TPW Commission
Work Session, November 4, 2015
Transcript
TPW Commission Meetings
TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION
November 4, 2015
TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE DEPARTMENT
COMMISSION HEARING ROOM
4200 SMITH SCHOOL ROAD
AUSTIN, TEXAS 78744
COMMISSION WORK SESSION & EXECUTIVE SESSION
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Good morning,
everyone. This meeting is called to order November 4th,
2015, at 9:28. Before proceeding with any business, I
believe Mr. Smith has a statement to make.
MR. SMITH: I do. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Public notice of this meeting containing
all items on the proposed agenda has been filed in the
Office of Secretary of State as required by Chapter 551
Government Code referred to as the Open Meetings Act. I
would like for this fact to be noted in the official
record of the meeting. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you,
Carter.
Next order of business is approval of the
minutes from the previous Work Session held August 19th,
2015, which have already been distributed. Do we have a
motion for approval?
COMMISSIONER JONES: So moved.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Moved by
Commissioner Jones, second by Commissioner Scott. All
in favor?
(Chorus of ayes)
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Any opposed?
Hearing none, that motion carries.
Next order of business is approval of the
minutes from the previous annual Public Hearing held
August 19th, 2015, which have also been distributed.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Approved.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Approval by
Vice-Chairman Duggins.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Second.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Second by
Commissioner Martin. All in favor?
(Chorus of ayes)
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Any opposed?
Motion carries.
Before we proceed, I want to announce
that Work Session Item No. 10, Grant of Utility
Easement, Brazoria County, Approximately 37 Acres at the
Justin Hurst Wildlife Management Area, has been
withdrawn from the agenda.
Work Session Item No. 1, Update on Parks
and Wildlife Progress in Implementing the Parks and
Wildlife Land and Water Resource Conservation and
Recreation Plan, Carter Smith.
MR. SMITH: Thank you, Mr. Chairman,
Commissioners. For the record, my name is Carter Smith.
I hope everyone is doing well this morning. Hopefully,
you noticed a few changes in the lobby when you came in.
Those wonderful pictures you may -- from Wyman Meinzer,
you may recall those from the 50th anniversary
celebration of the Department that was held in Houston
and so Josh and his team, namely Sonia Yeck, have got
those displayed proudly in the lobby. Make sure you
have a chance to look at them.
On the back hall, there's a great exhibit
of magazine covers that were painted by Orville Rice, a
famous wildlife artist back in the 50s whose artwork
graced the cover of a lot outdoor magazines. So if you
have a chance, take a look at it. And I want to
compliment Josh and Sonia, in particular, for their work
to help spruce up that lobby. As Sonia said, "It now
looks like us." So enjoy that.
Also, I wanted to let you know, last
night the voters of Texas resoundingly approved
Proposition 6, the right to hunt and fish. That is now
enshrined constitutionally. We've become the 19th state
in the country that has a constitutional amendment
guaranteeing the right to hunt and fish. Maybe a couple
of observations about that, if I could. One, it passed
with flying colors. Over 81 percent of the people that
voted, voted in support of the constitutional right to
hunt and fish. I think that's certainly consistent with
all of the polls and research that we see about the
public's strong support for certain types of hunting and
angling, and so nice to see that continue. Also, as we
talked about prior with the Commission, the bill
sponsors and the Legislators that moved that through the
Legislature to bring it the voters, worked very closely
with the Department on the language of that so, you
know, to make sure that really that serves as more of an
insurance policy down the road. There's not any
immediate or practical implications or bearing of that
constitutional amendment on the Department.
Obviously, the rights to hunt and fish
are still subject to the rules and regulations that are
put forth by this Commission, brought forth by science,
by your fisheries and wildlife biologists and enforced
by our game wardens. But anyway, we're pleased to see
that pass, again, with such strong support from the
public.
I want to call your attention -- at your
place should be an annual report from our Internal
Affairs Team that Jon Gray put together. Jon did a
great job summarizing last fiscal year's operations and
describes some of the caseloads and the categories of
cases, and then also some issues that he wants to make
sure that we're all advertent to going forward. And so
I'd ask all of you to make sure you have a chance to
take a look at that and if you have any questions about
any facet of that report, please feel free to reach out
directly to Jon or myself on that front.
Also, as you will undoubtedly recall, at
the end of August, Joe Carter retired; and so obviously
sad to see Joe go after a very long and distinguished
career as a State game warden with the Department and
also as our major in charge of Internal Affairs. Jon
ably stepped in as our acting Director of Internal
Affairs and worked very, very closely, obviously, with
our captains, Johnny Longoria and Brad Chappell, in the
interim to manage that unit and I want to thank Jon for
his steadfast leadership during this time. He's done a
terrific job to make sure that we didn't miss a beat on
Internal Affairs related initiatives.
We have also posted the Internal Affairs
Director position. That is open internally only. We
feel like we've got a great pool of talent inside our
Law Enforcement Division, our State Parks Division, our
Internal Affairs Team and so look forward to the
applications coming in on that front and, obviously, the
plan is to get that position filled as expeditiously as
possible; but I'll keep you posted on that front. But,
again, want to thank Jon for his leadership during this
time and also again, just if you've got any questions
about that report, don't hesitate to reach out to him.
He's here today.
Also, in your package there at your
place, there's a -- is an annual stocking report.
Chairman, this is great synopsis of the important
enhancement and restoration work that our fisheries and
wildlife biologists are doing all over the state to make
sure that our hunters and anglers and outdoor
enthusiasts are able to enjoy bountiful populations of
fish and game. Again, the report is pretty
self-explanatory. You get this every year.
But, you know, a couple of highlights.
Coastal Fisheries, you know, stocked over 30 million
fingerlings in our bays and estuaries. Obviously, most
of that are Redfish and Speckled trout; but the work on
the culturing and propagation of Southern flounder there
at Sea Center continues to go on very, very strongly and
excited about the developments on that front and
hopefully the expansion there in the future. A great,
great innovation by that team there. And our Inland
Fisheries team stocked 25 million fingerlings in 350
lakes and reservoirs around the state, including over 20
state parks. There's a great partnership there between
Inland Fisheries and State Parks to make sure that we've
got sufficient fishing opportunities where possible in
the parks.
And on wildlife front, you know, you'll
read about familiar restoration efforts going on with
Eastern turkeys and Pronghorn and Bighorn sheep; but a
couple things that I'll point out. One of which is a
Mule deer transplant project. Our biologists have been
working on to transplant Mule deer from Elephant
Mountain Wildlife Management Area down to the Black Gap
Wildlife Management Area and neighboring private lands,
where the Mule deer population still has really not
recovered from drought-related impacts from the 90s.
And so our biologists have done a great job on that
front.
Also, a new Horned lizard restocking
effort in which our biologists have been trapping Horned
lizards out in West Texas and releasing them there at
the Muse Wildlife Management Area near Brownwood. And
so a lot of great science going on on that front and,
obviously, a strong public interest in the health of
that species. So anyway, enjoy that report; and if you
have any questions on that, feel free to reach out to
Ross or Clayton or Craig or Robin and they can certainly
share more details with you.
Y'all will undoubtedly recall that in
2013-2014, we received a petition from various
individuals asking the Commission to consider the
prohibition of gassing as a tool for collecting
rattlesnakes out in the wild. We had a lot of
discussions internally and with the Commission and with
stakeholders and various members of the Legislature
about that proposal as we took a look at it from a
science and management perspective.
Chairman, you will recall that the
direction we got from the Commission was to charter
basically a stakeholder group, to task them at looking
at a variety of things, including make sure that
everybody had kind of a common foundation in the
science, make sure we had captured information about the
economic benefits of snake-related festivals throughout
the state, looking at alternative means for collection
and harvest and so forth.
We appointed a working group chaired by
Dr. Bill Eikenhorst, the chair of our Private Lands
Advisory Committee; and then had roughly a dozen
stakeholders that represented a variety of interests in
this discussion from the ranching community to snake
collectors to herpetologists and others to try to come
up with some recommendations for us to consider about
how to go forward. That group has been staffed very
ably by John Davis from Wildlife and Kevin Davis from
Law Enforcement, have done a great job on that front, as
has Clayton Wolf. Have held four meetings around the
state. There's a lot of very diverse viewpoints on this
issue, I think as y'all are aware. I don't believe that
the working group is going to be able to bring consensus
recommendations to us, Chairman; but what they will
bring to us is a history of their work and the process
and discussions and I think around a dozen to 14 items
of consideration that ultimately they're going to want
to make sure that the Commission is aware of, again,
with no real consensus around those; but at least things
that the Commission can consider.
So once we get the final report, which we
expect sometime in December, we'll share that, Chairman,
with you and members of the Commission; and then we'll
seek your guidance as to what to do and what next steps
on that front.
Next thing I want to mention, obviously
this Saturday for really most of the State's 700,000
deer hunters, be the first time for them to be able to
get out in the woods. Obviously, bow season has been
going on now for nearly a month and, obviously, those
landowners with Managed Lands Deer Permits have been
doing some hunting; but, again, for most folks, Saturday
is a big day for the state in terms of kickoff of deer
season. And as you might imagine, our biologists have
been very, very busy with surveys all over the state,
working very collaboratively with private landowners on
harvest-related recommendations. Our game wardens have
been out working to make sure that, you know, they're
enforcing all laws related to deer season and leading up
to it.
Hopefully, you got the information on
that case in Leon County that our game wardens made a
case that, you know, Craig described as probably the
most egregious suite of crimes against wildlife that
he's seen in his entire career. But, again, emblematic
of the important work our wardens are doing in terms of
protecting our wildlife.
Our Communications Team has been very
busy making sure that they're obviously promoting the
start of deer season this weekend and making sure that
folks are also getting out there and doing that safely
and responsibly and ethically and lawfully. And I want
to comment a minute on hunter education because that's
an area that the Commission has taken a lot of interest
in and made working with our Communications Team some,
you know, very fairly substantive realignments with that
program in terms of looking at the curriculum,
compressing the time of the course, creating
opportunities for expanded offerings for parents and
children that wanted to go deeper in hunter education;
but also for adults over 17, giving them an opportunity
to be able to take hunter education online and we've
seen the fruits of those changes. Last fiscal year,
roughly 72,000 hunters were certified in the state.
Prior to that, we'd seen around 40 -- Josh -- 40, 42,
45,000, kind of in that range. So some very appreciable
growth there. Again, I think making that program more
accessible to people.
Also, we were very pleased that in 2014,
we only had one hunting fatality and 25 accidents among
the million 100,000 licensed hunters. Obviously, one is
too many; but that was one of our lowest on record and
certainly one year does not a trend make. But, again,
we're very pleased with the rollout of this. We also
welcomed back an old friend to Parks and Wildlife to
lead our Hunter Education Program, Steve Hall. Steve
had retired from the Department, gone on to other
things, working for the Texas State Rifle Association
and then on the national scale, working on hunter
education -- really, an international scale -- but he's
come back to Parks and Wildlife. We're proud to welcome
him back to the team.
Our Wildlife Division has really made it
a priority, as you know, trying to maximize public
hunting opportunities wherever possible for big game and
small game, creating opportunities for hunters to be
able to hunt on places with a $48 annual public hunting
permit; but also through more managed drawn permit
opportunities, and that's been a huge priority for the
Division and certainly a strong direction from the
Commission to try to maximize those opportunities
wherever possible. As you can see here by this slide,
they're just doing a terrific job on that and have
almost, I guess, 237 hunting areas on the WMAs and state
parks; but also leased private lands, which play a
critically important role here and have exceeded their
goal for the year. So we're excited about those trends
and look forward to them continuing and, obviously,
we'll keep you posted on how that important program is
going. That's a -- that is a core, core program for
this Agency.
Two weeks ago, Commissioner Martin was
with us in Dallas to rollout the statewide Monarch and
Native Pollinator Conservation Plan with former First
Lady Laura Bush. She hosted a big rollout of the plan a
the Bush Library in Dallas, and we had the privilege of
partnering with her and Texan by Nature; had the
Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Dan
Ashe; and the Director of the National Wildlife
Federation, Collin O'Mara, to come down to rollout the
Texas Conservation Plan, working with trying to help
reverse the very precipitous Monarch decline and
couldn't be more pleased with that rollout. Our
Communications Team, led by Josh, David Eichler from the
EO did a terrific job coordinating with all of our
partners and pulling that event off and our Wildlife
Division put together a great plan that we've got for
y'all and please take a look at it.
You know, just as a reminder, I think the
beauty of this conservation initiative is really
twofold. One, you know, this is problem we can solve;
and secondly, every single Texan has a role to play. It
doesn't matter whether you live in an urban or rural
area. If you're doing things in your backyard, your
school ground, your church ground, your playground, your
farm or ranch, there's a role that you can play in
helping to recover Monarch butterflies and Texas plays,
obviously, a pivotal role in this effort and so we're
excited that Texas is playing a leading role here and,
obviously, this is an effort and initiative that's been
well-embraced by many across the state.
Last thing that I want to mention, in
October we announced the landmark settlement with BP on
resolving outstanding claims on the Deepwater Horizon
incident. As you will recall, that settlement resulted
in a $20.8 billion payment from BP to the five Gulf
states and various federal agencies to help, again,
remedy damages to the environment and economies from
that very tragic spill. About a billion dollars is
coming to Texas for projects to help offset
environmental damage and economic losses. Really the
majority of that, I'd say roughly three-quarters of
that, will end up going to environmental and
conservation related projects. We've talked very
extensively with the Commission in the past about that
allocation between kind of the three buckets. The
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which administers
the criminal settlement part of this and of which
203 million are allocated for Texas; and really, those
are for environmental restoration projects of resources
that were impacted from the spill. The Natural
Resources Damage Assessment Program, which is getting
$238 million for Texas, which will, again, offset
injuries to fish and wildlife and habitats, as well as
lost human use. And so, for example, we're able to use
some of that funding to help with the rebuilding of
Galveston Island and Sea Rim State Park. There's $150
million payment made to the State for economic injuries
and then there's roughly 400 to 450 million or so that's
going through the Restore Act process and that will be
available for both economic and environmental related
projects. Other than the funds allocated to the
National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which are coming
to the state over a six-year period, the funds from the
other parts of this settlement will be spread out over
16 or 17 years -- you know, Robin -- and so we'll see
those come in over time. And so, obviously, we'll
continue to play a substantive role there.
I would be very remiss though if I didn't
highlight for the Commission something that I'm not sure
the Commission is as well aware of, and I'll take
responsibility for that. When we had to engage in the
Deepwater Horizon settlement, Texas Parks and Wildlife
was the lead trustee for the state of Texas. So as you
know in these claims, we work with TCEQ and GLO and we
typically have a lead agency that works very closely
with the others and the AG's Office. And so Parks and
Wildlife was the lead on that and very quickly after we
got into it, realized that that was going to be a
full-time job for somebody. And that somebody, after
about six months, became Robin Riechers; and I want you
to know that when we asked Robin to take that over on
behalf of the state, he didn't hesitate. If he'd have
known what he was getting into for the last five years,
he would have hesitated. But I want to tell you, he has
done a terrific job behind the scenes representing the
state of Texas, doing an incredible amount of shuttle
diplomacy between the five Gulf states, the federal
agencies working with the state agencies in Texas, the
Governor's Office, many interested parties. He has been
on the front line. Literally, you know, 80 to
85 percent of Robin's leadership time has been spent
representing the state on this and I want to tell you,
he has just done a fabulous job and could not be more
proud of that and Texas faired very, very well in no
small part because of Robin's leadership and work and I
want to thank him for that. He's just been
extraordinary. Now, he's been supported by a lot of
folks -- Don Pitts from Inland Fisheries, really on the
resource side; Johanna Gregory; Angela Schrift; James
Murphy, an attorney that worked closely with Ann on
this; obviously, Ann's been intimately involved; Ted
Hollingsworth on the land side. But I just -- I want
you to know what a critically important role your team
at Parks and Wildlife played, led by Robin Riechers, did
to help make this possible and so would be remiss to not
brag on him.
Mr. Chairman, Commissioners, with that,
that is the sum and substance of my update and be happy
to take any questions you might have.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Any questions for
Carter?
Carter, thank you.
MR. SMITH: Yeah. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Item 2 is Fiscal
Year 2015 Internal Audit Update and Fiscal Year 2016
Internal Audit Plan, Cindy Hancock. Good morning.
MS. HANCOCK: Good morning. For the
record, I'm Cindy Hancock, Director of Internal Audit.
I'm here today to update you on the completion status of
the Fiscal Year '15 Internal Audit Plan and any ongoing
or completed external audits. In addition, I'll brief
you on the methodology used in developing the proposed
Fiscal Year '16 Internal Audit Plan and provide the
motion for adoption for tomorrow's meeting.
This is a summary of the internal audit
projects approved for Fiscal Year '15. The projects
marked with C have been completed, and the reports have
been issued. Since my last update in August, we've
issued four reports -- the travel advance audit, the
data integrity audit, the state-owned housing audit, and
the follow-up audit. The follow-up audit ended up this
year with 34 recommendations being implemented and 38
are still in progress.
To summarize some of the issues found in
the recent audits, the travel advance account -- or the
travel advance account, policies and procedures weren't
always followed in the administration or employee use of
the funds. So we suggested that the Administrative
Resource Division take a look at using the Citibank
card, which could allow possibly a more efficient
process compared to using the current petty cash
account.
