By BEN NEARY
NMWF Conservation Director
The exodus of commissioners from the New Mexico State Game Commission continues with the April 29 resignation of Commission Vice Chair Jimmy Bates of Albuquerque.
Bates, an executive with Premier Distributing in Albuquerque, said Tuesday that he resigned because the pressures of balancing his career and family obligations with the demands of the commission had become too great.
“Between work demands and my family, I just didn’t feel I was able to continue devoting the time that the commission position really deserves and warrants,” Bates said.
The commission is in the process this year of developing new rules that will control big game hunting in the state over the coming four years.
“With all these big rule changes coming up, you need someone who can devote the time necessary to do justice to the position and to the sportsmen and women in the state.” Bates said. “And I just didn’t feel like I’d be able to do that moving forward, and I wouldn’t want to stay on if I couldn’t fully commit the time that’s required.”
Bates said he was honored to have worked on the commission and was happy to see the game department acquire some important properties during his tenure.
Bates also said he’s known during his entire time on the commission that New Mexico conservation officers and biologists have been underpaid compared to those in neighboring states.
“Coming from private business, it’s really frustrating and disappointing to me that we haven’t been able to correct that in the time I’ve been on board,” Bates said. “I think that’s still a big gap that needs to be addressed as soon as possible.”
Bates was one of two Republicans whom Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham had appointed to the game commission in 2019. The other original GOP member, Gail Cramer of Mayhill, resigned last summer and efforts to reach her for comment since have been unsuccessful.
Bates’ resignation leaves the seven-member commission with only four members. Of those remaining four members, only two were among Lujan Grisham’s original slate of appointees.
Lujan Grisham recently appointed Commissioner Deanna Archuleta to replace Commissioner David Soules, who died last spring.
Former Commission Chair Joanna Prukop and former Vice Chair Jeremy Vesbach have said Lujan Grisham forced them out because they voiced concerns about the state game commission’s “non-navigable waters” rule.
The rule had allowed private landowners to petition the commission for certificates stating that rivers and streams across their land were private and closed to the public because they were non-navigable.
The game commission had approved five applications for “non-navigable” certifications from private landowners who own properties on rivers including the Chama and the Pecos. Lujan Grisham has accepted campaign contributions from some of the landowners.
In response to a legal challenge filed by the New Mexico Wildlife Federation and other groups, the New Mexico Supreme Court unanimously ruled in March that the game commission’s “non-navigable” rule was unconstitutional and void.
The court agreed with arguments from the NMWF and the other groups that the state constitution specifies that all waters of the state are public. The court has yet to issue its written opinion on the case.
The NMWF was instrumental in creating the game commission approach to wildlife management in New Mexico over a century ago. The federation continues to push for legislative reform to insulate commissioners from being removed by the governor for political reasons.
Commissioner Tirzio Lopez of Rio Arriba County said Tuesday he was saddened to see Bates leave the commission. He’s one of the governor’s original appointees.
“I think he was an excellent partner on the commission,” Lopez said of Bates. “He understood the issues statewide, and he brought a very good business perspective to the commission that I hadn’t seen before. He was an excellent partner. He was a hell of a commissioner and I’m very sad that he left.”
Lopez said the commission continues to function well and do its job despite the commissioner departures.
“It’s not affecting our ability to serve the public and get our job done,” Lopez said of turnover on the commission. “But dealing with if we have a quorum or not is concerning.”
Lopez said all the fellow commissioners he’s served with were good. “They all have great knowledge of the issues surrounding the mission of the department and the commission.” he said. He said that if Lujan Grisham is ready to appoint new commissioners, he looks forward to working with them.
Commissioner Roberta Salazar-Henry of Las Cruces, the other remaining commissioner from the governor’s original seven appointees, said Bates had said that the demands of his work and other obligations didn’t leave him with enough time to devote to the commission.
”In my opinion, Jimmy exemplified what a commissioner was supposed to do, in putting his voluntary service first and meeting his constituents’ concerns,” Salazar-Henry said. “He was fair, he listened well, he loved to collaborate with others to come up with the best ideas. I am really going to miss him.”
Bates was absent from the commission’s last meeting, on April 11. With only four commissioners present, a question arose about how many votes were required to pass a motion. The issue arose during a discussion about the commission’s work to develop a rule to govern bighorn hunting in the state over the coming four years.
Salazar-Henry had suggested directing the staff at the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish to explore whether some bighorn hunts could be limited to New Mexico residents only, while others could be left open to residents as well as to hunters who retained an outfitter before applying and to nonresidents. Currently, all bighorn ram hunts are open to residents, outfitted hunters and nonresidents.
Commissioners Lopez and Archuleta voted with Salazar-Henry in favor of her motion. But Commission Chair Sharon Salazar Hickey voted against it and said the motion didn’t pass because it would require four votes – a majority of a fully staffed seven-member commission.
The commission has scheduled its next meeting to start at 1 p.m., Mon., May 9, at the New Mexico Game and Fish Albuquerque Office at 7816 Alamo Rd NW in Albuquerque.
Among the items on the agenda are selection of a new vice-chair to replace Bates. The commission also has scheduled action on setting a voting standard for the commission as well as a vote about extending the period for additional public comment on the state’s pending bighorn rule.
The NMWF and others have voiced concern about a proposal from game department biologists to continue the present practice of lumping all Rocky Mountain ram tags into a single hunt code, all Rocky Mountain ewe tags into another hunt code and desert bighorn ram tags into a third.
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 current approach of lumping all the tags together even though they cover separate hunts spread out over several months in different locations has allowed the game commission to allot some tags to all three groups of hunters: residents, outfitted and nonresident. Without lumping the tags together, only resident hunters would be able to draw tags under the state’s quota rule that reserves at least 84 percent for residents.