf between these options within
6 the program. And several landowners expressed
7 concern of the difficulty of going from a general
8 season antlerless permit to the enhanced season
9 enhanced bag permit option. To address that, we
10 would propose an option within the managed land
11 deer permits for the purpose of population
12 control. It would require improved wildlife
13 management plan which would, for both sexes,
14 permits would be issued for both sexes,
15 landowners would have the option of issuing
16 permits to their hunters to a bag of five deer,
17 no more than three bucks. A 14 day special late
18 season for antlerless and spike deer would be
19 allowed. And this would also allow both sexes to
20 be taken in these -- on these properties using
21 bonus tags.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: So the $10 bonus tag
23 could be used for a doe as well as a buck?
24 DR. COOKE: As well as -- right.
25 This would probably have the greatest impact in
.0057
1 one buck counties, where reducing populations,
2 where they are explosive is difficult. And this
3 would allow greater flexibility for the
4 landowners and the hunters involved to control
5 those populations.
6 COMMISSIONER WATSON: This is
7 another option, I mean, to extend the season?
8 DR. COOKE: Yes. We would not
9 change any aspect of the other options within the
10 program.
11 DR. GRAHAM: It makes it easier for
12 the landowner transition from the general season
13 to the season extended back.
14 DR. COOKE: We want to maintain that
15 quality population habitat status of that
16 permanent option. And this would allow
17 landowners to move between those two options
18 rather seamlessly.
19 In that small compartment identified
20 in Henderson County, means of taking game animals
21 is restricted under current regulations to
22 shotgun and archery equipment only. We find no
23 resource basis for this regulation, and would
24 propose to allow all legal means to be used
25 throughout Henderson County.
.0058
1 In a related deer issue, we have
2 been asked to look into the trap, transport, and
3 transplant proclamation on two specific issues.
4 One is to determine if it would be possible for
5 us to identify and define what an insignificant
6 transfer of deer might be and also to see if
7 there was any way that we could provide greater
8 flexibility to urban areas for removing deer from
9 those kinds of situations. We will investigate
10 this. And if we can successfully come up with
11 some reasonable regulations or what we consider
12 to be reasonable, we would like to post that for
13 your consideration in April.
14 CHAIRMAN BASS: Right. By
15 insignificant transfer, you mean from a
16 biological point of view?
17 DR. COOKE: From a biological
18 perspective.
19 CHAIRMAN BASS: And is the number of
20 animals that is not going to have any biological
21 impact on.
22 DR. COOKE: Or some density of
23 release or some change within the relationship of
24 the population. There's many ways of looking at
25 it. And to be very frank with you, we have not
.0059
1 investigated them all. But we wanted to inform
2 you of this so that you wouldn't be surprised,
3 come April, if we have something for you to
4 consider.
5 To complete the presentations of all
6 of our divisions to the statewide hunting and
7 fishing proclamation, we would -- the staff would
8 recommend the following motion: The regulation
9 committee authorizes staff to publish the
10 proposed 2000-2001 statewide hunting and fishing
11 proclamation contained in Exhibit A with the
12 amendments as we presented them to you, in the
13 Texas Register for public comment.
14 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: The mule deer
15 regulations don't come up at this time or you're
16 not recommending any changes?
17 DR. COOKE: We have not had an
18 opportunity to evaluate whether -- the issue
19 specifically is, some of the counties in the
20 Panhandle have shown some interest in perhaps
21 extending the season over a longer period of
22 time, and whitetail seasons in those counties
23 tend to be concurrent with the mule deer
24 seasons. And we've been asked to look into that,
25 also. But we have not had an opportunity to
.0060
1 evaluate it sufficiently to include in these
2 proposals.
3 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Would that
4 preclude any changes being made for the next
5 hunting season or would we still have time to
6 consider that?
7 CHAIRMAN BASS: We would have time.
8 If we discussed it in April, we could post that
9 for May and still be --
10 DR. COOKE: It would require another
11 regulatory effort. Basically the Commission is
12 somewhat limited in what it can change in a
13 regulation without publicly posting the intention
14 of a change in those counties. So we could do
15 another cycle if that was found to be important
16 enough for the Commission to do so.