For the data integrity audit, we examined
the data within the Human Resource Information System
and the Texas Fleet System. We found that the data
integrity and accuracy could be increased through
various process improvements. And for the state-owned
housing charges, new policies and procedures need to be
developed and written due to changes in the requirements
of the General Appropriations Act; and an independent
verification of facilities, occupancy, and rental rates
should be periodically performed to ensure accuracy.
We're currently in the fieldwork stage
for four projects. The dedicated funds, local state
park grants, and fuel card audits are carryover projects
from fiscal year '15; and we anticipate these to be
completed in November through January. The fiscal year
'16 follow-up audit has already begun; and it will
continue throughout the fiscal year, with the final
report issued next September. In addition, we've
already started the preparation for two of the fiscal
year '16 fiscal control audits for the Law Enforcement
offices and State Parks. And the reason for that is
they requested that we audit them during late winter --
early and late winter, during their periods --
off-season periods.
We've not had any newly opened or
recently closed external audits since my update to you
in August. The Department of the Interior Office of
Inspector General is still conducting their U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service federal grant audit. A meeting was
held in late September where preliminary issues were
discussed; however, the audit is still ongoing and
auditors continue to request and receive documentation
from staff. The federal auditor said that they expect
the draft report to be issued sometime in December or
January.
Now, this concludes my first portion --
my update portion of the presentation and I wanted to
give you a chance to ask any questions before I move on.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Any questions
before we go on to the plan?
COMMISSIONER JONES: I don't have any
questions, but I do have a comment. And y'all are
probably going to get tired of hearing me say that; but
keep in mind, I'm only on the board for another two
years. So you'll only have to put up with this for
another two years. But I just want to give kudos to
Cindy and her staff, Dawn, Carter, everyone that's
helped make audit what it is right now.
I know audit typically elicits a response
of, "Oh, no. Not another audit. Oh, no. You guys are
just going to figure out what I did wrong." But I
really do think that attitude has changed within the
Department and now when auditors are seen, it's "Okay,
what can we do better," and that translates to the
Legislature such that they have confidence when they
give us money, that we're going to do with it what we
said we're going to do and we're going to be held
accountable for it and we're all holding each other
accountable. So I know I keep saying that, but I would
much rather say that than we have a problem and we need
to fix it.
So we don't have a problem. We have a
good system; and it turns out our system is so good,
it's being adopted by other State agencies. So I
just -- I just want to give kudos not only to Cindy and
her staff, but to the Division leaders, so that when
Cindy and her staff show up in your Division -- Craig
Hunter -- you know, you don't freak out and go, "Oh, no.
You guys are going to try to make me look bad in front
of Carter and the board." That's not the way it works.
And so we really do appreciate that, and we appreciate
all the Division leaders and your help to make this
audit system what it is.
MS. HANCOCK: I appreciate that. Thank
you.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
MS. HANCOCK: Well, it's that time again.
The Texas Internal Audit Act requires that the audit
plan should be developed using a risk-based approach
consisting of executive management's review of agency
functions, activities, and processes. The risks should
be ranked on their probability of occurrence and impact
to the agency and the financial, managerial, compliance,
and information technology areas.
Starting in September, I compiled fiscal
year '15 financial and other agency information into a
risk workbook. I then sent the risk workbook, along
with questionnaires or surveys, to 129 staff, including
executive management, Division directors, and other key
personnel. The surveys are structured to obtain top
concerns within each Division, agencywide, external to
the agency, as well as concerns regarding information
technology systems and fraud, waste, and abuse.
Twenty-five staff responded and these concerns were
scored and ranked based on the responses, creating a
list of top concerns.
Once the responses were scored, I sent
the top concerns to executive management and
Commissioner Jones to be scored as to their priority.
Once prioritized, I estimated the work hours needed to
complete each project and compared it to the total
number of auditable work hours available to our audit
team. I then sent the proposed audit plan to you for
comment. The plan will be finalized upon Commission
approval, hopefully tomorrow.
There were three areas that I want you to
be aware of that were ranked as high risk categories
during the initial staff survey, but fell into the lower
priority ranking in the later scoring process. Because
Internal Audit has a set number of staff and available
hours for audit work, three areas were not able to be
included in Fiscal Year 2016 Audit Plan. These areas
not included had to do with the Agency and Division
budget process, IT project performance, and emergency
radio communications. And the reason I'm making you
aware of this is that we have to disclose this on our
audit plan when we send it to our oversight agencies.
The final results of this risk-based
approach is the proposed Fiscal Year '16 Internal Audit
Plan, which is included in your books in Exhibit A. The
plan shows our fiscal year '15 carryover projects and
our new proposed projects for fiscal year '16. This
exhibit also includes the number of hours estimated to
complete these projects, and also it includes an
alternative project that can be substituted or added if
time permits.
So this is the motion I'll be asking for
you to adopt tomorrow for the approval of the Fiscal
Year '16 Internal Audit Plan, and I'll be happy to
address any questions.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Cindy, thank you.
Any questions on the plan?
Okay. Appreciate it.
MS. HANCOCK: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you very
much. Appreciate all your efforts.
If there's not -- no further discussion,
I'll place the Fiscal Year 2016 Internal Audit Plan on
the Thursday Commission meeting agenda for public
comment and action.
Item 3 is 2016-17 Statewide Recreational
and Commercial Fishing Proclamation Preview. Good
morning, Ken.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Good morning,
Commissioners. My name is Ken Kurzawski with Inland
Fisheries Division, and I'm here today to preview some
of the regulation -- potential regulation changes that
we've been discussing among our staff.
First category is evaluation of some of
the existing regulations and removing some unneeded
regulations. First is on Nelson Park Lake, a small lake
in Abilene. We put a catch-and-release regulation for
Largemouth bass there in 1992, and that was part of an
effort to manage bass in small impoundments. That
wasn't -- wasn't -- at least in this instance, wasn't a
successful regulation for the lake. It still has a
pretty minimal bass population. It suffers from some
low water quality. So we're just going to remove that
special reg and revert back to the statewide bag limit
for Largemouth bass.
And Meredith Reservoir for Smallmouth
bass, that had an excellent Smallmouth bass population.
Unfortunately, the low water levels and really Golden
alga there have decimated the Smallmouth bass
population. We also had a good Walleye population there
that was greatly impacted there. And since that
population has been decimated, we no longer need that
special slot limit on there. So we're just going to
revert back to the statewide limits. If the reservoir
does rebound and we wish to reestablish the Smallmouth
bass population, the 14-inch limit would be a good limit
for that starting out.
And for Saugeye, we -- we're stocking
this Walleye-Sauger hybrid in the 90s. Some states have
had success stocking these fish and preying on Stunted
crappie populations. We tried that in about ten
reservoirs around the state. Didn't have a lot of
success with it. We did develop a decent population in
Kirby Lake -- in Kirby near Abilene. But the anglers
seemed to have a difficulty catching the fish that were
out there. We -- we've kind of disbanded that program.
We last stocked the fish in 2011. We had to get those
fish from other states. There was difficulty getting
them. So we're going to remove that special regulation,
the 18-inch minimum on that, and just combine with the
Walleye regulation.
And moving on to modify some existing
regulations. Lake Naconiche was opened in 2012 with an
18-inch minimum, five-fish bag, which is the typical
regulation we impose on new reservoirs. And the goal
there was to protect those 14- to 18-inch bass and
establish a decent population there. The bass
population is still developing in that reservoir. The
staff there still thinks the trophy potential is high.
Many times in new lakes, there's good growth and we see
that strong year classes and good growth starting out.
And after it was opened, we did do a creel on the
reservoir. We did see that there was high effort. A
lot of fish. Catch rates were high. Not much harvest,
but we did see some harvest of those fish over 18 inches
and staff thinks we could further enhance that
population and look at some of the other trophy aspects
of it.
We did put out a -- asked the anglers
that fish the reservoir, their opinion on some possible
trophy regulation possibilities and we gave them -- gave
them -- asked their opinion on some of the regulations
that we use for trophy fishing and 16-inch maximum is
the one that the anglers seem to prefer and staff
believes that has some good potential for the reservoir.
So our proposal there is to implement that 16-inch
maximum length limit and five-fish daily bag and that
means 16-inch maximum, you can't harvest any fish over
16 inches; but if you were to have -- if you did happen
to catch a fish over 24 inches and it exceeded
13 pounds, you could retain that fish and donate it to
our ShareLunker program. We have a couple of reservoirs
there, Nacogdoches and Kurth, it would -- near Lufkin
that we have this reservoir on and it seems to be
well-accepted by the anglers in that area. And what
we're hoping to do there is maximize really the trophy
production of those fish over 16 inches, while allowing
some harvest to get a little bit of turnover in the
population, give some of those harvest-oriented anglers
some fish to catch.
Moving on to -- in East Texas, we have --
our coastal estuaries there have bass populations.
Typically, the fishing there has been locally based and
reasonably limited. There's a few small tournaments.
Mostly just small groups of weeknight jackpot
tournaments. We have been looking at that -- at those
areas over the years. We did some electrofishing in
2000 and we have -- have done some stocking of Florida
bass. We did some of that in response to the
hurricanes. The saltwater intrusion into those areas
usually has a negative impact on the bass populations.
These are some of the areas that -- where we've been
looking at down there, the lower Neches and Sabine and
some of the attendant bayous in and around the Port
Arthur area. And there's -- recently, there's been some
increased tournament interest in some of those areas,
kind of a unique fishery. There was a Bassmaster Elite
Series there, had a couple tournaments; and there's been
a number of high school and college events.
What they found and what we knew, that
there was a low abundance of bass over 14 inches. We've
always known that those populations down there responded
and were a little bit different than our -- many of our
statewide populations. And there's also been a local
desire in and around that area to recruit more of these
tournaments into the area and they felt that the lack of
fish over 14 inches was a detriment to that.
In the recent Legislative session, there
was a bill introduced that would allow participants and
high school and college fishing tournaments to weigh in
fish 2 inches below the minimum length limit and it
covered quite a wide area there, all the way down
Intercoastal into Chambers and Galveston County. We had
some discussions with the Representative that offered
that up. The bill did not advance, but we did make a
commitment to continue to examine the population
dynamics in those systems and also to get some angler
input on some -- maybe some possible regulatory changes.
When we looked at -- our staff there did
extensive work this year to look at the current state of
those bass populations and what we found were a lot of
fish below 13, 14 inches. As we knew, not many fish
were being caught over 14 inches; and there was a couple
other things that are a little bit different. There's
quite high natural mortality in that area, even though
the condition of fish -- their relative weight, which we
want to -- we like to see around 95 to 100, was good.
The fish natural mortality was still high and growth was
slow. Typically, it was taking them almost four years
to reach 14 inches and in some of the other reservoirs
around there -- for instance, Sam Rayburn, it takes two
years. Toledo Bend, about 2.9 years for them to reach
14 inches. So this was a slow-growing population with
not many fish over that 14 inches.
We looked at -- looked around the south
and we've looked for some similar systems. Atchafalaya
Basin had a similar situation. Bass were growing slower
than statewide averages there. They also had high
natural mortality; and in Louisiana, they decided to
remove the length limit there. Another similar system
in Alabama, similar -- a few large fish and they did
some bioenergetics modeling and they felt that the
salinity and -- contributed to the slower growth. Also,
there were some prey availability things due to the
saltwater estuarine areas that were impacting --
impacting the growth of bass.
So what our next step is there, we're
considering reducing the bass length limit to either a
12-inch minimum or possibly a no minimum length limit.
We would retain five-fish bag. We're still considering
what the boundaries of that and we're going to -- we're
in the process of doing a survey of the anglers in that
area to see what they think of some possible regulatory
options and we're continuing to work with the
Representative's office, keep them informed what we're
considering in this situation.
And finally, we have on Lake Tawakoni, we
have an excellent catfish fishery there, currently being
managed under the statewide length limits. There's been
some just excellent catches of catfish there, large
mainly Blue catfish. And we're hearing some desire
among the anglers there to reduce the harvest of these
catfish over 30 inches and provide some more additional
harvest below 20 inches. As you know, we've been
working on a catfish management plan, which is coming
out soon; and one of the -- some of the outcomes of that
plan is when we talk to the catfish anglers around the
state, there's a -- we know -- we knew and it sort of
confirmed that our catfish anglers are harvest oriented,
but also there's a desire there also to be able to at
least catch some larger catfish. The trophy aspect is
becoming a little more important. They would like to
harvest some of them; but above all, they would like to
be able to have the opportunity to catch some of those.
So we're looking at taking that into consideration. On
this fishery, we -- this fishery developed from one
stocking of Blue catfish in 1989. That's typical of
some of our reservoirs where we stocked the Blue
catfish. One or two stockings will develop some pretty
excellent populations. Sometimes it takes a little
while, but they usually do develop. And the combination
with the Blue catfish and the Channel catfish, this area
got declared the catfish capitol of Texas in a --
earlier in the 2000s.
As I said, there's been some just
excellent catches of large fish and some of the anglers
are concerned about that and our staff has been looking
at that and they are concerned that could this trophy
fishery be sustained at that level. So they started --
did some extensive special sampling in 2013 to assess
that fishery and to try and get some information on that
population. And what we saw comparing the harvest from
creels, the anglers' creels over a couple periods, 2008
to 2009, we did see a pretty large increase in the
number of fish harvested. The numbers -- the number we
actually saw in our creels and the TH, which is total
harvest. It's sort of a projected harvest over the
entire fishery. And we also did see an increase there
in those fish over 20 inches over that period and we've
been kind of focusing on the fish from 20 to 30 inches.
A 20-inch fish there is about 3 pounds, takes about nine
years. And the 30-inchers are -- takes about 11 years
to -- they're about 11 pounds and about -- about that
same amount of time to get to that size.
So what -- we also -- taking this
information, we went back out to the anglers to get
their opinions on the fishery. We saw that most of the
anglers were satisfied with the current limits, but
there was some support there -- a fair amount of
support -- for reducing the harvest of those large Blue
catfish. So some of that concern that we were hearing
did get borne out in the survey, and there was some --
there was strong support for reducing the harvest of
those larger fish for more opportunities to catch large
fish in the future and I want to make a distinction
between the harvest and the catch. The catch is --
includes harvest, but catch can also include catch and
release. So the anglers, what they were saying is they
want to be able to continue to have the opportunity to
catch those fish; but not necessarily harvest all of
them and they also were interested in keeping more small
fish in exchange for reducing some of the harvest of
those small fish and that's an important component of
this to continue to provide some harvest.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: You meant reducing
the harvest of the big fish?
MR. KURZAWSKI: Yes.
So what we're -- looking at that, we used
a model to model some of the impact population dynamics,
taking the age and growth information, the mortality
information, and population abundance; and we tried to
look at those 20-, 30-inch fish under various regulation
scenarios to see what were the tradeoffs if we limit the
harvest of the various size groups of fish that are
present in that population. And our goals there to --
you know, maintain or increase the catch of fish of
those large Blue catfish over 30 inches and then really
have a minimal impact over harvest overall by
redistributing the catch.
And what the -- the option we're
considering -- staff's considering now is removing the
12-inch minimum length limit. We're going to retain the
25-fish daily bag, but we're kind of proposing a new
method for the composition of that 25-fish bag. We
would allow the harvest of seven fish over 20 inches;
but then further limit that, that only two of those
could be 30 inches, to try and redistribute that harvest
among the size groups that we're looking to impact to
maintain the good fishing in that population.
Blue catfish are really the main focus of
this. Most of the Channel catfish are less than
20 inches. Anglers are pretty satisfied with that
fishery, and that really won't be impacted much by this
regulation. And our rational there is to, you know,
we're trying to address the concerns about the harvest
of those big Blues by redirecting that harvest to some
of the more abundant sized classes and looking to
maintain or increase the number of fish that could be
caught in the coming years. And the next step here, we
want to go back out and discuss this with the anglers.
We recognize that this is a little -- certainly a
different wrinkle on our regulations, and we need to get
some input to see if the anglers are -- feel this would
be a worthwhile step to take.
And with that, I'd be happy to entertain
any questions.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Questions for
Ken? Commissioner Scott.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Ken, if you go back
to the slide or the picture, the one that you've got
that shows the saltwater, the slower growth in the fish
and everything where you've got Lake Sabine, Lower
Neches River, and Taylor-Hildebrandt.
MR. KURZAWSKI: The map?
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, the map.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Right.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Okay. If you look
on the -- look on the Lower Neches River one, I'm sure
you're aware of this; but, you know, when you go up the
Neches River and you get to Beaumont and then you see
I-10 where it goes from Beaumont to Vidor?
MR. KURZAWSKI: Right.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: And, you know, right
above there on the Neches River, they built that
saltwater barrier. Gosh, I guess Lampson was
congressman when it got passed. So it's been at least
ten years. I'm just curious because I had a nephew that
was on that board and it's pretty amazing the salinity
levels from that saltwater barrier down to Sabine Lake,
how much difference there is. And I'm just curious,
you're not hardly very far above I-10 on this model and
I'm just curious why you didn't go further up to get the
ramifications of the difference in the salinity because
it's truly an amazing statistic because they've actually
got Redfish now all the up to that saltwater barrier
because the salinity goes all the way from Sabine Lake
up to that and people -- nobody really understood how
much difference in the salinity was until they built the
barrier and I'm curious on your model --
MR. KURZAWSKI: I guess the outline here
is just to focus the areas that we've been looking at.
