A group of state senators in Idaho want the federal government to cede control of a large swath of wetlands currently managed by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS). Joint Senate Memorial 104 requests that the Idaho Department of Fish & Game (IDFG) work together with the Feds to transfer ownership of the Camas Creek National Wildlife Refuge to the state—and to add the area to the nearby Mud Lake Wildlife Management Area. The Memorial passed the Idaho State Senate with a voice-only vote on March 17.
Camas National Wildlife Refuge in southeast Idaho was set aside by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1937, three years after he signed the law that created the federal duck stamp. The Refuge contains 11,000 acres of federally protected habitat for a variety of migratory bird species. Hunting opportunities include waterfowl, upland birds, and elk.
Idaho State Senator Van Burtenshaw, a Republican from Terrenton—a town near the refuge—sponsored the resolution. In addition to requesting that the refuge be handed over to the state government, Burtenshaw wants the Feds to expedite a permit that would allow adjacent ranchers to draw more water from the protected wetlands for use in their agricultural operations.
“A purpose of this legislation is to help the water users in that area obtain the water that they have coming from snow runoff,” Burtenshaw said during the hearing, as reported by the Idaho Capitol Sun. “The problem we have is that when we get to the Camas Wildlife Refuge, we can’t get our water through there, and we can’t obtain a permit to clean the channel so that the water can come on through.”
The required permitting is what’s known as a Section 404 Permit. It’s a stipulation of the Clean Water Act. “We believe it’d be easier to work with the Idaho Department of Fish and Game,” Burtenshaw said while debating the Joint Memorial on the day it passed. “The regulations will be the same. The only difference is, we’ll work with somebody we can see, as opposed to a seat in Washington, D.C.”
Nate Collins is the Policy Committee Chair for the Idaho Chapter of Backcountry Hunters & Anglers, which opposes Burtenshaw's Joint Senate Memorial. While he expects the measure to pass the Idaho House, he says it take immediate steps to seize the refuge. Instead, it signals the Idaho Legislature's support for the idea of transferring the federal wildlife refuge to the state.
"There there's no real reason to transfer management from the US Fish and Wildlife Service to the state of Idaho," Collins tells Field & Stream. "It would be like putting a band-aid on a very large wound, and the wound is general issues with water rights and water usage throughout the Snake River Plain."
According to Collins, the refuge could lose critical habitat protections if transferred from the federal government to the state of Idaho. "There are active mining operations on current IDFG WMAs," he says. "That wouldn't fly on a US Fish & Wildlife Refuge."
The effort comes amid other attempts to transfer federally managed lands to state governments, most notably in Utah where a lawsuit supported by Gov. Spencer Cox seeks to dispose of some 18.5 million acres managed by the Bureau of Land Management. And in Montana, State Rep. Tom Millet recently introduced House Joint Resolution 24—a measure that seeks to “support for Utah in their land lawsuit against the United States.” Meanwhile, on the federal level, the Department of the Interior under Doug Burgum is partnering with Housing and Urban Development to identify “underutilized federal lands” that could be used for “affordable housing.”
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But even as the so-called “land transfer movement” continues to gain momentum in certain halls of power, the general public’s support for such ideas appears to be on the wane. A recent poll conducted by the Colorado College, for instance, shows record-high support for public land conservation, with 65 percent of Westerners with an array of political affiliations opposing proposals that would “give state governments control over national federal lands.”