17 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Specifically
18 I've had some people in our part of the country
19 that have mentioned the need to have a longer --
20 or the desire to have a longer season in those
21 counties where the mule deer season was open for
22 the first time two years ago. The five-day
23 season and the timing of it has not been very
24 conducive to hunter success.
25 DR. COOKE: We would have time
.0061
1 between now and April to consider that. And the
2 regulations committee certainly suggests -- since
3 we have no mule deer proposals in place, I'm not
4 sure. I would have to check on the section
5 arrangement. You can't reopen a section until
6 rules goes into place, and those kinds of
7 things. But we'll certainly know by April.
8 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: I think some
9 of our staff people out there think that it ought
10 to be at least looked at.
11 CHAIRMAN BASS: I think one of the
12 purposes of trying to move the regs cycle earlier
13 in the year, as we did, is to allow for
14 opportunities like this, to catch things and
15 still get them in with enough lead time.
16 MR. COOK: If it's possible, if it's
17 a liberalization under the law, the open sections
18 and all that, I think we could address it.
19 MR. SANSOM: Yes. As long as it's a
20 liberalization.
21 CHAIRMAN BASS: I understand your
22 caveats because the code is sometimes Byzantine.
23 DR. COOKE: Well, there's also the
24 caveat of landowners having contracts in place
25 and we have at times encountered opposition to
.0062
1 changes primarily because of that.
2 MR. SANSOM: With their bookings.
3 DR. COOKE: Yes.
4 CHAIRMAN BASS: Well, in this case
5 the time slot that it would be booked for would
6 still be legal. It just wouldn't be all the
7 legal days. So we wouldn't impose any undue --
8 DR. COOKE: We'll certainly, if it's
9 possible to include for the April consideration,
10 we will. And if not, we'll have some options for
11 you.
12 CHAIRMAN BASS: Jerry, before we
13 have a motion, can we go back to the Edwards
14 Plateau liberalization proposal for a moment? My
15 question is, basically what we're proposing is to
16 provide a late antlerless and spike window of 14
17 days and add to the bag limit what in effect is
18 one doe.
19 DR. COOKE: Right.
20 CHAIRMAN BASS: Now, in that area of
21 the state, as you pointed out, it's a very high
22 deer density and a high reproductive rate
23 regime. Is there a reason that the
24 liberalization, the bag limit is restrictive --
25 obviously there is. I just wanted to ask you,
.0063
1 what is the rationale for the liberalization of
2 bag limit to be restricted to only the doe
3 segment of the population, where generally it's
4 overpopulated.
5 DR. COOKE: That's correct.
6 However, while you could take out fire ants with
7 an atomic blast, that's pretty hard sometimes.
8 Certainly we wouldn't want to disrupt things that
9 are in good condition in the population in an
10 effort to reduce the overall population. There
11 are counties in the Edwards Plateau that have a
12 well enough developed age structure in the buck
13 harvest that it probably could include an
14 additional buck in that bag. And some of those
15 counties having been identified. However, the
16 proposal, because of the short turnaround nature,
17 was to focus on specifically increasing harvest
18 on the antlerless segment, with the option to
19 consider other things at later times.
20 CHAIRMAN BASS: And with the various
21 MLD permits, et cetera, the people that -- can
22 still get a three buck bag limit through
23 participating in those programs?
24 DR. COOKE: Exactly. The MLD
25 program is to take a general population condition
.0064
1 and identify exceptions within it. And when
2 those exceptions become common, then you change
3 the general bag in the county. This is an issue
4 that is general throughout most of the Edwards
5 Plateau, the need to reduce overall population.
6 Individuals who are doing higher levels of
7 management within their properties are generally
8 in the managed land deer permit program and can
9 exploit those options there.
10 CHAIRMAN BASS: Any other
11 questions? The chair would entertain a motion to
12 approve this package to continue.