We haven't -- you know, as far as settling on where we
would draw those lines, we would -- we haven't settled
on that. It would be certainly expanded possibly
throughout the entire county.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I'm just curious if
that affects anything that you're looking at doing or
proposing or anything? I'm just curious how that would
impact, you know, because it is such a huge difference
in the bass fishing and everything above that saltwater
barrier is --
MR. KURZAWSKI: Right.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: -- dramatically
different.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Correct. And we -- and
people are moving -- what I'm trying to say, we're
moving over those barriers, fishing various sides. So
we need to consider that when we do make that
regulation, take a look at our population information
and how far out those -- you know, where the people are
going, so.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Yeah, I just wanted
to --
MR. KURZAWSKI: Yeah. That wasn't really
representative of where we -- regulation would be. It's
just to kind of focus those areas that we had been
sampling in.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Okay, thanks.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Great.
Commissioner Jones?
COMMISSIONER JONES: The regulations that
you're proposing -- I think I understood this
correctly -- apply both to the Blues and the Channel?
MR. KURZAWSKI: Yes. They're the -- our
regulations are -- for those are always those combined.
It's a combined bag limit, Blues and Channel catfish.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Got it. So it
doesn't matter whether you caught a Channel or whether
you caught a Blue. You got the limit of two above 30.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Right. Most of the
Channels, there are very few above 20 inches. That's
why this regulation, it would impact mostly -- that 20-
and 30-inch would just impact Blue --
COMMISSIONER JONES: Blues more than any.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Right.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay. All right.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: And, Commissioner
Duggins?
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Would you pull up
the slide -- I think it's right -- keep going. It's
"Current bass population status." It's got the WR --
what are do the diamonds --
MR. KURZAWSKI: Those are -- that
would -- that just represents the relative weights of
those inch groups of fish. So, for instance, you know,
there in the 90 to 110 range for the relative weight --
and that's just the measure of condition. Sort of the
plumpness of the fish, an index we use to determine, you
know, fish of the varied -- fish that would be in --
wouldn't be in good condition, wouldn't be growing well,
skinny, would be down around 80.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Well, I understand
that. But if you look at the fish in the -- looks like
the 6- to 10-inch group, they've got great WRs.
MR. KURZAWSKI: Yes, and that's we -- we
did -- you know, that's -- overall, the fish are in good
condition there; but they aren't -- they aren't --
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: But then they drop
down as they get bigger. Is that -- is that due to a
lack of bait or --
MR. KURZAWSKI: They're --
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: -- just too much
competition because there are too many small fish?
MR. KURZAWSKI: I guess from that study
in Alabama, they saw some --
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: What do they know?
MR. KURZAWSKI: Well, that's in addition
to some of the things that they were preying on. They
didn't seem to be getting as much benefit when they got
to the large sizes. Sort of a bio -- the were eating
them, but they weren't getting much -- much -- you know,
it was enough to keep them in good condition; but it
didn't contribute to their growth, so.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Okay, thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you, Ken.
Appreciate it.
Any other questions?
All right. Jeremy, Coastal Fisheries,
please.
MR. LEITZ: Good morning, Commissioners.
For the record, my name is Jeremy Leitz with the Coastal
Fisheries Division; and I'm here today to talk about
Division's potential changes for 2016-2017. And really
all we have before you today is to clarify a regulation
for Black drum on the recreational side limit related to
the maximum length limit. Right now on the recreational
side, Black drum have a five-fish daily bag. There's a
14-inch minimum length limit. You can keep one over
52 inches, as well. Additionally, since about the last
1980s, there's been a 30-inch maximum length limit
associated here.
But just recently when our Administrative
Code was switched from a table format for bag and
possession limits to a text format, that maximum length
limit go eliminated in the process. It's still up on
our website. It's still in the Outdoor Annual. It's
still in our bag and size limit cards. It was just
omitted accidentally from the Administrative Code. And
so what we're doing is proposing to just put that back
in at this time, back to the 30-inch minimum length
limit. And that's what we have this year, and I'll be
happy to address any questions you might have.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Any questions?
Okay. Thank you very much.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Might I ask just
an --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Please, sure.
COMMISSIONER JONES: -- unrelated
question? It's related, but it's unrelated to Black
drum.
MR. LEITZ: Okay.
COMMISSIONER JONES: I went fishing down
at the coast during a red tide that we had not that long
ago; and as I understand it, red tide only comes in once
every four years, five years. It's infrequent; but when
it happens, it's pretty -- it's pretty awful. Do we
have any data or do we do any studies of the effect of
the red tide on the fish population and whether we
should or should not do anything as a result or does
nature pretty much fix itself and we just kind of leave
it alone and let it go until the next red tide rolls in?
MR. LEITZ: Sure. We certainly have
staff that do look at that. I may look to Robin here a
little bit, as well; but there's certainly a large -- or
people that look at that; and we do, you know, study
fish kills, the counts of the algae systems in the
water. But in regards to specific studies on impacts to
species, I --
MR. RIECHERS: Yes, sir, Commissioner.
Robin Riechers with Coastal Fisheries Division. What we
do is we do our routine, normal sampling that we do; and
when we have these bigger events, we can -- especially
when they've been of real consequence, we've been able
to pick those up in our surveys in regard to our bag
seines and our gillnets and we can then follow that
through time. Now, as far as each individual spill,
when it reaches the size of this event, we try to do
fish counts to determine the overall kill rates
associated with different species and then, you know, as
we move through time, we then look at that in comparison
to those routine studies that we do. Yeah.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
MR. RIECHERS: So we try to measure that
impact in ways that we have both for the event itself,
as well as through the time series of data that we
collect.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay. I'll talk to
you more about that offline then. I just wanted to know
if we --
MR. RIECHERS: Yep.
COMMISSIONER JONES: -- did stuff because
there were a lot of fish sitting on top of the water.
MR. RIECHERS: Sure, sure. And most of
the time it impacts rough fish and bait fish; but
certainly you will see some other sport species in that
mix of species, as well.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Yeah, okay.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you very
much.
MR. RIECHERS: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: I think we're
going to start with Alan Cain for Session Item No. 4,
2016-17 Statewide Hunting Proclamation Preview.
MR. CAIN: Good morning, Mr. Chairman,
Commissioners. For the record, my name is Alan Cain,
White-tailed Deer Program Leader. This morning, I'll
brief the Commission on possible changes to the
White-tailed deer regulations.
First change staff are considering is the
elimination of the antlerless deer control permit and
under the ADCP permit, a person may harvest does and
spikes from September 1 through the end of February.
The ADCP permit was started in 1993 and was very popular
up until 2003. And then in 2004, we saw a sharp decline
in permit requests and uses and that's continued to
today. In the last four years, we've issued only four
ADCP permits and three this year to date.
The decline in 2004, coincided with some
changes to the MLDP program where we extended the season
for MLDS to the February; and we did away with the dual
tagging requirements that, at one time, you had to have
a hunting license plus MLD tag or a bonus tag/MLD tag.
So we did away with that and it made it -- MLD program
more attractive. So consequently, those folks in the
ADCP program, permit program, a lot of them moved to the
MLD program.
And with that in mind and the declines,
staff are considering discontinuing that permit; and by
doing, so that would help eliminate a significant
expense that would be required to incorporate ADCP
administrative changes into the TWIMS redesign as we go
forward to redesign it for MLD. Additionally, there's
no demand for the ML -- or ADCP permit, as you can see
from the graph. And those individuals that have --
there are only three of them now that have the ADCP.
One of them we talked to, and he said he would move to
the MLD program if this changed. And other two,
obviously, would have the option to move to MLD or
Triple T or TTP to handle their harvest needs.
Another change staff are considering is
amending the definition of a legal buck during special
late season. Currently, there's 136 counties in the
state with the special late season where you can harvest
a doe and spike and that's the common -- folks refer to
that is. However, it can be confusing to a lot of
hunters out there that are hunting in counties where
there's anter restrictions in place. And, for example,
in general season in an antler restriction county, a
legal buck is -- one of the legal bucks that a person
may harvest is a deer with at least one unbranched
antler. And so you can see from the photo, obviously, a
spike would be legal. It's the photo on the right. And
then on the left is a picture of a three-point. He's
got a little fork, and so that would be legal. However,
when special late season opens, the only buck that would
be legal would be the spiked buck and that creates
confusion for those folks in those antler restriction
counties as far as what's legal as the -- you switch
what the definition is, especially relates to unbranched
antler type deer.
Therefore, staff will consider amending
the legal buck to include any buck with at least one
unbranched antler during that special season.
Obviously, it would help reduce confusion among hunters
and possible -- especially in those antler restriction
counties and possible unintended violations. Regardless
of whether you're in an antler restriction county, you
could be hunting in South Texas, think you're shooting a
spike, and you get up there and he's got a little fork
and you'd be in violation. So this would kind of clean
up some of that and help remove some of those unintended
violations.
Additionally, it provides some consistent
regulations with the definition of legal buck in our
antler restriction counties; and if you recall, it's
also consistent with the new MLD changes where under the
harvest option, a person may harvest an unbranched
antler buck with a rifle during that early season in
October.
Additionally, staff are considering
opening the deer season in 14 counties in the western
part of the Panhandle in Texas there. Over the last
several years, staff are noticing an increase in deer
density in that western portion. The counties outlined
in blue on the screen there, we'd be considering
expanding or opening the deer season to. We're also
receiving requests from private landowners over there
for the opportunity to harvest White-tails as they move
into that area there. And traditionally, that's Mule
deer habitat; but White-tails are expanding westward
from Lubbock all the over to the New Mexico border
there. It does provide flexibility for these landowners
to manage the expanding deer population.
So what staff would be considering is for
the counties in blue, we'd consider archery and general
season, with a bag limit of one buck and two antlerless;
and then for the county in green, which is Winkler
County, we'd consider an archery and general season,
with a bag limit of one buck and two antlerless for all
seasons combined, but antlerless could only be harvested
during the archery season. And the reason it's
different is because the counties that surround Winkler
there, have that same bag limit and structure. In other
words, you can't take a -- you could only harvest
antlerless deer during archery season, and so we keep
that consistent with those counties around Winkler
there.
Additionally, staff are also considering
expansion of doe days in 23 counties in the Post Oak
Savannah ecological region; and that region, also we're
experiencing an increase in deer density. I think over
the last ten years, we've seen a 23 percent increase.
Antlerless harvest comprises about 40 percent of that
region's -- of the harvest -- total harvest in that
region. Obviously, harvest is skewed towards bucks; and
as a result, we've seen skewed doe-to-buck rations over
there ranging from 3.5 does per buck up to six or so,
depending on the particular area within that ecological
region.
Additionally, we've seen a 50 percent
increase in the MLD participation rates over there,
especially in the last six years. I had one biologist
tell me in the last four years, he's gone from three
properties in one particular county up to 47; and so,
obviously, that contributes to some of the workload
issues we've talked about in the past with MLD. So
expanding doe days in those counties would reduce
impacts, deer browsing impacts on the native habitat out
there, help to improve the sex ratio, provide off --
additional hunting opportunity, and provide some
flexibility for landowners to manage deer populations
over there.
And so what staff would be considering
is, so the counties on the map that are in orange with
the dark-brown outline, currently they have zero doe
days. We would consider opening those up to a four
doe-day season in those counties. And then the counties
in green with the dark-green boundary, currently have
four doe days; and we'd consider expanding those to 16
doe days.
Additionally, in that Post Oak Savannah
ecological region there, we'd also consider the
expansion of a muzzleloader season. That's depicted by
the counties in blue on the map. Currently, there's a
muzzleloader season that spans most of the eastern part
of the state and down to the Oak Prairie region; and so
we'd fill in and make that consistent with the rest of
that region over there. And the muzzleloader season
opens the first Monday following the first Sunday in
January and runs for 14 connective days, and it
generally coincides with the special White season in the
rest of the state. So most of those counties in white,
it doesn't have a muzzleloader season; but it does have
a special late season for the doe and the spike harvest
with the exception of the few counties over there.
And the last change staff are considering
has to do with antlerless harvest on U.S. Forest Service
lands. Current -- under current rule, antlerless deer
permit is required to harvest an antlerless deer on
certain U.S. Forest Service properties during any
season. And over the last several years, we've had
requests from the U.S. Forest Service to exempt youth
hunters during the youth-only season from that
antlerless permit requirement. And so staff would
consider allowing for the take of antlerless deer
without an antlerless permit on U.S. Forest Service
lands during any youth season. So both on the front
end, just that weekend before general season, and then
on the back end, that week-long youth season there. It
would provide additional harvest opportunity for the
youth out there and we don't see any biological
implications to that and it would be consistent with our
policy and practice on our WMA properties that we lease
from the Forest Service where we do exempt youth hunters
from a permit requirement during that youth-only season.
So that concludes my portion of the
statewide preview. I'll be happy to answer any
questions.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you, Alan.
Questions for Alan?
Commissioner Duggins.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Alan, if you go to
your chart that shows the counties where you're thinking
about recommending expansion -- yeah, that one. I think
that last year or maybe it was two years ago when we
looked at expanding the hunting, White-tail hunting, in
Lynn and Terry Counties or one of the two or it could
have been both. We got -- had a number of landowners
there around Tahoka, have expressed some real
reservations and concerns and we backed off of -- more
from a safety standpoint, than anything given the nature
of that terrain. Am I remembering that right?
MR. CAIN: It may be Mule deer that we
had the concern over and I'm not sure -- Shawn Gray, our
Mule Deer Program Leader is in here. He might be able
to speak to that.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Well, all I'm
suggesting we do is before we move too quickly on that,
that we make sure we connect with the landowners up
there who did express concerns last time so that they're
in the room and able to share their comments early on.
That would be my suggestion.
MR. CAIN: Yeah, certainly we can do that
and provide some scoping meetings up there to get some
public input. So, Shawn, do you have any -- do you
recall --
MR. GRAY: For the record, I'm Shawn
Gray. I'm the Mule Deer and Pronghorn Program Leader.
Yes, you're correct. It was trying to open up Mule deer
season in Lynn County, and we did get a petition that a
lot of the landowners or folks in the community did not
support opening a season at that time; but we are
actively talking to them now. Hopefully, in the next
year or two, propose Lynn County for Mule deer season
and we're getting more support for that for sure.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Well, I just -- I
would just suggest that we talk with those who signed
that petition. One name that comes to mind was Crawford
Edwards, whose family has a large ranch there at Tahoka.
And I'm not suggesting that whatever he wants, he gets
by any -- I don't mean to suggest that. I'm just saying
let's talk to people like him because they did have
serious reservations last time.
MR. CAIN: Sure, great idea.
COMMISSIONER JONES: What -- remind me,
what was the safety issue? What was the --
MR. SMITH: I think the issue in that
area is you've got really a lot of farm country
interspersed with little pockets of Mule deer habitat
and those farm roads tend to get driven by a lot of
people and so I think there was a concern about
enforcement and maybe pockets of habitat getting poached
under the pretense of hunting.
And so I think Shawn and his team are
doing a great job talking to those ranchers about that;
obviously, engaging our game wardens to make sure that
we've got appropriate law enforcement presence. But I
think that's what it really was about, all of that open
farm field and a lot of folks driving on those farm
fields and then having, again, little pockets of cover
where the deer will concentrated, concerned about
vulnerability there.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you.
MR. CAIN: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Kevin Davis.
MR. DAVIS: Good morning, Mr. Chairman.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Good morning.
How are you?
MR. DAVIS: Commissioners, for the
record, my name is Kevin Davis, the Law Enforcement
Division. Oh, let's see. We've got the wrong slides up
there.
MS. CLARK: We skipped Dave Morrison.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Oh, did we?
MR. DAVIS: Okay.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: I've got Kevin,
and then Dave Morrison next; but we can -- whatever --
MR. SMITH: Did you have anything on the
statewide, Kevin; or is your stuff on the aerial
permits?
MR. DAVIS: It'd be on the aerial.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Oh, okay.
MR. SMITH: Yeah, let's go back -- could
we -- if we could, Mr. Chairman --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Sure.
MR. SMITH: -- go back to Dave Morrison?
Then, we'll get Kevin up.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: All right. We're
going to go to Dave.
MR. MORRISON: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: And then get
Kevin up here.
MR. MORRISON: Sorry about that.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: It's all good.
Good morning.
MR. MORRISON: Mr. Chairman,
Commissioners, my name is Dave Morrison. I'm the Small
Game Program Director. And this morning, even though we
just finalized the waterfowl regulations back in August,
it's time to, once again, begin the process of setting
federal -- state regulations for federally protected
species and we're going to be talking about the 2016-17
migratory game bird for next year.
And primarily the purpose of this
briefing is to provide you with an update on the new
process and timelines. As we mentioned before, we're
going to change in how we establish regulations for
migratory birds. I'd like to also provide you with
information that we have available at this time to help
drive our decisions next year, as well as any potential
changes that we see for the 2016-17 season.
As I mentioned, there is a new process
that's starting; and these changes were implemented as a
result of the Fish and Wildlife Service and how they
wanted to operate in the future. In the past, we'd come
before you in March, with adoption of the early season
sometime in May and followed up with a late season
typically being adopted in -- at the August meeting.
