By BEN NEARY
NMWF Conservation Director
The New Mexico State Game Commission voted Monday to take more time to explore alternatives to the way the state has allocated bighorn sheep tags since 2014.
The New Mexico Wildlife Federation and others are pushing for changes in the state’s approach to allocating bighorn sheep tags. The commission is preparing new regulations this year that will control the allocation of sheep tags over the coming four years.
Some other groups, including the New Mexico Council of Outfitters and Guides, have urged the commission not to change the current system.
The commission on Monday unanimously directed staffers with the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish to meet with opposing groups over coming weeks to search for compromise. The commission originally had been scheduled to act on the final bighorn rule at its June 3 meeting in Eagle Nest, but Monday’s action will push that back until August.
The NMWF and others for years have criticized the state’s practice of lumping all Rocky Mountain ram tags into a single hunt code while lumping all desert ram tags into another hunt code. The state has followed that approach since 2014, when bighorns came under the state’s quota law.
Lumping all the sheep tags together allows the state to give sheep licenses to hunters who retain an outfitter prior to submitting their license applications as well as to nonresident hunters. Without lumping the tags together, those two groups would be ineligible to draw tags.
New Mexico’s quota law specifies that residents must receive a minimum of 84 percent of the tags for each hunt. The law reserves 10 percent for residents or nonresidents who have contracted with an outfitter and 6 percent for nonresidents who haven’t contracted with an outfitter.
In order to have enough tags to give New Mexico residents the required minimum of 84 percent and still have a tag left over for an outfitted hunter, a specific hunt must have a minimum of seven tags. And in order to give a tag to a nonresident hunter who hasn’t contracted with an outfitter, a hunt must have at least 13 tags.
The NMWF has criticized the current system. But by lumping all the tags together under single hunt codes, the group says, the commission effectively has ignored the state law definition of “hunt code,” which states it must specify the species, weapon type and time frame for a specific hunt. The bighorn and desert ram hunts are spread out over several months and many are hundreds of miles apart.
The New Mexico Attorney General’s Office recently released an opinion stating that the game commission’s approach to lumping bighorn tags together was legal.
At the commission’s April 11 meeting, Commissioner Roberta Salazar-Henry suggested having game department staffers meet with opposing groups to look for ways to compromise. She said she wanted to explore whether some bighorn hunts could be limited to New Mexico residents only, while others could be left open to outfitted hunters and nonresidents.
Commissioners Deanna Archuleta and Tirzio Lopez voted at the April 11 meeting in support of Salazar-Henry’s proposal. However, Commission Chair Sharon Salazar Hickey opposed it and ruled that the motion died because it lacked support of four commissioners – a majority of the commission if the commission were at full strength of seven members.
At Monday’s meeting, the commission agreed to adopt a voting standard that in all votes except for final votes on rules and for votes on issuing bonds, a majority of the commissioners actually present would be sufficient.
The commission is down to four members and Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has been slow to appoint replacement commissioners. She recently appointed Archuleta to replace David Soules, who died last spring. The governor has failed to fill three other vacancies over the last year.
The commission voted Monday to name Archuleta as vice chair to replace Jimmy Bates, who resigned from the commission last month.
After adopting the voting rule, the commission on Monday unanimously approved Salazar-Henry’s suggestion to direct the game department to meet with groups on different sides of the bighorn tag issue. The department staffers will report back at the June 3 commission meeting.
Jesse Deubel, executive director of the NMWF, told commissioners that his group has been very clear that it opposes lumping all the ram hunts together into two separate hunt codes. However, he said that in the spirit of compromise, the federation is willing to meet with other groups to try to work something out.
Speaking after the meeting, Deubel encouraged state resident hunters to file comments with the game commission in support of increased resident bighorn hunting opportunities.
“Other states in the West limit nonresident hunters to 10 percent of the available tags,” Deubel said. “We’ve seen past game commissions do back-flips to keep pumping up the number of bighorn tags that our state gives to outfitted and nonresident hunters. It’s time to bring some basic fairness to this situation for our resident hunters.”
Deubel encouraged resident hunters to submit comments to the game commission expressing support for establishing at least some bighorn ram hunts that will be limited to residents only. Send comments on the plan to: DGF-Bighorn-Rule@state.nm.us.
Kerrie Cox Romero, executive director of the New Mexico Council of Outfitters and Guides, told the commission that her group strongly believes there is no need to extend the public comment period for bighorn sheep and no need to change the existing system.