13 DR. COOKE: This is a motion to
14 publish. So there would be no action tomorrow on
15 this.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: Motion to publish.
17 COMMISSIONER AVILA: So moved.
18 CHAIRMAN BASS: Motion is seconded.
19 All in favor? Opposed?
20 (Motion passed unanimously.)
21 CHAIRMAN BASS: Publish away.
22 AGENDA ITEM NO. 3: ACTION - PROPOSED FINFISH
23 LICENSE LIMITATION PROGRAM.
24 MR. HAMMERSCHMIDT: Mr. Chairman,
25 commissioners, my name is Paul Hammerschmidt,
.0065
1 program director for the coastal fisheries
2 division. My briefing to you today will cover
3 staff's proposals to fulfill legislative mandate
4 to implement a licensed management program for
5 the commercial finfish fishery in Texas. The
6 76th Legislature under Senate Bill 1303 granted
7 the Parks and Wildlife Commission this authority.
8 As with the crab license management
9 program, that for finfish will encompass three
10 different proclamations. First, we will create a
11 new finfish license management program
12 proclamation. Second, license and transfer fees
13 will be proposed in the finance proclamation, and
14 finally, amendments to the statewide hunting and
15 fishing proclamation will be proposed.
16 Before I get to the staff's
17 proposals, I would like to provide you a brief
18 review of the authorizing legislation. Since
19 it's spelled out, certain key elements of the
20 licensed management program and our proposals
21 hinge from them. First is eligibility.
22 Individuals who held a commercial finfish
23 fisherman's license from September 1, 1997, to
24 April 20th, 1999, will automatically be eligible
25 for the new license. Staff currently estimates
.0066
1 this will be about 970 people.
2 For those individuals who are not
3 automatically eligible, a review board will be
4 elected to review these cases. The board will be
5 made up of eligible finfishermen who are elected
6 by their peers and it will reflect the
7 geographical distribution of the industry. The
8 review board will make recommendations concerning
9 the administration of the program and will
10 include the appeals cases.
11 Finally, just as an overview, the
12 bill set forth a list of flagrant violations
13 that, based on a scale of escalating or
14 repetitive violations could result in license
15 suspension or revocation, as you can see those on
16 the screen.
17 Now to our proclamations. The
18 proposed new finfish license management
19 proclamation incorporates rules which delegate
20 administrative authority to the executive
21 director, establish rules for the display of the
22 license plate on a vessel, set the date -- sets
23 the date of transferability of licenses to any
24 time beginning September 1, 2000. And it lays
25 out the framework of a license buyback process.
.0067
1 The proposed license buyback
2 procedures are similar to those that we have for
3 the crab fishery. A buyback fund will receive 20
4 percent of all finfish license and transfer
5 fees. The proclamation will describe
6 administrative procedures for the buyback
7 program.
8 Staff will subsequently develop
9 criteria to select and purchase licenses that are
10 voluntarily offered. And all licenses purchased
11 under the buyback procedure will be retired.
12 The cost for the new finfish
13 fishermen's license and transfer fees are $300
14 for resident, $1200 for nonresident.
15 Now, at the printing of your
16 briefing book, the revenue codes were not
17 available. They are available now, and I will
18 incorporate those into the finance proclamation
19 pending approval of the committee.
20 As with the other licensed
21 management programs, some amendments to the
22 statewide hunting and fishing proclamation are
23 necessary. And in order to maintain continuity
24 with the suite of finfish license management
25 proposals, I've included those here rather than
.0068
1 during the earlier proposal for the statewide.
2 The proposed amendments to the
3 statewide establish specific trotline and crab
4 trap marking requirements that will facilitate
5 gear identification for both fishermen and law
6 enforcement. Because Senate Bill 1303 allows
7 persons holding a new finfish fishermen's license
8 to operate up to 20 crab traps to catch crabs for
9 bait, staff proposes these traps be uniquely
10 marked to identify them as belonging to
11 commercial finfish fishermen rather than a
12 commercial crab fisherman and to distinguish crab
13 trap floats from trotline floats.