That's all changing now.
All migratory bird regulations will be
rolled into a single regulation process starting with
the 2016-17 season. This is going to allow Texas to
establish both the resident and migratory regulations
all at the same time and roll them into a single
process. So what it's going to look like in the future,
in November we'll come to you with a briefing of what we
perceive to be potential changes in the recommendations.
In January, we would present proposals for your
consideration; and then have those put into the State
Register, with a final adoption by the Commission in
March. And after the final adoption, the Fish and
Wildlife Service would publish the final rule sometime
in May, which will allow us the opportunity to try to
bring all of this information into a single document.
With respect to information that we have
available, no news is good news. We have nothing new.
Basically, we're going to be moving forward with the
16-17 season using prior years' information. This is
new for ducks. It's not new for dove. We've used prior
information in setting regulations for dove, and we
don't anticipate any real changes in the structure of
the season. The frameworks will be basically unchanged.
And just to kind of give you a highlight
of what we see, for waterfowl, which is ducks and geese,
the framework for ducks, the outside days would be the
Saturday nearest September 24th, closing date of the
Sunday nearest January the 31st. For geese, the opening
date, the earliest it could be would be the 24, just
like ducks; but the framework allows you to run later,
which is the Sunday nearest February 15th. We
anticipate a liberal bag limit for ducks this year,
which is essentially a 74-day season, six-bird bag
limit; and we don't anticipate any changes for geese.
For dove, the season frameworks and bag
limits remain unchanged. We'll again be offered three
zones with no more than two segments. The framework for
the North and Central Zone will be September 1 through
January the 25th. For the South Zone, the earliest we
can open next year would be September 23rd, latest we
could run would be January 25th; and a special
White-winged dove area, essentially same frameworks for
the South Zone, with the exception that we're provided
four additional days in early September to take
advantage of White-wings.
There is a bit change coming. In the
past, we've had a 70-dove season. We were able to get
that changed during this regulation's process and next
year, Texas will be offered 90-day dove season for the
first time ever. We're basically going to be looking at
ways to deal with that. For other migratory birds, like
snipe, rail, gallinule, woodcock, and cranes, we do not
anticipate any changes with respect to the season
structure or bag limits.
COMMISSIONER JONES: How many days do we
have for dove now?
MR. MORRISON: Seventy.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Wow, that's
significant.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Where do we stand,
Carter -- I don't know if it's for you or for you. You
know, we were talking about trying to merge the zones
and everything at one point in time. Where's all -- are
you fixing to address that?
MR. MORRISON: I'm not, but I can.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Okay.
MR. MORRISON: We do have --
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Please.
MR. MORRISON: We have the option, the
opportunity -- and it would be not necessarily for the
16-17, but for the 17-18 process. Trying to do some of
the things that are necessary within a very shortened
timeline, it would be smarter for us if we want to
really address looking at the zones and splits, it would
be for the 17-18, with us taking forward proposal to the
Fish and Wildlife Service by May of next year. And then
if we want to proceed down that path, we could implement
it in the 17-18 season.
And essentially what you're asking for,
we do have the opportunity every five years to relook at
zones and splits. But understand that right now, Texas
has a grandfather clause; and any time you start
tinkering with changes in the number of zones, etcetera,
we lose that grandfather ability and we can never go
back. And what that grandfather ability is, is the
January 25th closure.
So if we were to recommend a change and
go to two zones in the state, we could have three
segments in the two zones; but we could not go to
January 25th. And whatever that southern most zone,
currently the way it's structured, we could still not
open any earlier than the Saturday nearest
September 20th, but no earlier than the 17th. It's
really wacky when you deal with some of these things.
So we do have that opportunity. We are going to discuss
it after we go through this process because we do not
have to make a decision until next May. That gives us
ample opportunity. We actually do have a survey out
right now that are coming back, asking questions about
what the preferences would be of the dove hunters in
Texas; but there are some things that we would have to
seriously consider, particularly the 25th of January
which we would give up if we did go to change our zone
split configuration as it currently stands.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: So we have would
have to go back from the 25th a number of days?
MR. MORRISON: Yes, sir. It would be --
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: How many?
MR. MORRISON: January 15th is the
current closure, yes, sir. So those are the things that
we will have to certainly weigh before we would come
forward, and we would certainly involve you in those
discussions; but it is one of those grandfather clauses
that Texas does have. We are the only state that does
go to January 25th right now, so.
Moving forward, with respect to --
proposals are still being developed. We just got the
final word from the Fish and Wildlife Service a couple
of weeks ago at the Service Regulations Committee and so
we have yet to have an opportunity to sit down with the
Technical Committee, much less have an opportunity to
talk to our Migratory Game Bird Advisory Committee about
any proposals. But for waterfowl, we don't see any
changes in season length and bag limit. We do look
at -- we're going to have to look at calendar shifts
simple because we need to understand the timing of the
shifts, the splits. Are we going to maintain the splits
at the same time, offset them? Because what we're
looking at next year, we do have a leap year; and when
you have a leap year, it really kind of throws things
off by a few extra days. So those have -- those
decisions have yet to be made yet, have yet to be even
talked to; but we are going to look at the open and
closing dates for the North and South Zones. We don't
necessarily anticipate much change with High Plains
Mallard Management Unit simply because we do have the
extra days. And as I said earlier, the bag limit, the
season length, waterfowl will be unchanged.
For dove, this 90-day addition -- these
additional 20 days added onto the current 70 is going to
require some discussion and how is the best way to
allocate those days by zone, as well as the best use of
those days for the respective areas. So we're going to
have some discussions with staff, as well as our
advisory boards to try to come up with what we think
would be the best opportunity to consider when we open
it, trying to ensure that the closing dates -- it's a
little bit complicated because you want to try to close
them all the same date so in the second split, you would
like to open the same date to avoid any confusion. So
adding 20 days is certainly a blessing, but it does
bring with it its own set of headaches as you try to
structure season in a state as large as Texas.
Although migratory birds will be very
similar to last year, the -- those that typically
coincide with waterfowl will continue to coincide with
waterfowl; and most of them will have calendar
adjustments where necessary.
In summary, this whole new process is a
learning experience for us all. All the states up and
down the Flyaway and Fish and Wildlife Service, we're
working towards that. The proposals are going to be
developed by staff working in consultation with our
Migratory Game Bird Technical Committee. Once we have
proposals developed, we will then take those to the
Migratory Game Bird Advisory Committee for their review
and provide input; and we'll bring those proposals back
in January. We do think that this new process is
certainly going to be simpler for hunters with all the
dates for deer, squirrel, rabbits, ducks, dove being
adopted at the same time because it will provide more
lead time to plan for the next hunting season.
With that, I'll answer any questions you
may have.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you, Dave.
Questions for Dave?
Appreciate it. Thank you.
MR. MORRISON: Thanks.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Item 5, Area
Wildlife Management. Kevin Davis, you're back up.
MR. DAVIS: Thank you, Chairman and
Commissioners. Again, my name is Kevin Davis, for the
record; and I'm with the Law Enforcement Division. I
just wanted to give you guys an overview of a petition
we received this past spring for rulemaking regarding
aerial management of wildlife.
To give you a background, the petitioner
had had a conflict with an aerial wildlife permit
management holder. Basically, they had the same
property. They had permission on the same property to
conduct their activities. The petitioner had permission
to hunt waterfowl and the permit holder had permission
to be conducting aerial management for hogs on the
property. That created a conflict that neither party
wanted the other one there.
So we got involved in that and ran into a
few issues and the petitioner decided to look at our
rulemaking process. Basically, he asserted that the
current rules allowed for the harassment of migratory
birds in violation of both state and federal law. He
also asserted that adjacent landowners would actually
stock hogs next door to property where they know they
were trying to eradicate hogs. He further suggested
that we, as a Department, should inspect properties that
to make sure that depredation is actually occurring by
feral prior to issuing a permit, and also wanted to look
at a timeframe where a season would occur for the
management of feral hogs. He wanted those -- that
season to take place outside of other hunting seasons.
Although the staff recommendation was to
deny the permit, we did take his -- excuse me, deny the
petition. We did take his petition very seriously, and
we were already looking at aerial permit changes needed.
And so I'm going to articulate some of the reasons we
denied -- we suggested that we deny the petition. I
want you to know that Mitch Lockwood is going to speak
to some areas of his concerns that we're able to address
in our proposal today.
First of all, feral hogs are indisputably
an ecological and agricultural menace. TPWD has a long
history of trying to assist landowners in management of
that specific species. TPWD did not wish to impose
unnecessary restrictions on landowners in that
endeavorer. Unintentional disturbance of non-target
species does not violate state or federal law. It's
actually permitted under the Federal Airborne Hunting
Act and state law. A season for management of the
wildlife and exotics from March 15th through August 31st
would place a serious burden on landowners to actually
manage their properties, and developing criteria for
evaluation inspection would place a burden on staff.
However, I wanted to note that
intentional harassment of other species under the guise
of the permit is enforceable by Law Enforcement; and we
can enforce that and do. With that, I'll take any
questions.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: I've got --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Commissioner
Morian.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: I've got one. Just
out of curiosity, if you -- if Law Enforcement observed
an aerial hog eradication program that harassed ducks or
anything else unintentionally, but incidental to the
aerial hog hunting, what would Law Enforcement -- what
would be your reaction to that?
MR. DAVIS: Well, we -- obviously, we
take all complaints seriously. And so we would talk to
the parties involved and let the facts speak for
themselves. But, yeah, it's a highly regulated
activity. Meaning they have to keep daily flight logs.
They have to keep -- they have to turn those reports in,
and the State Legislature has deemed it pretty egregious
to deviate or not do the practices that are required to
be done under the permit. In fact, they make all
violations that are not related to reporting, a Class A
misdemeanor. So we -- we investigate that. We'll talk
to all parties involved and actually go where the facts
leads us.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: But if you
observe -- I mean, it's not intentional. It's just
incidental and you're focused on the hogs and you're --
MR. DAVIS: Incidental movement is not a
violation of the law. So if they're operating under the
parameter of the permit, there's not a lot we can do
right there.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: So you wouldn't
respond or --
MR. DAVIS: Oh, we would respond, every
case; and, again, investigate and make sure that it was,
indeed, incidental and not intentional.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: Okay. Interesting
situation, but thank you.
MR. DAVIS: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Mitch.
MR. LOCKWOOD: Good morning, Mr.
Chairman, Commissioners. For the record, my name is
Mitch Lockwood. I'm the Big Game Program Director; and
this morning, I am seeking permission to publish in the
Texas Register proposed amendments to the rules
governing an aerial wildlife management permit, which,
of course, is the permit that authorizes the use of --
authorizes the wildlife management activities from
aircraft, whether it be conducting deer surveys or net
gunning deer for Triple T purposes, for example, or as
Kevin just shared with you, shooting feral hogs from
helicopters, as well.
Most of the amendments are intended to
streamline and clarify existing rules. For example, we
propose to clarify that hunting license requirements
apply to anyone who's attempting to take wildlife from
aircraft, except those who are attempting to take
depredating feral hogs or coyotes.
We also propose to allow for the renewal
of expired permits. So our current rules require one to
submit an application for renewal within ten days prior
to the expiration of their current permit, and that
creates some administrative burdens both for the
applicant and for our staff. And we simply propose to
allow for the renewal of expired permits. Our current
rules state that an LOA is valid for the duration of a
permit, which could last for several years. And as
Kevin Davis just shared with you, we have received at
least one request for a permit to be specific -- to be
valid for a very specific period of time, whether that
be three days to -- that's required to conduct the
permitted activity, for example.
And so staff have proposed to allow the
LOA to be valid for the life of the permit or for a time
specified in the authorization. Now, I should clarify
that the statute of the Parks and Wildlife Code does not
give Parks and Wildlife Department the authority to make
an LOA valid for a period of less than 12 months. In
fact, the code specifically states that the LOA must be
valid for at least 12 months. However, staff do believe
that we have the authority and should respect the wishes
of a landowner who would like to withdraw that
authorization.
Additionally, staff propose to require a
georeference map showing the exact boundaries of the
property to accompany the LOA and for the landowner to
verify the accuracy of the LOA in the map and these
requirements are intended to reduce the incidences of
aerial wildlife management activities being conducted on
the wrong property.
Current rules allow for staff to approve
LOAs in the field in emergency situations. It's not a
common practice; and staff really believe that it's not
necessary, since LOAs are typically processed and
approved within a day of the Department receiving these.
It does create some additional administrative burdens
when they're approved in the field because it's not
administrative staff who's doing this approval if it's
in the field. It's a game warden doing it and so a
number is not assigned to this for tracking purposes and
so there's really no way to follow up on the activity
that's being conducted on that property. We can't
really follow up or track the reports associated with
that activity for that property, which are required in
order for us to comply with the federal reporting
requirements. Therefore, staff propose to repeal the
rule that authorizes the LOA approval in the field.
Several months ago --
COMMISSIONER JONES: Mitch, can I ask you
a question about that?
MR. LOCKWOOD: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER JONES: What -- what -- for
what purpose would somebody need an emergency LOA? And
this is assuming that they're not abusing the process.
Just what things would arise where you would need an
emergency LOA?
MR. LOCKWOOD: That is a good question.
The few times that it has happened that I'm aware of in
my career, it's been questionable -- the instances that
have come to mind have been questionable of whether or
not it truly is an emergency. I would like to lean over
to Kevin Davis to see if he has a good example.
MR. DAVIS: Yeah, it's difficult to find
an example of a real emergency related to an LOA. So
that --
COMMISSIONER JONES: I couldn't think of
one either. That's why I was bringing it up. I don't
really see that we need that provision if -- I mean, I
didn't want to miss something if there was a, you
know --
MR. DAVIS: No.
COMMISSIONER JONES: You know, a hog
showing up in your backyard I don't think is an
emergency. It might not be desirable, but I don't think
it's an emergency.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: How many have we
issued?
MR. DAVIS: So emergency LOAs, I'll have
to get that number for you sir. But I will you that the
ones that I'm aware of, all deal with exotic -- other
than a hog -- getting off a property and onto somebody
else's, and whether or not that is an emergency has been
what has been hard to determine. In most cases, the
landowners are working together and resolving those
issues and in normal business hours, are able to resolve
those.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: All right, good.
Thanks.
MR. LOCKWOOD: Several months ago, the
Department began requiring that the quarterly reports be
submitted electronically; and as you can imagine, that's
greatly increased the efficiency of -- for data entry
and for reporting by our staff. And staff would simply
like to clarify our propose that this rule be made clear
in -- that this requirement, rather, be made clear in
the regulation.
This proposal also includes permit denial
language that's consistent with the permit denial rules
that apply to various deer management permits. That is
that the Department may refuse to issue to -- issue new
permits to or renew permits or revoke a permit for any
person who has been found and convicted of, pleaded nolo
contendere to, received deferred adjudication, or
assessed an administrative penalty for a violation of
Parks and Wildlife Code Chapter 43, Subchapter C, E, L,
R, or R-1 or Parks and Wildlife Code violation that is
Class A or B misdemeanor, State Jail felony, felony or a
violation of Parks and Wildlife Code 63.002 or a
violation of the Lacey Act. Staff also propose that the
Department be able to refuse to issue a new permit or
renew a permit or revoke a permit to any person that we
believe and have evidence of that is acting as a
surrogate or on behalf of someone who is prohibited from
engaging in these permitted activities.
And then finally, this proposal would
prohibit someone from contracting as a gunner or an
observer if that person has been found and convicted of,
pleaded nolo contendere to, received deferred
adjudication for, or assessed an administrative penalty
for an offense that is listed in this section.
And that concludes my presentation, but
I'll be glad to answer any questions that you may have.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Kevin, Mitch,
thank you.
Any other questions?
COMMISSIONER JONES: The only question I
have I think was probably for Ann. I noticed in some of
the language, it looked like y'all were trying to
clarify agent of the landowner or authorized agent for
the landowner or you were trying to take out that
redundancy or whatever. It -- it -- and I don't -- you
don't really need to comment one way or the another.
But if you were trying to take out a redundancy, you
might just want to run through -- there are a couple of
places where we still refer to an "authorized agent."
And I think probably where you were going with this is
if you're an agent, you're already authorized. So
that's the only comment I have.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Dan?
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Yes.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: One quick question.
If we've established some review boards so if a
person -- if we don't -- if we deny them a permit, what
is their option to seek relief?
MR. LOCKWOOD: That's a good question.
And since this proposal actually does not address a
permit review process like a lot of our deer permits
provide, I would ask if Ann Bright could come up here
and address your question on what options there may be.
MS. BRIGHT: Good morning. I'm Ann
Bright, General Counsel. Okay, there's sort of a
practical answer and then a legal answer. And the
practical answer is we could, if we wanted to, assemble
a review panel to look at this. I will say we take, you
know, these kinds of complaints very seriously, somebody
who thinks that they were wrongfully denied. Legally,
their legal option would basically be to sue us.
You know, having said that, I guess, you
know, we could always -- if the Commission wants us
to -- include something in the rules about a review
panel.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: We have a -- we
currently have a process for permittees for other
permits, right?
MS. BRIGHT: Right. And what we would
probably do is just reference that process.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Rather than a
separate process.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I just question not
having any -- not having any recourse. I mean, to me,
that -- I just -- we've been through this issue on a
couple, you know. The bad could show up no matter what.
I just question whether we need to address that issue
while we're passing this at the same time or not.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: I think it makes
sense to keep it consistent with other review processes.
So, you know, just --
COMMISSIONER JONES: Just add it.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Okay.
MS. BRIGHT: That's easy enough. This
wouldn't be up for adoption until January; and there are
a number of other things that we're going to try and
clean up in these rules, including some of the
redundancy.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Good.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Just an observation.
MS. BRIGHT: Okay.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: That's a good
point.
MS. BRIGHT: Okay.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you.
MS. BRIGHT: Okay.
COMMISSIONER JONES: It's just a black
hole.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you. So
I'll authorize staff to publish proposed rules regarding
aerial wildlife management in the Texas Register for the
required public comment period.
Item No. 6, Chronic Wasting Disease
Update, Recommended Adoption of Interim Proposed Rules,
Briefing on Potential Carcass Movement Restriction
Rules, Briefing on Emergency Trap, Transport and
Transplant and TTP and DMP, Mr. Wolf.
MR. WOLF: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For
the record, I'm Clayton Wolf, the Director of the
Wildlife Division. And as the Chairman has already
indicated, there's quite a bit of material that I'm
going to try to cover as quickly as possible related to
CWD. Thank you very much for your patience in advance.
One thing want to -- we feel like we need
to do is really take a look at our timeline and some of
outreach. You know, this is -- these rules related to
breeder permits and Triple T permits and whatnot, the
initial steps were interim emergency rules; and we were
operating on a pretty compressed timeline. Nonetheless,
we do want to share with you some of our outreach and
how we were able to reach out to stakeholders to be able
to get input and involvement that did actually influence
the final text of the rules.
And then also I want to talk about
carcass transport rules. We were actually contemplating
these even prior to the discovery of CWD in Medina
County. What we anticipate is operating under the same
schedule as the statewide hunting and fishing
proclamation; but since this is CWD related, I'll
include it as part of my presentation. Then I'll update
you-all on the emergency interim rules for Triple T,
TTP, and DMP that were adopted on October the 5th. And
then finally, I'll review again the interim deer breeder
rules that we'll be asking you to consider for adoption
tomorrow. And I do quantity to emphasize the term
"interim," particularly for the deer breeder rules to
let folks know; and at the end of my presentation, I'll
talk about our process for the new set of rules that we
will be bringing early in January.
First, timeline of events. And I do want
to -- I do want to recognize Dr. Andy Schwartz. He's
the Assistant Executive Director at Texas Animal Health
Commission, over here to my right. I think folks
recognize the face from up from the special meeting.
You know, with the discovery of CWD in Medina County and
since early July, there have been numerous -- sometimes
daily -- meetings with Texas Animal Health Commission
primarily; but also to include USDA and the diagnostic
lab in College Station in working through the disease
investigation, herd plans, rules. And in the early
stages, early July, we met regularly and obviously
relied quite a bit not only on our own wildlife
veterinarian Bob Dittmar, but on the expertise of Texas
Animal Health Commission professionals and the fact that
they have some regulatory overlap, if you will, when it
relates to CWD in these native species.
So we've been working regularly. In
fact, Friday had another working group meeting here
with -- in -- at our headquarters. But on July 8th --
and it is Mr. Smith and the Executive Director Dee Ellis
of Texas Animal Health Commission that established a
group of stakeholders. These were leaders within the
deer hunting industry that we were using to outreach to,
use as a sounding board, and also get input. And so our
first stakeholder call was on July 8th.
We also went to the TWA annual convention
on the 10th and briefed attendees at that convention
about the discovery of CWD, and then had our first CWD
task force meeting -- and I want to make sure we don't
confuse the working group with the task force. The task
force is an interagency appointed advisory group, if you
will. It's appointed by Mr. Carter Smith and Dr. Ellis,
and these are primarily wildlife health professionals
and producers in the cervid and deer breeding industry
that we rely upon as we're talking about CWD rules.
And so we briefed them on July 14th.
Most of the discussion was about the index facility and
what our plans were and also receiving input on how to
deal with that facility. Of course, we briefed this
Commission with a special meeting on July 16th. We had
another stakeholder call on the 24th; and then we had an
important meeting on August 6th with our CWD task force,
particularly as it relates to these interim deer breeder
rules that we're going to ask you to consider for
adoption tomorrow.
We spent many days working with Texas
Animal Health Commission, USDA, to develop the first set
of proposed rules. We rolled those out at that August
6th meeting here in the Commission hearing room; and
then in the following days, August 7th through 9th,
there were numerous phone calls with leadership,
primarily the deer -- the leadership from Texas Deer
Association and the Deer Breeders Corporation, but also
calls between Carter Smith, myself, and my staff to
make -- to see if we could make these -- the -- take the
input and make it workable and incorporate it into the
rules. And as a result, there were some significant
changes to those rules that were adopted as emergency
rules.
We took those proposed changes and had a
conference call with the stakeholders again on August
10th; and because we needed to move forward quickly to
be able to get deer breeders back moving again --
because remember, there was -- on July 1, we basically
had a moratorium on movement. Mr. Smith told the group,
told the organizations on the call and asked the -- he
specifically said, "I'm not asking you to tell me if you
like these rules." He says, "What we need to understand
is are these -- is this set of rules something that you
can live with as a temporary set of rules for this
hunting season until we can have more time to adopt a
more -- and more comprehensively study a new set of
rules?"
All the responses were affirmative at
that call; and so with that response, we move forward.
Now, to be fair to Texas Deer Association, we believe
that perspective has changed some. We're anticipating a
comment letter from them or at the least, comment
tomorrow at the Public Hearing; and so just to be fair
to them, I believe we may hear a change in perspective
from Texas Deer Association. But at that point on
August 10th, we proceeded with the knowledge that we had
the head nod from everyone on that call.
On August 14th, it was -- Dr. Ellis and I
addressed the TDA annual convention and the update on
where we were with the rules and the epidemiological
investigation. And then on the 18th, the rules were
filed and effective. And, of course, we briefed this
Commission on the 19th and 20th. And an important
point, on August 24th, the week after the Commission
meeting, TWIMS was activated; and this is an important
point every. Everyone, every deer breeder that was
movement qualified prior to the moratorium, by
August 24th was back in business. Now, obviously, there
might be some release site testing implications; but
those that had met the movement qualification
requirements prior to July 1, on August 24th, all those
parties were back in business and eligible to move and
liberate deer. And I've got to say, you know, just a
herculean effort by our Wildlife permit staff and George
Rios' staff and IT and doing all the development, the
change in the coding, the testing. They were working on
an extremely tough deadline, and they actually -- they
delivered, you know, a couple of days in advance; and so
we were able to launch and actually launch flawlessly.
So kudos to that group of staff out there that did all
the development and testing within TWIMS.
On September 1, we changed gears. We, of
course, had the adoption of the breeder rules; and so
now we focused on another set of permits -- Triple T,
TTP, DMP -- and we addressed our CWD task force meeting
to receive input on some contemplated rules. Took that
input, then had another stakeholder call on the 16th,
got some more input from the stakeholders, and was able
to incorporate that. And then on October 5th, by
executive order, Carter Smith adopted these emergency
interim rules for those particular permits; and I will
cover that in a little more detail in a few minutes.
I'm sure folks are probably a bit
interested in where we stand with some of the testing.
If you read this slide right here, obviously shows the
general locations of the 30 facilities that provided
deer to the index facility in Medina County; and the
next slide here shows the 145 facilities in Texas that
received deer from the index facility in Medina County,
not including the two in Mexico. And this particular
slide here kind of shows the breakdown. That's where we
started basically at the beginning of July. We -- our
staff were able to pull the herd owner information, if
you will, the facility owner information, provide that
to Texas Animal Health Commission and they did the heavy
lifting on writing the hold order letters, developing
herd plans in consultation with us and getting with all
these facility owners to let them know that they had a
hold order or to possibly learn some information that
would free them of that hold order and also inform them
of their requirements if they wanted to try to have that
hold order released. And so this particular slide, this
data was presented by Dr. Schwartz downtown at the
Capitol on the 21st.
A little update on these trace-in and
trace-out herds. After folks got started, what we
learned was that there were four hold -- or four of the
facilities, trace-in facilities, were actually closed by
the time we discovered the CWD positives. So they were
not in possession of any deer. There was -- you know,
there was no need to tell them to keep anything in place
because they had closed their facility, vacated that
facility of any deer; and so no hold orders placed on
those facilities. But there were 26 active breeding
facilities and Animal Health Commission got with them,
presented herd plans to all of them; and you'll see in
the graphic there, we have two herd plan -- where it
indicates herd plans, those are herd plans that were
signed and agreed to by the landowner.
There are also two pending herd plans.
Those are plans -- a pending herd plan in this slide and
others, basically indicates they were presented a herd
plan -- at least at the time of this presentation -- had
yet to sign that herd plan. But I am told by Animal
Health Commission that after 15 days, that that herd
plan is effective. Now, there is -- they can protest
that herd plan, and there have been a small number of
protests. But several herd plans that have presented
that have not been signed, there's not been a protest;
but essentially the herd plan is effective.
The most important part is 22 of those
facilities, the hold orders were released. So either
through testing where they tested out or because of some
temporal or spacial aspects that were learned during the
investigation, Animal Health Commission deemed that this
was not a facility that would have provided a CWD
positive deer to the index facility.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Let me stop you. Go
back to the pending herd plans, the two pending. That
means they were presented with a plan, but they didn't
sign it?
MR. WOLF: That's correct. That's
correct.
COMMISSIONER JONES: So does that mean
that we -- I guess let me rephrase the question. I take
that to mean there may -- they may or may not be
compliant with the plan?
MR. WOLF: So maybe it might be a good
idea to call Dr. Schwartz up. We're going to get into
their business a lot more than my wheelhouse; and so if
we could get him to come up here and explain how they
handle pending herd plans, I think that would be best.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Great, because my
suspicious antenna just went up.
DR. SCHWARTZ: Mr. Chairman,
Commissioners, my name is Andy Schwartz, Assistant
Executive Director with the Texas Animal Health
Commission; and I will attempt to address the pending
herd plan situation. And Clayton explained it
accurately that the -- all of these individuals were
presented with a herd plan and the herd plan is in
effect in 15 days, unless they protest it. But we're
trying to work through some details with some of these
individuals, looking at -- although it's beyond the 15
days, we're looking -- researching in TWIMS and
gathering other epi information to see if there's
anything that can be done to customize that herd plan
for their situation. So we're trying to take into
account each particular situation, so.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Well, I guess my
question is more general. If a person doesn't sign a
herd plan, how do we know that they're doing the herd
plan?
DR. SCHWARTZ: Well, that is a legitimate
concern; and it's our concern as well. And so we met
with Clayton Wolf and Mitch Lockwood and others here at
Parks and Wildlife on Friday to discuss compliance
issues to use our -- both Agencies' legal authority to
ensure there's compliance. And so within the next two
days, we will -- we're going through systematically with
each of our regions and each -- on -- to discuss each
particular situation so that we know which ones are not
likely to be compliant and the plan is to move forward
to gather the Agencies together to enforce those certain
plans and it's primarily, again, you know, not moving
animals; but also testing any animals that are
harvested.
COMMISSIONER JONES: So I guess -- and I
don't mean to dwell on this because I know you've got a
lot of ground to cover today. But I guess what that
means is, if somebody doesn't sign the herd plan, to me,
that tells me what they're thinking; and so that means
we have to step up our oversight, right?
MR. WOLF: I think that's a correct
assessment, and that's what we were looking for is
obviously -- I mean, we don't want to be too
presumptuous in interpreting their motivation for not
signing; but at the same time, I think it's probably
prudent for us to understand the risk level associated
with those facilities and the extent to which we might
have to exercise our authority if we have someone that's
just -- that is just not wanting to cooperate, and
there's some level of risk there that we feel like we
need to address.
COMMISSIONER JONES: All right.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: But distinction
to maybe what you're asking, I think -- if this is
correct -- they would be under a hold order if they have
an unsigned, unexecuted herd plan; is that correct?
DR. SCHWARTZ: That's correct. But the
hold order remains as long as they're under a herd plan,
as well. So they can only move by permission basically.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Okay.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay. I'm just --
maybe I'm overly sensitive, but I'm just suspicious of
somebody who doesn't acknowledge the hold plan and
acknowledge by signing that "Yeah, I'm willing to commit
to this." That raises a red flag to me that they may
not be committing to it, so.
DR. SCHWARTZ: I would just say,
Commissioner, I think both the leadership of both
Agencies share that concern; and so we're doing what we
think is appropriate to address that.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
MR. WOLF: Okay, I will continue on.
I've got another slide on herd plans here. So Dr.
Schwartz, maybe if we have any others, I'll ask him to
stand by. For --
COMMISSIONER JONES: I'm sorry. I'm
sorry. Just one more thing. Is that public record who
they are?
And, Ann, I'm asking the question to
let's look at that over the next several days. I'd like
to know if that -- if those two plans that have not been
signed, if that's a public record.
MR. WOLF: We can -- we can definitely
get that, get an answer for you.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
MR. WOLF: Because there's going to be
some more on this slide, as well. So it's not limited
to two.
And so when we talk about trace-out
herds, what we did was we discovered on the trace-out
herds that there were -- there were basically 14 closed
facilities. Now, there's a caveat. One of those was in
our database as a closed release site. It's not a
common occurrence, but someone can ask to basically have
their release site deactivated and closed in TWIMS. So
initially, there was no hold order; but I show we did --
once we learned that it was a release site, then Animal
Health Commission did issue a hold order for that site,
as well. But basically, 133 herds with that -- with the
current status in our system when we started or after we
looked in different, 83 of those are breeding
facilities; and essentially close to three-quarters of
those, just shy of 75 percent, the hold orders have been
released through testing or some epidemiological
information and then remainder of those -- and you can
see we have 12 pending herd plans and 11 signed herd
plans related to breeding facilities.
As far as release sites, the data is
inverted a bit and that stands to reason because these
are sites where deer have been released and so folks
don't necessarily have track of those animals or they
could have been harvested in the past. So about
two-thirds of those release sites have herd plans.
Twenty of those are signed and nine pending as of date
of this slide and 16 release hold orders resulting from
testing or the epidemiological investigation.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: What would
that -- an example of that investigation be? If it's
not testing, what's an example of something that would
get a site released or a hold -- a hold order released?
DR. SCHWARTZ: So if, for example, if
they never received the deer. I mean, they show --
showed it went -- they -- that it transferred to them
and through them to another facility. If the deer was
never received at that location, there wouldn't be any
chance for exposure there, so.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Direct deliver to
the --
DR. SCHWARTZ: That's correct.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Okay.
MR. WOLF: So --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Okay.
MR. WOLF: Right. And so the -- I mean,
the initial investigation is whatever data is in TWIMS
and so sometimes it -- you know, it may not necessarily
be what we would intuitively think of as an accurate
reflection of the transaction.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Okay.
MR. WOLF: Okay. And the three DMP
facilities, all those hold orders have been released and
then there's the two herds in Mexico that USDA is
working with the federal authorities in Mexico and then
the one release site that was closed, received a hold
order, as well.
As far as the Medina County index
facility, you'll recall that there were 136 adult
White-tailed deer in the facility on July 1 and
associated fawns. And in late July, we did some target
sampling and authorized the facility owner to also
collect some animals and there were -- there's a natural
mortality or two in there. And as a result of those 43
samples being sent to the lab, we came up with three
additional positives. So that totaled the number of
four CWD positives. Interestingly enough, all the
positives are two-year-old males that were born on site.
And then the final depopulation occurred on -- at the --
on September the 30th. All those test results were in,
and there were no additional positives. So obviously,
the -- all those two-year-old males were age-and-pen
cohorts and some, I would call, distinct information;
but it's not completely revealing yet because
obviously -- or I'll let you know. I mean, as far as we
know now, we still have not been able to determine where
or how CWD got into the facility and what's unique about
those animals and their relationship with each other or
other potential animals that are now gone.
And as you-all know, one of those
trace-out facilities, as a result of a -- that purchased
deer from Medina -- the Medina County herd in October of
2014, had a natural mortality tested. That test was an
age-and-pen cohort. So a two-year-old buck, as well;
and it tested positive for CWD. So that facility was
placed under quarantine by Texas Animal Health
Commission. Approximately 156 adults and associated
fawns in the facility. This particular facility in the
investigation was not near as complex as the Medina
County facility. Number one, because they'd only been
in business for a year. So our data show that 84 deer
had traced out to nine facilities. You can see the
breakdown of facilities there. Already five of those
hold orders have been released. So we basically have
four standing hold orders still in place; and I think it
was the USDA, it had informed us last week that the
count of animals in those other four facilities is 35
animals. So a lot less complex; and obviously we, you
know, don't have any complexity on the trace-in side
because we know where the positive animal came from.
A little bit about hunter harvest
surveillance. We focused a lot of time on permit
programs because we need to get folks moving, and we had
permits that needed to get issued; but we also had deer
season coming up. And so staff were simultaneously
working on a new surveillance plan to really ramp up our
sampling. Essentially, what that means is we're going
to see over a 300 percent increase in our sampling goal
as compared to our annual sampling goals in the past.
Our previous goal statewide was 2400 samples, and we're
looking at around 8,000 samples this year is our
sampling goal and so it's all hands on deck and the
staff has been doing a great job.