14 Current gear designs and
15 restrictions for both trotlines and crab traps
16 will remain as they currently are. If approved
17 by the committee, these proposals will be rolled
18 into the total statewide proclamation package
19 presented earlier and will be sent to the Texas
20 Register and presented at public hearings.
21 I will be happy to answer any
22 questions if there are any.
23 CHAIRMAN BASS: Any questions or
24 comments?
25 MR. HAMMERSCHMIDT: If there are
.0069
1 none, I would like to -- the staff would
2 recommend that the committee adopt the following
3 motion: The regulations committee of the Texas
4 Parks & Wildlife Commission authorizes staff to
5 publish the proposed regulation changes in the
6 Texas Register for the required 30-day public
7 comment period and hold public hearings.
8 CHAIRMAN BASS: Do we have any
9 reason to expect anything other than broad-based
10 support from the industry?
11 MR. HAMMERSCHMIDT: No, sir. All of
12 these issues were brought up prior to the
13 legislation where our staff worked very closely
14 with the constituents in the commercial fishery
15 to develop these criteria themselves. So these
16 should be absolutely nothing new to them.
17 MR. OSBURN: That's not to say that
18 there won't be some folks come out of the
19 woodwork and wonder why they got left out of a
20 two-year process. But we have the review board
21 and the appeals process to offer them in that
22 case.
23 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Move
24 approval.
25 COMMISSIONER HENRY: Second.
.0070
1 CHAIRMAN BASS: The motion is
2 seconded. All in favor? All opposed?
3 (Motion passed unanimously.)
4 CHAIRMAN BASS: Thank you.
5 Public lands proclamation.
6 AGENDA ITEM NO. 4: ACTION - PUBLIC LANDS
7 PROCLAMATION.
8 DR. GRAHAM: Mr. Chairman, members
9 of the committee, again, I'm Gary Graham,
10 director of the wildlife division and I've asked
11 Herb Kothmann to present the public lands
12 proclamation recommendations.
13 MR. KOTHMANN: I'm Herb Kothmann,
14 director of public hunts, I'll be presenting an
15 item on proposed changes of the public lands
16 proclamation and also our proposals for public
17 hunts on state parks for the 2000-2001 season.
18 The first proposal that we have
19 would lower the minimum age requirement for an
20 adult supervising a youth engaged in public
21 hunting activities, from 21 to 18. We're advised
22 by legal staff that an 18-year-old is equally
23 able to assume legal responsibility for a minor
24 as a 21-year-old. And this would be consistent
25 with what the federal refugees in Texas currently
.0071
1 are allowing to supervise a youth. We will be
2 proposing -- allowing an 18-year-old to supervise
3 a 16-year-old.
4 The second proposal would be to
5 establish an antlerless deer permit for use on
6 the U.S. Forest Service areas where hunting is
7 managed by Parks and Wildlife. This would allow
8 the antlerless deer to be taken, a limited number
9 of antlerless deer, during the general season.
10 It would create additional hunter opportunity by
11 allowing that opportunity to take those deer.
12 The permit would be issued by the U.S. Forest
13 Service rather than Parks & Wildlife staff; and
14 therefore, would place no additional burden upon
15 our manpower requirements.
16 Another proposal would be to waive
17 the regular permit fees. This is a daily permit
18 for activities other than hunting and fishing for
19 people who hold an annual public hunting permit,
20 a limited public use permit, or one of the two
21 Texas conservation passport permits. This
22 proposal would establish equity in access permit
23 requirements for both consumptive and
24 nonconsumptive users. Presently we do waive
25 these fees for consumptive users. This proposal
.0072
1 would extend that to the nonconsumptive users
2 also.
3 Another proposal would prohibit the
4 distribution or removal of wood, rock, gravel,
5 sand, soil, or shell from public hunting lands,
6 except as authorized by the department. This is
7 proposed in order to address a problem that we
8 encountered within the past year when we had soil
9 removed without our authorization from one of our
10 lands and found out our rules prohibiting that
11 removal of soil were somewhat lacking for
12 enforcement purposes.