Also, we refined our sampling strategy.
We're stratifying by resource management unit instead of
ecoregion. But within those resource management units,
we're doing a countywide risk assessment. So we'll be
sampling in a county, but some counties may have just
the minimum of ten because their risk score was very low
based on the parameters that we had. Other counties
may -- we may be looking at well in excess of 100
samples per county to reach that total goal for the
RMUs. So it won't be equally distributed across -- our
sampling efforts will not be equally distributed across
the landscape. And in addition, we're obviously going
to target CWD positive areas and CWD exposed sites.
We've hired six seasonals -- or actually,
we have five and are extending a job offer here shortly
to a sixth person to help us in this effort; and we've
already distributed two news releases to let hunters
know about our sampling efforts so we can let hunters
know how -- you know, how they can contribute to this
sampling effort. If you go to our CWD website, we
actually have an interactive map and on that interactive
map there are pushpins and you can mouse over that
pushpin and it will tell you the times and dates when
you can show up at a certain TPWD facility to have your
deer tested.
I do want to let you know if you go look
at that site, those are not the only sites where we're
going to be checking deer. Those are the sites where we
knew we could have staff there, say, you know, from 8:00
to 5:00 on Monday and Tuesday, etcetera. That's going
to be primarily our WMAs and our district offices. But
on opening weekend, this coming weekend, we're going to
have a lot of staff at locker plants across the state --
the places where people bring a lot of deer -- trying to
samples, but we also want to maintain some mobility when
we do that because if it's slow at one locker plant, we
want to be able to pick up and move to some other place
to get the samples. So the sites on the web -- the
pushpins on the website represent those predictable
those sites, but we're going to be in many other places
collecting samples.
And so this slide right here -- and I
have to correct the date on there. Actually, Alan Cain
provided data to me Monday; and so it's actually
November 2nd data. We're now at 1400 samples. So we're
over 17 percent of the way there. This data is quickly
assessable. We have Art Collector. It's an application
you can put on a tablet or your tough pad or phone. Our
staff is using that to collect their CWD data and then
they can sync that and that data comes right in and we
can ask Alan to produce a report. In fact, we will be
producing a weekly report. And as a matter of fact, on
October 29th, the number was 995. So, you know,
since -- you know, in that several day period, we had
gotten 400 samples from staff; and I think that's good
news because general season has yet to open. We're
going to get our biggest volume here in the next -- in
the coming weeks. And so I'm very proud of our staff
and their efforts to reach out there and get samples and
all the hunters and landowners that are helping to
contribute to this. We've had a lot of cooperation.
We're very proud of that.
And this particular -- this just shows a
map. This is a map that's produced. This is a
screenshot of a map from that particular application.
So not only do we get the numbers; but we can look at
the distribution of sampling as it occurs, you know,
every week with our report. And, of course, West
Texas -- just FYI -- Mule deer -- you know, MLD Mule
deer opens up this upcoming season, as well. And so
some of those places -- and then South Texas where
hunting is, you know, a little slow until it cools off,
we're certainly going to be able to fill those voids.
Switching gears to carcass transportation
rules. We share information with our staff. You can go
to our website, and you can see this "Common sense
precaution for handling and processing deer." You know,
we do want to reiterate that all the science out there,
all the trials that have been done to look at the
transmissibility of CWD/humans indicates that it cannot
occur; and so we want to emphasize that point.
Nonetheless, you know, if we have -- if we have a deer
that has CWD, you know, it's advisable not to consume
animals with disease or someone just makes that choice.
And so we do let folks know the organs and the parts of
a deer where the prions tend to accumulate.
This particular diagram shows the organs
and the lymph nodes, spine, brain, etcetera. And there
has -- and there has been plenty of research to show
that you can have site contamination by the distribution
of a contaminated carcass. And so what we want to do is
we're considering for next hunting season, is some rules
that are similar to other states that would prohibit the
movement of spinal tissue and the brain from CWD
positive states and CWD positive areas in Texas.
This particular map here basically shows
the states or the portions of states that have CWD
throughout the U.S. and Canada. And then, of course, we
have the containment zone and the high-risk zone in West
Texas. And so we'll be working with Law Enforcement to
refine a proposed rule to make sure that it's workable,
it reduces the risk of spreading disease; yet, it's not
onerous. You know, obviously, we need to consider
individuals that want to have an animal mounted, you
know, and taken to a taxidermist. And we don't want
these rules to be onerous, but we do want something
that's prudent for minimizing the spread of CWD across
the landscape via an infected carcass.
Along similar lines, the current --
currently -- yes, Vice-Chairman.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Before you move
on, going back to the common sense precautions page.
Yeah, that page. I'm curious why we say do not shoot a
deer that appears sick.
MR. WOLF: Well, that goes along with if
they're going to shoot it just for recreational harvest
and consumption. Now, what we do ask folks to do is if
they see a deer, to contact us if it's a sickly deer;
and we can authorize them to take that animal for
sampling purposes. And there also is a statute that
allows for the dispatch of an injured or an obviously
diseased animal so it's not illegal for someone to do
that. If someone does do that, we urge them to contact
us quickly to get that carcass so we can get a sample
pulled. But the precaution is generally for a hunter
that has the intent of consuming a carcass.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: It seems like we
might want to clarify that to say --
MR. WOLF: Good point. Point taken.
When a hunter --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Have you thought
any consideration of disposition of, you know, other
parts of the deer that aren't consumable? I mean, how
they dispose of it and what they do with that?
MR. WOLF: There --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: It might involve
a lot of these other things, like lymph node and spleen
and so forth, so.
MR. WOLF: So with the normal --
obviously the -- you know, the spleen and such usually
is left in place at -- you know, at the site for field
dressing. But, you know, a couple of those lymph nodes
are, you know, embedded in the hind quarters and you're
not going to get to them until you debone your meat and
take it apart and that would be remnants of scrap that
would -- I guess, you know, if you're doing your own,
would go in the garbage.
We do recommend to folks when you're
talking about the rest of the head, the eyes, the advice
is not to -- you know, not to just throw a bunch of
animal parts into your trash can unless you have talked
with your -- with your -- the person that's taking
care -- picking up your waste there because some
landfills are approved -- the Type 1 landfills are
approved for that kind of material.
I don't know if, Dr. Schwartz, if you've
got, you know, anything to add related to advice that we
give folks related to those -- those --
DR. SCHWARTZ: Not at this point, no.
MR. WOLF: And then FYI, so the depops
that we did, you know, if we have a site that is CWD
positive, you know, there are a lot of precautions that
we take to make sure that -- I mean, everyone wears the
full suits and essentially when we take those -- depop
those animals, we make sure that there's not any bodily
fluids or anything that escapes that lined trailer and
that goes to a Type 1 landfill. So we're very careful
about our handling of carcasses from these CWD positive
sites.
If someone shoots a deer before they get
to their final destination, they're required to maintain
proof of sex of that animal. It's for bag limit
enforcement purposes. And so for a buck, that's the
head with the antlers attached. For an antlerless deer,
that's the head. But you can also have a receipt from a
taxidermist, a statement from a landowner. You can get
a PWD 905 -- that's our CWD collection form -- from our
staff. Or any of the permits serve that purpose, as
well. But because we're encouraging folks to provide us
samples, we realize there may be some places out there,
some ranches, where someone wants to leave some heads
behind in a cooler for us. The landowner's not present.
They're not on MLD. We can't provide them a receipt.
Yet, we don't want to have -- but yet we want them to be
able to leave legally with a carcass. And so what we're
investigating is looking at an additional form of proof
of sex documentation, much like other states have -- if
you go to Colorado or Virginia -- that would allow for
the visible sex organs to be also proof of sex of the
animal that you harvested. So we'll also be working
with Law Enforcement to further refine that language to
make sure that it's something that is enforceable,
something that allows for latitude; but it also is
something that's workable for our deer hunters.
So on a Triple T, a TTP, and -- and the
TTP permits, the previous rules prior to the adoption of
these emergency interim rules for Triple T, basically
allowed someone to trap free-ranging deer from one site,
move those deer to another site; but in order to do that
in advance of being permitted, they had to provide to us
non-detected CWD results on 10 percent of the animals
that they were permitted to move. No fewer than ten, no
more than 40.
In the later years, we actually added an
incentive to these rules to incentivize folks to get to
a 60 -- to 60 samples. And when they got to that point,
then their annual testing requirement was reduced to
3 percent or a minimum of one deer. We also allowed
folks to use samples from the previous season. We
visited with our CWD task force on these rules and we're
all in the agreement that really in light of the current
circumstances, we won't -- we want to get current
testing. And so the recommendation that staff presented
and that we got input on from the task force and
ultimately the emergency rules that were adopted by Mr.
Smith, would -- they eliminate the -- what we call the
"preferred status" for 60 samples. They eliminate the
provision that allows you to use samples from a previous
season.
We also have a provision that does not
allow for Triple Ting from Class III release sites; and
as a result of input from our stakeholders, this --
these testing provisions now also apply to TTP. TTP
does not have the same risk because we're not moving
live animals; but nonetheless, you know, it's an
opportunity to get sampling off of other populations out
there. And so this testing requirement also -- in the
emergency interim rules -- applies to TTP permittees, as
well.
Deer Management Permit, as many of you
may know, is a permit that allows for the trapping of
animals on a high-fence ranch, the temporary detention
in a breeding facility. No more than one buck and 20
does. And as that regulation developed through the
years, we allowed for the introduction of breeder deer
into these facilities and breeder bucks may return to
their originating facilities; but those must be
released. And so essentially, we have a nexus with that
deer breeding network or at least a potential nexus; and
there is a release. And so it goes to reason that these
are essentially the same as deer breeder releases; and
so the staff recommendation and ultimately the rule, the
emergency interim rule for DMP, treats DMP release sites
just like deer breeder release sites. If you receive a
deer from a TC 2 facility, then that ultimately will
become a Class II release site.
When breeder bucks are transferred to a
DMP facility, sometimes they go back and sometimes they
can go back to a different facility. And so following
the same logic, if you have a TC 3 buck and it goes to a
TC 2 facility, that facility status is downgraded. And
then also the emergency interim rules require that all
deer breed -- all breeder deer placed in a DMP facility
that is a Class III release site, must have an official
form of ear identification.
And so the Triple T -- these rules, the
Triple T rules, TTP rules, and DMP rules were all filed
and effective October 5th, 2015. If you include the 60
days extension, then essentially the period of validity
for these rules will be able to cover the entire Triple
T and TTP season. So we see no reason to come back for
an informal adoption of these rules. We'll basically
look at these in January as we consider the deer breeder
rules and all the other rules, but the emergency period
covers the whole effective date for TT -- for Triple Ts
and TTPs. So we see no reason to permission to publish
those rules for public notice and comment.
However, the MLD season and the detention
of those deer can run up into next fiscal year; and so
we are seeking permission to publish the interim DMP
rules for public notice and comment, just to make sure
we don't have a void between the expiration of the
emergency interim rules and when we develop our new
rules in the upcoming year.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Wait, hold on.
MR. WOLF: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I don't know if this
is for you, Carter.
I don't know if anybody else has been
getting them, but I -- seemed like I started getting
them about Tuesday of last week, some phone calls from
people that -- and it surprised me some of the people
that called me -- that had heard that we were adopting
the rules to make permanent what we've done on the
emergency orders, which we all know is not accurate; but
I just bring that up because perhaps while you're
putting this information out, apparently some people
have not got the message that this is a strictly
this-hunting-season kind of deal. We've all -- we all
know what we intended to do, but you may want to --
MR. WOLF: Point taken. We have heard
that input, as well. In fact, I've got a slide at the
end that we're hoping we can convey to everyone that --
and it's been said on the record many times by Carter
Smith that this is for one season only. We are
committed to revisiting these -- revisiting these rules.
MR. SMITH: We will, Commissioner. I
don't know how to say it more clearly, but we will say
it once again that these are interim, these are
transitional, these are emergency. We plan to come back
with proposed revisions in March to the Commission with
a proposal for you to consider adoption in May. I think
what will do is: Will give everybody a very clear sense
of what the playbook is, the rules of the road, a
blueprint for going forward. And I think that's
important for planning business, certainty, etcetera.
So we are absolutely committed to working through,
coming back with the next suite of recommendations based
on a lot of input from all of the myriad stakeholders --
and there are a lot of stakeholders, as you know, in
this dialogue -- to come back with revisions, you know,
through the normal regulatory process.
So that will be very clear. It will be
open. It will be participatory; and people will have
very ample notice as to what's going on, what's being
proposed, and what ultimately is adopted and have
ultimate clarity on that.
So we'll continue to reinforce that as
explicitly as we can, Commissioner; and I'm glad you
raised it because Clayton is right. That criticism has
reached a crescendo in recent weeks. And, again, I'm
not sure how to say it any more clearly than what we
just did.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: And it may just be
because the regular season is opening Saturday. It
could --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Right.
MR. SMITH: Could be.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: -- just be it's kind
of just --
MR. SMITH: Yeah. Yeah, good point.
MR. WOLF: Thank you, Commissioner. So
now we're here at the -- we're in the home stretch as
far as my presentation goes; and so what I'm going to do
now is cover these interim proposed rules for breeder
deer movement and liberation, emphasizing interim. And
obviously, the vast majority of these rules are
identical to the emergency rules that were filed; but
obviously, they will expire and we want to make sure
that we don't leave a gap out there of unregulated -- an
unregulated time period.
You can rest assured, I'm not going to go
through this flowchart again like I did last time. I
think I sufficiently impressed everyone last time I
navigated it and -- but it is important, I think, to
just demonstrate that as we sat down, we tried to
develop some tools that -- for folks that are in the
deer breeding business that mean something and to try to
get them -- help them navigate these and understand
where they sat, as well, particularly in the early
phases.
We distributed this information just
within days after the rules were -- or the day the rules
were adopted. But more simply put, previous to the
adoption of the emergency rules, you basically had two
movement statuses: You were movement qualified, or you
weren't movement qualified. The new rules now have
three levels of movement qualification, in addition to
being not movement qualified and that's Transfer
Category 1, Transfer Category 2 and 3 and then the
associated release sites.
And so I think you've heard me say this
before; but essentially if you're a release site or if
you want to receive breeder deer and you receive breeder
deer from one of these Transfer Category 1 sites, then
that creates -- that basically makes your ranch a Class
I release site. If you also want to get deer from a TC
2 facility, then the lower classification will prevail;
and you will be bound by the Class II release site
provisions and the same for TC 3.
I've also referred to this model of
testing requirements as a compensatory testing model.
And so if you look at the slide here, on the left side
of the screen is the testing performance. Kind of a
relative scale of testing performance for breeding
facilities. And so a TC 1 falls at the top end of that
scale; and so if you're at the high end of testing
performance, then the associated release site is at the
low end of the testing requirements. In this particular
case, there are no additional testing requirements for
Class I release sites. If you're at the midlevel of
testing in the breeding facilities, then there's
moderating testing requirements at the release site.
And if you're at the low end of testing performance in
the breeding facilities, then the testing requirements
are at the highest end of the spectrum at the release
sites.
And so what does that look like? I'll
quickly review these. I know we saw these in August.
But the Transfer 1 categories are these certified and
these fifth-year herds. These are herds that are
enrolled with Texas Animal Health Commission. There's
annual monitoring, and they're expected to test
100 percent of their eligible mortalities. They also
must have a reconciled herd inventory and they cannot be
one of these exposed sites, one of these Tier 1 sites,
and any facility that receives deer from a Class I -- or
from a TC 1 facility is a Class I release site and there
are no additional testing requirements because of the
testing performance in those breeding facilities.
Transfer Category 2 is really -- it's
kind of the new standard we've developed and that
requires that if you want to be at TC 2, you test four
and a half percent of the average population in the
facility over the last two years and you also must have
a reconciled herd inventory and not be a Tier 1 site and
you'll voluntary sacrifice animals to meet the four and
a half percent standard. And when I present to you some
of the public comment, we did receive a few comments
about, I guess, implying or maybe even outright stating
that the rules required someone to sacrifice deer. And,
in fact, that's not the case. These rules, if someone
is at TC 3, they -- if they want to go to TC 2, they may
have to sacrifice animals to get there; but they can
also operate at that TC 3 level without sacrificing
deer.
These Class II release sites must test a
minimum of 50 percent of the hunter harvested deer or a
number equivalent to 50 percent of the deer released,
whichever is less. And these were -- these couple of
components here were -- we made some significant changes
as a result of stakeholder input there in, you know,
August 7th through 9th. Irrespective of the first two
bullets, they must test 50 percent of the breeder deer
that are liberated and harvested in the same season.
And then Transfer Category 3, basically
it's our old movement qualification standard. They must
have tested 20 percent of their eligible mortalities
since May 23rd of 2006 and obviously have a reconciled
herd inventory. And then those exposed sites, those
Tier 1 sites, can also be in this TC 3 category, as
well. The testing standards on Class III release sites
are the highest. They're required to test 100 percent
of the hunter harvested deer or a number equivalent to
the number of deer released, whichever is greater,
breeder deer released. And then they must also -- all
deer released on these sites must have that -- the
official on forms of identification, specifically the
RFID tag or the National Uniform Ear Tagging System clip
tag.
Just a few other general provision. A
deer breeding facility will assume the status of the
originating facility from which it received deer if that
facility is of a lower status. These release sites have
to be high fenced, and the Class II and III release
sites have to maintain a daily harvest log on site. So
those were all components that were presented to each of
you at the August Commission meeting and then since that
time, we've received questions from folks as we -- you
know, the "what ifs." And so we were looking at
everyone that was a deer breeder at that time and trying
to put them into particular categories based on testing
performance. But then someone asked a question, "Well,
what about a new deer breeder? You don't have any
testing performance. So where do we fall?"
And so the rules that we're asking you to
adopt tomorrow also include a provision that simply
states that a new deer breeding facility will inherit
the lowest status level from among all facilities from
which it received deer. It seems to make sense. If a
facility is downgraded because it received deer -- say,
if you're a TC 2 and you receive a TC 3, the question
was asked, "How long do I stay a TC 3," because they're
really testing at a higher performance level; and the
rule we're asking you to adopt would basically state
that they must stay at that point for two years. To
some degree, that's kind of a moot point because we're
going to be looking at these rules in January. So we
don't know if that will be the same. But nonetheless,
it kind of -- it provides some closure to that question,
at least temporarily.
And the new facilities, same question
asked, "If I'm a new facility, when do you calculate my
status?" And the rules we're asking you to adopt would
have that status calculated after a period of two years
from -- after a period of two years.
And then finally, Commissioner Scott, to
your question and we have been receiving a lot of
questions about the temporary nature of these rules and
we wanted -- we had a suggestion that these rules have
an expiration date. And so the rules we're asking you
to adopt would indicate that the interim rules will
expire August 31st, 2016. But as a point of departure,
we're certain that we're going to have a new set of
rules well in advance of that. I'll just briefly talk
about our winter schedule.
Dr. Schwartz has been working with Dr.
Dittmar on our staff and other members of our staff and
we are planning for a symposium in January to really
look at the newest science, you know, to address these
questions like "What are the population level impacts?
You know, what's the real story on live animal testing
as far a sensitivity?" Looking at -- you know, at the
statistical reliability so we can assign some kind of
risk level and so we'll be doing that in January and
then from January through March will be rule
development, looking -- you know, working with our
stakeholders, our working groups, our task forces,
etcetera, to develop and refine rules that we will
come -- that we plan to come to this Commission in March
seeking permission to publish rules. So folks will
already have a pretty good idea of what we're looking
at, even if they're not actively engaged in that
process. And then ultimately look to seek adoption of
rules in May, and so that's our schedule that we are
shooting for. It's -- we're going to hit the ground
running right after the New Year and staff has already
been developing a list of experts and speakers to get
down here so we can get that CWD symposium off the
ground in early January and get things rolling.
As far as public comment, this is a
little different than what you have on your computer.
Updated early this morning. The public comment is now
at -- on these particular rules, is 569 that agree with
the rules and 355 that disagree. In addition, we've
received some letters from organizations; and we would
like to, you know, highlight those organizational
comments. We received one letter that has 26
signatories on it, and the sum and substance is that
they encourage the TPWD Commission to adopt the rule in
its entirety. And so this slide shows some of those
signatories, as well. This slide. And I'll give you a
second to look. The next. And then finally, the last
slide.
Additionally, received one -- an
individual letter from East Texas Woods and Waters
Foundation essentially encouraging TPWD to adopt the
rule in its entirety, as well. And actually during this
meeting -- just about an hour, hour and a half ago -- we
also received an e-mail from Ducks Unlimited with a
letter addressed to the Chairman and the e-mail -- the
e-mail essentially says that they support the CWD rules.
And then you'll notice that I put support
down there for Texas Farm Bureau. We received a letter
from Texas Farm Bureau I think that all of you may have
seen, that reference -- that shares their policy
positions that relate to these CWD rules, but they don't
necessarily get into specifics of saying we agree with
the rules or disagree with the rules and so we didn't
want to misrepresent their letter. But I will read the
second-to-last paragraph: "Farm Bureau policy favors
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and the Texas Animal
Health Commission addressing disease problems associated
with interstate and intrastate shipment of native
wildlife, particularly those related to the hunting
economy of Texas. Additionally, Farm Bureau policy
supports continued research to develop a live test for
CWD," which will obviously be part of the subject matter
in our January meeting.
And then as we typically do, we try to
characterize the comments on all the disagreement the
best we can and at least hit on the more common themes.
And so the most common theme we got was there's
identical or nearly identical comments that were
submitted opposing the rule. Essentially, it's a rather
long e-mail; but the salient points were that there's
not an emergency, no considerable threat, current
testing requirements are injuring the industry without
cause, and specifically the request -- the specific
request to the Commission related to this disagreement
is to, in addition to considering all the rules, is to
specifically dispense with the Class II release site
testing. And so that was the most common reason for
disagreement.
The 86 count does not include those --
our analysis of what came in over the night, overnight.
So that may -- I probably will update that by tomorrow.
And then other common themes, there were nine comments
that essentially opposed deer breeding or the rules are
not stringent enough. There's a feeling of overreach or
overreaction by the Department. There are nine that are
in opposition because they believe that the rules
require deer to be sacrificed, that the rules were
punitive, and singling out deer breeders. We had ten
comments in that category. We had eight comments that
rule should allow for live animal testing and that
testing should be the same for all deer, five comments.
And then we had four additional comments that opposed
release site testing in that they're -- three comments
that the disease is contained, that there's no
emergency. And then just some other general comments
and themes that I could pick up from reading through the
summary was that the negative -- that there would be
negative economic impacts on deer breeders, land value,
and the local economies.
And that concludes my presentation. I'll
be happy to answer any questions.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Clayton, thank
you. That was a very good -- Commissioner Scott.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I followed all the
stuff you were doing on the breeders and then the
release sites and everything. My question is I don't
see anywhere on here where we're addressing a
situation -- if a facility is a deer breeder facility,
high fenced, and they only release on their particular
land and they don't sell, they don't bring any in, they
don't have any outside contact, where do they fall into
all this?
MR. WOLF: So they would also be a Class
I, II, or III release site. So irrespective of whether
you ship your deer 100 miles to a ranch or you liberate
them from your facility onto your own ranch and your own
site, the rules -- the rules see no difference in that.
It would be treated as a release site.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I don't know if -- I
may have a further question on that. I'm not sure that
I follow. If you've never brought any in, how -- I'm
having -- I'm having a little problem on trying to
follow the logic. I understand it clearly on if anybody
has bought some, if they've moved them or sold them. I
understand that one. But if it's a 100 percent
contained situation, why would they fall under the same
category as people that deer breed and sell them, move
them, do the hunts and all that?
MR. WOLF: Oh, so maybe I don't
understand the question. Are you referring to a deer
breeder?
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: I'm referring to an
all-inclusive deer breeder.
MR. WOLF: Okay.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: In other words, they
breed them on site, they release them on their site, and
nothing ever moves outside of that high fence and
nothing is ever brought into that high fence.
MR. WOLF: Uh-huh.
MR. SMITH: Yeah. So your question,
Commissioner, is, you know, what's the epidemiological
assessment on that and, you know, isn't there some --
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: And assume that
they're doing a lot of testing.
MR. SMITH: And assume that they're doing
a lot of testing. So, you know, maybe that's something,
Clayton or Andy, if you want to address that.
I mean, obviously, there are those
situations out there where you have facility owners that
have a breeder facility and then they immediately
release deer onto their own ranch, which is, again, a
permitted release site. I know that was considered,
obviously, as part of the emergency rules and is
categorized as such.
Are you suggesting that's something that
we need to look at going forward in terms of how we
categorize that?
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Well, I think
that's -- I think it appears to me -- and maybe I'm not
understanding it; but it appears for somebody that has
no exposure for getting it, for transporting it, for
moving it, it just seems to me like they're being
penalized for something that they're not even doing.
MR. WOLF: Yeah, it's a good comment and
part of the discussions of our working group, the level
of exposure really was a part of our active dialogue
when we started looking from everything from certified
herds, fifth-year herds, three-year herds because, you
know, what you described in the classic sense is a
certified herd that's been monitored. There's no new
introductions. They're doing a high level of testing
and then once you get to that fifth year, you're --
really your risk of having CWD is much reduced; and then
everything really is on a scale coming off of there,
just depending on your exposure to deer breeding
facilities.
Now, obviously when they started, you
know, they received -- they received deer from
somewhere. And so that was all part of the active
dialogue as we tried to figure out how to develop these
classifications and where we draw the line in those and
where we settled. But no doubt, you know, you could --
you know, you could slice -- you can slice the pie, you
know, in a few more slices and have different
categories; and we tried to keep it -- we tried to make
it not too complex, but it is -- it is -- it will be
part of the discussion as we move forward.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Clayton, how
would we currently categorize that example? Would it
be -- it's not a TC by definition.
MR. WOLF: No. So that --
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Would it be a
DMP, or how would you --
MR. WOLF: Well, it's my understanding
that Commissioner Scott is talking about a deer breeding
facility; but they're one that's really been
disconnected from the industry for a long time. One of
the things -- and the caveat that you gave us of
testing, because when we talked about that, we do have
herds that are disconnected; but they don't necessarily
have good testing performance, and that caused us some
concern. And so -- and then, of course, the other thing
to consider is as we find new CWD positives related to
this, we then want to have a model or we were trying to
avoid a model where there would have to be an intensive
assessment every time we had a new positive so that we'd
have to shut down the industry for, you know, for an
extended period of time. And so that -- you know, going
two, three, four generations out was also something we
considered.
But, obviously, all of those -- I mean,
working with Animal Health Commission, all those factors
that contribute to risk or those things that mitigate
risk, as you indicated, will be part of our
consideration as we move forward.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: That example
would almost be like a DMP, right, because it's
contained in the release site as there?
MR. WOLF: It is; but, obviously, a DMP
can have a nexus with a deer breeding facility.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Right.
MR. WOLF: And so it depends, but you're
right. If it's a DMP that does not utilize breeder
deer, then there's -- and the movement, obviously, and
the movement and the connectivity to this network are
all a part of that risk assessment and there's -- you
know, there's no black-and-white line. It's simply a
gradation as you move through it. But a DMP not --
without deer breeding would be closer to that, to that
kind of example.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Commissioner
Morian.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: I've got a
question. There's no test on this, is there?
MR. WOLF: No, sir. I'm not sure I would
score very well.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: But in this case,
I'm just trying to get the -- in this case, the penalty
that you're talking about, is that the additional
testing or the testing they would have to do?
MR. WOLF: So that's -- so that's the
way --
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: After that, there's
no other -- no other requirements?
MR. WOLF: That's correct. Keeping that
harvest log and, of course, that's what has created the
most consternation, at least among those that disagreed
with the proposal, is the release site testing. That --
it's a new -- it's a new aspect. It's something that
has been talked a lot with -- you know, among folks, you
know, in the industry. It's been talked a lot about
here, but we have -- you know, we have never -- we've
never entered into that.
And so when we were contemplating the
rules, what we were trying to figure out is how do we --
how do we get everybody back moving again, yet mitigate
disease risk? And so really the model -- the best model
that we could come up with, since folks had already had
their testing performance and we were going to launch
off of that, was to transfer some of that testing burden
to the release site so that everyone could continue to
move; but obviously -- so it's new to the model.
I have to tell you also, when you're
looking at trying to look at natural mortality in a
captive deer breeding pen, natural mortality is pretty
low. Four and a half percent on an annual basis. And
so the statisticians when they look at that, it takes a
long time to get enough mortalities if you're just
restricting yourself to the deer breeding pens and --
but, obviously, if you have a hunting operation that's
associated with that and there's a lot of deer that are
being harvested, it's a great way to capitalize
without -- well, actually, without requiring anybody to
sacrifice any more deer. The animal is already being
harvested and so it's just -- it's just at a different
location. So, but to your point --
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: I'm just following
up on Commissioner Scott's question. I'm not sure I
understand what the self-contained breeding operation
requirement would be, other than testing; or am I
missing something?
MR. SMITH: No, you're not. I mean, I
think that -- I think, you know, to be fair and
Commissioner Scott said it well, people that are
subjected to enhanced testing requirements, some
perceive that as being punitive. That is absolutely not
the intent. From an epidemiological perspective, the
goal is to get more samples, and that was made
abundantly clear.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: But you could just
revert back to the 20 percent; is that right?
MR. SMITH: You could.
MR. WOLF: You could -- you -- in the
example, for instance, that Commissioner Scott
articulates, if someone is testing at that 20 percent
level, they're self-contained, they've been removed,
they can still release deer onto their own ranch; but
they are going to have to test 100 percent of those
hunter harvested deer on that ranch since that's a --
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: 100 percent.
MR. WOLF: 100 percent.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: Okay.
MR. WOLF: In that lowest TC 3 Category.
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: Okay, thank you.
MR. SMITH: Commissioner, I think just to
close the loop on what you asked about. You know,
you're raising a question about connectivity and how we
address that going forward and risk assessment.
Obviously, as we go forward looking at these interim
transitional emergency rules that we propose to put in
place through this hunting season and then revisit in
March, those kind of situations that are more site
specific, you know, we do have and will have more of the
luxury of time to be able to assess those and do a
better risk assessment on.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: That was going to be
my suggestion is that we do look closely or have an
option to grant specific things if it so warrants.
MR. SMITH: Yeah, you're right. And I
think that's the great caveat on there. You know, what
do the epidemiologists say in terms of the level of risk
and how do we accommodated that within a proposed
realignment of this disease containment model.
Absolutely.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: That's good.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Questions for
Clayton? Dr. Schwartz? Thank you.
MR. WOLF: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you both
very much. Appreciate it.
DR. SCHWARTZ: Thanks.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: So I'll place the
adoption of interim proposed rules on the Thursday
Commission meeting agenda for public comment and action.
I will also authorize staff to publish proposed interim
rules regarding DMP in the Texas Register for the
required public comment period.
Work Session Item No. 7 is State Park
Rules, Request Permission to Publish Proposed Rule
Revisions in the Texas Register, Mr. Kevin Good.
MR. GOOD: Good morning, Commissioners.
My name is Kevin Good. I'm with the State Parks
Division; and today we're requesting permission to
publish proposed amendments to the Texas Administrative
Code, Chapter 59, which deals with the State Parks
System.
Sometime ago, State Park was asked to do
a comprehensive review of Chapter 59, which governs the
system. Currently, there are ten subchapters in this
chapter and its programs have not been reviewed in a
number of years, as you'll see. So we've been working
closely with Ann and her staff to go through these rules
and have identified some changes that -- and
improvements that we feel could be made.
After we went through this review, there
were six subchapters, the ones highlighted in yellow,
that were found to be in need of some revisions. These
ranged from minor amendments and additions to complete
rewrites of some sections. So in undertaking this
review, staff was guided by several principles. First
and foremost, we wanted to simplify the language that
was in the rules to provide clarity for staff and our
public, as well.
We wanted to remove obsolete language.
There were several sites that are referenced that are no
longer in operation as part of the Park System. We
recognized that there was a changing environment in
parks and these proposals would provide greater
flexibility for staff to consider revenue generating
opportunities or address customer needs. We also felt
that there was a need to address some issues that have
arisen in parks in recent years, such as concerns over
exotic or invasive species and some operational issues
that have come to our attention.
And finally, although you'll see some
major changes in regards to the fee system, we really
did not want to use this as an opportunity to change
park fees. We felt like that was sort of a separate
issue that needed to be addressed on its own.
Starting out with Subchapter A, as
currently written, we have -- it's really one of the
most confusing pieces of the code that we've run across.
So we are proposing that this entire section or
subchapter be repealed and replaced with new language.
In order to make these more understandable, we took
several steps. First, in reference to the entrance fees
and park passes, all of those are currently scattered up
and down the 24 separate clauses in this subchapter. So
we took those and grouped them together into several
stand-alone sections. We eliminated the obsolete fees,
such as the references to train fares that we have not
operated since 2007; state fishing piers, which have
been gone even longer than that; the Matagorda Island
Ferry; those kinds of things. We took all of those out.
We also are proposing to reduce the
number of facility categories. Right now, we've got six
types of facilities listed. Those rules are for
recreation halls, group lodges, dining halls, pavilions,
amphitheaters, gymnasiums, and bunkhouses; and then in
addition to that to make it even more confusing
colloquially on a site specific basis, those facilities
may have a different term that people refer to them as.
For instance, the dining hall at Bastrop State Park is
usually referred to as the refectory. Frankly, it's
hard to understand which fee would apply to those. So
we really just took those and grouped them into new
categories: Group day use facilities and group
overnight use facilities.
We also want to establish authority to
combine entrance fees, facility fees, and activity fees
into a single package fee in some circumstances.
Particularly at a site like Big Bend Ranch, it might
make more sense to have a little bit more user friendly
pricing structure so that we may be able to combine
entrance fees, the facility fee, and perhaps a tour and
activity fee all into a single package that we could
give customers just a single price for their visit. We
feel like that would be a little more user friendly
again, and then also particularly more attractive to
perhaps some group use.
And then similarly, a new single fee is
established to replace five current fees that are on the
books. Right now, we have authority to have filming
fees, special public activity fee or wedding fee,
special event fee, a park operations fee, and a
commercial use fee. Again, just really confusing to
park users and we have tried to take all of those and
put them into one fee that staff could implement by
looking at what the cost of a special event might be,
where it incurs perhaps additional staff time, utility
cost. There may be some times when it impacts other
visitors that might then decide not to come to a park,
and we would lose that revenue. So we want to take all
of those factors, look at them, and put them into a
single package that then would be put into a contract
with those vent promoters.