13 Another proposal would authorize
14 holders of an annual public hunting permit,
15 limited public use permit, or one of the two
16 Texas conservation passport permits to use public
17 hunting lands to access adjacent public waters,
18 and to fish in adjacent public waters from the
19 bank of those public hunting lands. Presently we
20 are quite more restrictive than this. We require
21 a person fishing from our bank in adjacent public
22 waters to have the full $40 annual permit,
23 whereas we allow people coming down those public
24 waters to get out and stand on our bank and fish
25 without either type of permit. Then they get
.0073
1 back in their boat and get underway. This would
2 at least allow our permit holders equal
3 privileges to what we allow the people who come
4 down those public waters in watercraft and go on
5 their way.
6 Proposals for state park hunts for
7 year 2000-2001. At this time we're proposing
8 again 42 parks to be hunted, the same number we
9 had this past season. They would be the same
10 parks with the exception that we would have
11 Dinosaur Valley dropping out and South Llano
12 River returning to the list. Okay.
13 New types of hunts proposed for
14 parks is on Arroyo Colorado, a youth deer
15 antlerless hunt; Fort Boggy, gun, deer, either
16 sex, and gun feral hog hunts; Lake Whitney, gun,
17 deer, either sex; Resaca de la Palma, youth,
18 quail.
19 And we have a two-part proposal.
20 Staff recommends the regulations committee would
21 adopt the following two motions: One is that the
22 regulations committee authorize the staff to
23 publish the proposed amendments to 31 TAC 65.192,
24 concerning the public lands proclamation in the
25 Texas Register for public comment.
.0074
1 The second part, the regulations
2 committee authorizes the staff to solicit public
3 comment concerning the hunting activities
4 proposed for units of the state park system
5 that's contained in Exhibit B.
6 Do you have any questions?
7 CHAIRMAN BASS: Any questions or
8 comments? The Chair would entertain a motion to
9 approve the staff recommended motions, both parts
10 one and two.
11 COMMISSIONER HENRY: Motion.
12 COMMISSIONER IDSAL: Second.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: I have a motion and
14 a second. All in favor?
15 CHAIRMAN BASS: Any opposed? Thank
16 you very much.
17 (Motion passed unanimously.)
18 CHAIRMAN BASS: At this time we'll
19 stand in recess of the public portion of our
20 committee meetings.
21 I would like to announce that
22 pursuant to the requirements of Chapter 551
23 referred to as the Open Meetings Law, executive
24 session will be held prior to reconvening in
25 public session for infrastructure, for finance,
.0075
1 and for outreach committee meetings. And we will
2 see you folks in an hour or so.
3 *-*-*-*-*
4 (HEARING ADJOURNED.)
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.0076
1 REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE
2 STATE OF TEXAS )
3 COUNTY OF TRAVIS )
4
5 I, MELODY RENEE DeYOUNG, a Certified Court
6 Reporter in and for the State of Texas, do hereby
7 certify that the above and foregoing 74 pages
8 constitute a full, true and correct transcript of
9 the minutes of the Texas Parks and Wildlife
10 Commission on JANUARY 19, 2000, in the commission
11 hearing room of the Texas Parks and Wildlife
12 Headquarters Complex, Austin, Travis County,
13 Texas.
14 I FURTHER CERTIFY that a stenographic record
15 was made by me a the time of the public meeting
16 and said stenographic notes were thereafter
17 reduced to computerized transcription under my
18 supervision and control.
19 WITNESS MY HAND this the 18TH day of
20 FEBRUARY 2000.
21
22
MELODY RENEE DeYOUNG, RPR, CSR NO. 3226
23 Expiration Date: 12-31-00
3101 Bee Caves Road
24 Centre II, Suite 220
Austin, Texas 78746
25 (512) 328-5557
EBS NO. 37595