We also have three types of annual passes
that are on the books right now. Those stay -- stay on
the books. But, again, it was really confusing the way
it was organized and so we just went through and grouped
all of these together and have tried to make that a
little bit more easy to understand.
First, is the annual park entrance pass,
typically referred to as the state park pass. We just
took all the rules regarding the benefits that a holder
of that pass gets, what the -- where it applies and what
the fee is, put that into one section. Did the same for
the youth group annual entrance pass. And then finally,
the parklands passport, which is usually referred to as
the bluebonnet pass. This pass is actually established
in legislation and so we referred back to that
legislation and then just put those eligibility and
proof of eligibility requirements into the code. So
it's very clear, we hope, that a user that may wish to
pursue one of these passes, can show up at a park, show
them their driver's license and say, "I'm over 65. I
want my bluebonnet pass."
Subchapter C currently provides guidance
and authority for staff to ensure the conservation of
cultural resources in state parks; but there wasn't a
corresponding section that related to natural resources,
and instead we had one long section that governs
historic sites. So the idea was that we took all of
these and reviewed them, reworked them to provide
guidance for all of our state parks in the system,
rather than just focusing on those historic sites. And
because of changes to our park inventory over the past
20 years or so with moving a number of sites out of our
system, we wanted to eliminate some sections that were
no longer really applicable. So in that, we took the
acquisition criteria for parklands that is currently in
Subchapters C and K, combined it all into this one
section and made it apply to all of our sites.
We did the same with the development
guidelines. And then we deleted the four sections that
really provided a lot of detailed information,
specifically regarding historic sites. Those were the
thematic organization. There were more categories of
themes listed than I think we had historic sites at this
point. Additional funding, guidance, maintenance
guidance, and personnel guidance selections, all of
those were just overly detailed we thought and really
not necessary at this point in time. So those were
removed.
Subchapter E, which regards park
concessions, we made much fewer changes and so this just
amends the current language. We really had two goals in
this area: To eliminate the unnecessary language and
provide greater flexibility to staff to pursue revenue
generating opportunities and operate in a more
businesslike manner. Right now, there are ten types of
concessions that are listed in the Administrative Code.
I won't go through all ten of those; but suffice it to
say that between those ten types of concessions that are
listed, it pretty much covers any type of business that
could possibly be done in a park. So rather than having
all of that specific language in there, we've just
authorized the parks to have concessions. We also
simplified the contract terms and language that is in
the code right now. Again, these contracts are all
governed by other state law and so the specific and
detailed language that's in the code just seemed a
little redundant and often hard to understand. So we
just, at the most, proposed to simplify that. And then
I should also note that all of our contracts are
reviewed by legal staff to ensure that the interests of
the Department are protected. And we wanted to provide
flexibility in -- to staff to look at new business
opportunities that might be out there or be proposed and
take opportunities to utilize those when it makes sense.
The next section is the park operational
rules. These are sort of the visitor behavior rules.
First of all, we wanted to establish that we have clear
authority to close parks when necessary. Over the past
years -- and, in fact, past weeks -- we've seen that
parks obviously are impacted by natural disasters and
other events and as we went through this review, there
didn't seem to be any place where it clearly stated that
during an emergency, we can close a park to visitors.
It was implied, but it just wasn't really clearly
stated. So we thought it would be useful to have that
in there. There may also be times, such as during a
prescribed fire, where we may want to close a park.
Again, we just want to make that it's clearly understood
that we have that authority.
Another more minor issue is expanding the
types of animals that are allowed on park trails. Over
the years, we've had a number of requests from the
owners of llamas, that they be allowed to utilize those
as pack animals on park trails. We've looked at that.
There do not seem to be any issues regarding transmittal
of diseases between species and other species and
llamas. So there just didn't really seem to be a good
reason to prohibit that use; and so we just propose to
allow those animals on designated trails, much the way
horses are.
As I stated earlier, we want to clarify
that -- or expand our prohibition on the introduction of
exotic species. Currently, it is prohibited to
introduce fish into the waters of a state park. We want
to expand that to include all species of animals because
we feel that, you know, we are having more and more
issues with invasive and exotic species and this would
allow us another tool to address that issue. We would
also like to amend the current language to accommodate
bow fishing and archery events. Those uses are sort of
implied under current law; but, again, clarity is our
goal here. So we wanted to make it clear that you can
participate in bow fishing in a state park and not be in
violation of our rules about display of weapons, and
then update the rules to be in compliance with recently
passed legislation about the display of firearms.
It seemed to end right there, but there
are two chapters that are proposed for repeal. Oh, here
we go. The first is relocation assistance in park
acquisition projects. This section was established back
in the late 1990s, I believe, during the development of
World Birding Center. It was really something that was
put in to address a specific situation. Staff doesn't
really feel like this is liable to come up again, and so
we just propose that this be deleted. And then also, as
noted earlier, Subchapter K which addresses the donation
of donated lands, that was largely moved into Subchapter
C and expanded to cover all park acquisitions, not just
donations of land.
So with that, I will close; and if you
have any questions or comments, I will try to address
those. And, obviously, this was a very high-level,
quick overview of these changes. The process took a lot
longer to do than to make this presentation; but if
you'd like to visit on any of the specifics of this, I'd
be glad to do that now or in the future.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Thank you.
Any questions for Kevin? Commissioner
Duggins.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: I've got a couple
of suggestions, tweaks to the language; but we can talk
about it after.
MR. GOOD: Great, be happy to.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: So if no further
discussion, I'll authorize staff to publish proposed
rules in the Texas Register for the required public
comment period. Thank you.
MR. GOOD: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: With regard to
Work Session Item No. 8, Land Acquisition, Matagorda
County, Approximately 6,554 Acres on the Matagorda
Peninsula, does any Commissioner have any questions or
comments concerning that item?
Hearing none, I will place this item on
the Thursday Commission meeting agenda for public
comment and action.
With regard to Work Session Item No. 9,
Grant of Utility Easement, Brazoria County,
Approximately .4 acres at the Justin Hurst Wildlife
Management Area, does any Commissioner have any
questions or comments?
Hearing none, I will place this item on
the Thursday commission meeting agenda for public
comment and action.
We're rocking and rolling here. Work
Session Item No. 10, Grant of Utility Easement, Brazoria
County, Approximately 37 acres at the Justin Hurst
Wildlife Management Area, this item was previously
withdrawn.
Which brings us to our mystery guest
who's going to present Work Session Item No. 11,
Boundary Agreement Including Exchange of Real Estate,
Presidio County, Big Bend Ranch State Park, Request
Permission to Begin the Public Notice and Input Process.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Who are you?
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Please identify
yourself.
COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Please, let's see a
driver's license.
MR. HOLLINGSWORTH: Chairman,
Commissioners, good afternoon. My name is Ted
Hollingsworth. I'm with the Land Conservation Program.
This item regards Big Bend National Park out in West
Texas. I think most of y'all know where that is, in the
Big Bend Country, south of Marfa, more or less adjacent
to the Big Bend National Park, adjacent to a couple of
large protected areas across the river in Mexico. It is
our largest state park by far, approximately 310,000
acres.
We've been building that park since 1988
when we acquired the first 212-acre tract. We have
about 22 miles of frontage on the Rio Grande River and
more than 100 miles of boundary in common with adjacent
landowners. As you can imagine, civil surveys are very
complex. The park is comprised of many parcels of land,
many of which have not been surveyed for a variety of
reasons. And there were fences in that country that
were there before we purchased that property, and those
fences are fences of convenience. They've been put
where fences can be put. A lot of areas out there,
because of the substrate, because of the topography,
just don't lend themselves to fences.
And so with a number of our neighbors, we
actually have agreements that we understand that the
fences are not on the boundaries, that we own to our
boundary, the neighbor owns to the boundary, doesn't
necessarily mean it's where the fence is. It's an open
ranch county, which means that the owners of cattle
don't have to keep their cattle fenced in. If you want
cattle not on your property, you have to keep them
fenced out. And so as a result, we do have boundary
agreements with a number of our neighbors.
There is a ranch that's adjacent to the
stovepipe or the northern part of the park on the east
side of the stovepipe called the LaMota Ranch. The
family that owns that ranch, donated over 13,000 acres
of that ranch back in 2000. We have about 18 miles of
boundary in common with that LaMota Ranch and they've
recently added land and gone to a considerable expense
to survey that common boundary between their ranch and
the state park and as a result, we can now propose to
straighten that boundary out.
This shows the general location of that
ranch on the east side of the stovepipe. But we have an
opportunity to straighten that boundary out and if we do
that, a tract that's now a part of the park would become
part of the LaMota Ranch, a tract -- or two tracts that
are part of the LaMota Ranch would become part of Big
Bend Ranch State Park. It would shorten that boundary
by almost 5 miles and would add almost 600 acres to the
state park. It would also add -- and I think this is
very significant -- it would add frontage on that county
road that includes the best road into what we call the
Cienega portion, about 15,000 acres of the state park,
the Cienega portion of the state park. Again, that
boundary -- or that east/west -- I'm sorry, that
north/south boundary would be shortened from 10 miles to
5.2 miles. We would net add approximately 578 acres to
the state park and we would gain a good access road into
the Cienega portion of the Big Bend Ranch State Park.
We believe that this is a very good
transaction that makes a lot of sense for both parties.
We have a very willing landowner who's worked very
closely with us. We do have a team of archaeologists on
the ground this week, in fact, to study that common
boundary, that a landowner has agreed to fence around
any archaeological resources that are discovered and has
agreed to fence inside his boundary line by a few feet
in order to ensure that he doesn't fence in any state
park property. We have a very good working relationship
going and a rare opportunity to clean up what can be a
very convoluted boundary line in that country and we'll
end up with a fenced common boundary, which is probably
the exception rather than the rule at Big Bend Ranch.
So staff does recommend that you grant us
permission to being the public notice and input process
for this one. I'd be happy to answer any questions.
COMMISSIONER MARTIN: What a great
opportunity.
MR. HOLLINGSWORTH: Yes, ma'am.
COMMISSIONER MARTIN: It's just great.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Is there any
further questions or comments?
All right. I'll authorize staff to begin
the public notice and input process.
With regard to Work Session Item No. 12,
Acceptance of Land Donation, Cameron County, Inholdings
Totaling Approximately 15 Acres at Boca Chica State
Park, does any Commissioner have any questions or
comments?
Hearing none, I will place this item on
the Thursday Commission meeting agenda for public
comment and action.
Let's see. Work Session Item No. 13,
Land Sale, Brown County, Approximately 19 Acres at the
Muse Wildlife Management Area, Request Permission to
Begin the Public Notice and Input Process, Mr. Corky
Kuhlmann. Welcome.
MR. KUHLMANN: Good afternoon,
Commissioners. For the record, Corky Kuhlmann with the
Land Conservation Program. This is a request for a land
sale in Brown County at the Muse Wildlife Management
Area located just northeast of Brownwood. Generally,
we're here to talk about acquiring land and we work
really hard to acquire land and sometimes it makes sense
for us to dispose of some land, which, you know, happens
at times.
The Muse consists of 1972 acres. It is a
very typical wildlife management area, used to develop
wildlife habitat and protect the native habitat and
wildlife species, provide demonstration areas to the
public, and also provide public hunting opportunities to
the public.
In this case, the Muse was donated to
Parks and Wildlife. There was a small tract, as you can
see on this slide, about 19 acres that's across the
county road from the rest of the management area.
This -- the 19 acres across the county road is difficult
to manage. We have a lot of trouble with vandalism,
trespass, littering, dumping of trash; and this takes
away a lot from the staff time trying to keep track of
that small tract. We put up gates. People tear them
down. We've had gates that's only lasted a couple of
weeks, tear them down to get in. They know that the
site isn't policed that much. It's kind of far away
always from the headquarters, opposite end of the
headquarters of the -- of that management area.
What we would propose to do is to offer
to sell the 19 acres to one of two adjacent landowners.
In the deed restrictions that Parks and Wildlife got
when we got the land, it says it must be managed in
perpetuity by a wildlife management plan provided by
Parks and Wildlife. If one of the two adjacent
neighbors chose to buy it, then there would be a plan
put in place by Parks and Wildlife and managed by that
plan in perpetuity and that would include no building of
any kind allowed. We would reserve all mineral rights
on the property, which we own the mineral rights.
There is -- I don't know if I have a
slide to show it. I don't. There is a small adobe pit
on the site. We're going to ask whoever buys it to
rejuvenate and put back into native -- put soil on it
and put it back into native vegetation. I'll be glad to
answer any questions.
COMMISSIONER JONES: You said it's a
small adobe what?
MR. KUHLMANN: I'm sorry. Caliche pit.
MR. SMITH: Caliche, yeah.
MR. KUHLMANN: Caliche pit.
COMMISSIONER JONES: Oh, a caliche pit.
Okay.
MR. KUHLMANN: Yeah, a caliche pit.
Sorry about that. I was in the wrong part of the world.
COMMISSIONER JONES: That's all right.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Any other
questions or comments?
I will place this item on the Thursday
Commission meeting agenda for public comment and action.
With regard to Work Session Item No. 15,
Acceptance of Land Donation, Bexar County, Approximately
232 Acres at Government Canyon State Natural Area,
Request Permission to Begin Public Notice and Input
Process, does any Commissioner have any questions or
comments about that work session item?
Hearing none, I'll authorize staff to
begin the public notice and input process.
No. 16 will be heard in Executive
Session, 17 in Executive Session, 18 -- did I skip one?
Oop, I beg your pardon. Sorry, Corky. I
skipped over...
COMMISSIONER MORIAN: Fourteen.
COMMISSIONER MARTIN: Fourteen.
MR. SMITH: Fourteen.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: With regard to
Work Session Item No. 14, Land Acquisition, Cochran
County, approximately 5 Acres at Yoakum Dunes Wildlife
Management Area, does any Commissioner have any
questions or comments about that prospective land
acquisition?
Hearing none, I'll place that item on the
Thursday Commission meeting agenda for public comment
and action.
Now, returning to Items 16, 17, and 18,
each of those will be heard in Executive Session.
So at this time, I --
MS. BRIGHT: Commissioner, could I
clarify something quickly?
With regard to Item No. 13, which is the
Muse Wildlife Management Area, what we would request is
that staff begin the public notice and input process;
and we won't bring that back to the Commission until
January at the earliest. So that one won't by heard
tomorrow.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Okay. Any
objections from any Commissioner to that?
Okay, so done.
MS. BRIGHT: Thank you.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: So approved,
whatever.
Now, can we go into Executive Session?
MR. SMITH: Yes, sir.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: All right. Now,
that I've gotten my clearance.
COMMISSIONER JONES: I think he's hungry.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Let me ask
counsel. Bill, are you okay?
COMMISSIONER JONES: I'm good. I'm good.
I'm hungry.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: All right. So at
this time, pursuant to the requirements of Chapter 551
of the Texas Government Code known to everyone as the
Open Meetings Act, an Executive Session will be held at
this time for the purpose of, number one, seeking legal
advice under Section 551.071 of the Open Meetings Act,
including advice regarding pending or contemplated
litigation; number two, deliberating the evaluation of
personnel under Section 551.074 of the Texas Open
Meetings Act; number three, deliberating regarding the
duties and reassignment of public employees under
Section 551.074 of the Texas Open Meetings Act; and
lastly, deliberating the deployment and specific
occasions for implementation of security personnel or
devices under Section 551.076 of the Texas Open Meetings
Act.
We will now recess for that Executive
Session.
(Recess taken for Executive Session)
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Okay. We will
now reconvene the regular session of the Work Session on
November 4th, 2015, at three and change.
COMMISSIONER DUGGINS: Seventeen.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: I can't -- no.
COMMISSIONER JONES: 3:20.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: Yeah, 3:22.
COMMISSIONER JONES: The clock is
different.
COMMISSIONER FRIEDKIN: At 3:22. With
regard to Work Session Item No. 16, Texas-Mexico Border
Security and Deployment of Department Personnel,
Operation Strong Safety, no further action is required
at this time.
With regard to Work Session 17, Update on
Regulatory Litigation, no further action is required at
this time.
And finally regarding Work Session Item
18, Personnel Matters, no further action is required at
this time.
Mr. Smith, this Commission has completed
its Work Session business; and I declare us adjourned.
MR. SMITH: All right. Thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
(Work Session adjourns)
C E R T I F I C A T E
STATE OF TEXAS )
COUNTY OF TRAVIS )
I, Paige S. Watts, Certified Shorthand
Reporter in and for the State of Texas, do hereby
certify that the above-mentioned matter occurred as
hereinbefore set out.
I FURTHER CERTIFY THAT the proceedings of such
were reported by me or under my supervision, later
reduced to typewritten form under my supervision and
control and that the foregoing pages are a full, true,
and correct transcription of the original notes.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my
hand and seal this Turn in date _____ day of
________________, ________.
___________________________________
Paige S. Watts, CSR, RPR
CSR No.: 8311
Expiration: December 31, 2016
7010 Cool Canyon Cove
Round Rock, Texas 78681
(512)335-5110
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