The fine (easement) print in federal duck stamp increase leg
Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2014 5:36 pm
The fine (easement) print in federal duck stamp increase legislation
By Rob Drieslein, Mn Outdoor News
Posted on August 27, 2014
http://www.outdoornews.com/August-2014/ ... gislation/
Several times a year, my email erupts with links to a magazine piece, newspaper story, or blog proclaiming the merits of the federal duck stamp and the habitat it’s protected since 1935. Though I tire of the self-congratulatory back-patting, especially when modern federal conservation policy is roaring down the drain, the duck stamp indeed has accomplished great things – $900 million in expenditures, 6 million acres of habitat in almost 80 years, etc. As the consistent cornerstone of funds dedicated to preserving North American waterfowl and in acquiring wetlands for duck habitat, the duck stamp has accomplished something almost as important. It’s created hunter habitat in the form of waterfowl production areas and national wildlife refuges.
Outdoor News has written this summer about federal legislation that would increase the price of a duck stamp from $15 to $25. Last raised in 1991, the $10 increase is embarrassingly overdue, but I still have a concern about the details of the proposal.
The legislation would restrict expenditures from the new dollars to strictly easements, not fee title. I’ve always been an unapologetic acquisition guy because buying secures wetlands, grasslands, and public access permanently – with no worrying about landowners violating terms of easements. Since Joe Albert’s Outdoor News story about the legislation on July 25, however, no one else has groused about the proposal, and the folks at conservation groups like Ducks Unlimited have embraced it.
In a phone interview with me earlier this month, Paul Schmidt, chief conservation officer for DU, defended his organization’s support for the legislation, noting that a large percentage of existing expenditures from the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund already finance easements. People in the conservation business of ducks tell me easements have done great things for waterfowl in the 21st Century, and there are places like North Dakota where fee title is a virtual nonstarter.
OK, if the director of the USFWS can best use some of these dollars for easements, great, but where I break ranks is codifying it into law. Right now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decides where to best prioritize dollars, and in today’s fiscal and anti-government environment, easements often work best. But fee title may become a more legitimate option in the future, and if Congress passes this law, the USFWS loses purchasing flexibility with some stamp funds.
Eric Alvarez, chief of the USFWS Division of Realty, tells me the 1.4 million federal duck stamp sales generate about $25 million annually, and a $10 increase would add another $14 million. Another source adds even more money these days to the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund: import duties on internationally built firearms. When you buy a Glock or Beretta, you pay an import fee that goes into that migratory bird fund. Because of increased firearms sales the past several years, those import duties have added a sizable chunk of change – $35 to $40 million. Alvarez estimated the total current annual contributions to the fund at $60 to $65 million. Duck stamps provide a consistent contribution to the fund compared to import fees, which fluctuate. Of the total, he estimated 70 percent finance easements, mostly in the high-priority prairie pothole region, and the remaining 30 percent goes to fee title.
With respect to DU and other groups working hard to secure habitat on the ground, someone needs to take a hard line here. If I’m going to spend 66 percent more for a duck stamp, it’d better provide more than another funding source to pay landowners to do the right thing. We have plenty of those programs already.
Finally, this strikes me as an area where nonhunting purchasers of duck stamps could chime in. Easements benefit bird-watchers in the form of more birds, but fee title produces access in the form of refuges and waterfowl production areas where legions of bird-watchers march with their fine binoculars.
However you benefit from the federal migratory bird stamp, let your Congressional representative know you don’t support language that would require additional dollars to be used strictly for easements. Some might argue, "Don't let perfect get in the way of good, Rob." Well, I'm not buying it. Allowing politicians to codify how the USFWS can apply expenditures from the duck stamp is a slippery slope that could tie up best waterfowl conservation practices for decades, or longer.
The bipartisan bills were introduced by Sen. David Vitter, R-La., and Rep. John Fleming, R-La., or find your own U.S. senator or House representative.
By Rob Drieslein, Mn Outdoor News
Posted on August 27, 2014
http://www.outdoornews.com/August-2014/ ... gislation/
Several times a year, my email erupts with links to a magazine piece, newspaper story, or blog proclaiming the merits of the federal duck stamp and the habitat it’s protected since 1935. Though I tire of the self-congratulatory back-patting, especially when modern federal conservation policy is roaring down the drain, the duck stamp indeed has accomplished great things – $900 million in expenditures, 6 million acres of habitat in almost 80 years, etc. As the consistent cornerstone of funds dedicated to preserving North American waterfowl and in acquiring wetlands for duck habitat, the duck stamp has accomplished something almost as important. It’s created hunter habitat in the form of waterfowl production areas and national wildlife refuges.
Outdoor News has written this summer about federal legislation that would increase the price of a duck stamp from $15 to $25. Last raised in 1991, the $10 increase is embarrassingly overdue, but I still have a concern about the details of the proposal.
The legislation would restrict expenditures from the new dollars to strictly easements, not fee title. I’ve always been an unapologetic acquisition guy because buying secures wetlands, grasslands, and public access permanently – with no worrying about landowners violating terms of easements. Since Joe Albert’s Outdoor News story about the legislation on July 25, however, no one else has groused about the proposal, and the folks at conservation groups like Ducks Unlimited have embraced it.
In a phone interview with me earlier this month, Paul Schmidt, chief conservation officer for DU, defended his organization’s support for the legislation, noting that a large percentage of existing expenditures from the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund already finance easements. People in the conservation business of ducks tell me easements have done great things for waterfowl in the 21st Century, and there are places like North Dakota where fee title is a virtual nonstarter.
OK, if the director of the USFWS can best use some of these dollars for easements, great, but where I break ranks is codifying it into law. Right now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decides where to best prioritize dollars, and in today’s fiscal and anti-government environment, easements often work best. But fee title may become a more legitimate option in the future, and if Congress passes this law, the USFWS loses purchasing flexibility with some stamp funds.
Eric Alvarez, chief of the USFWS Division of Realty, tells me the 1.4 million federal duck stamp sales generate about $25 million annually, and a $10 increase would add another $14 million. Another source adds even more money these days to the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund: import duties on internationally built firearms. When you buy a Glock or Beretta, you pay an import fee that goes into that migratory bird fund. Because of increased firearms sales the past several years, those import duties have added a sizable chunk of change – $35 to $40 million. Alvarez estimated the total current annual contributions to the fund at $60 to $65 million. Duck stamps provide a consistent contribution to the fund compared to import fees, which fluctuate. Of the total, he estimated 70 percent finance easements, mostly in the high-priority prairie pothole region, and the remaining 30 percent goes to fee title.
With respect to DU and other groups working hard to secure habitat on the ground, someone needs to take a hard line here. If I’m going to spend 66 percent more for a duck stamp, it’d better provide more than another funding source to pay landowners to do the right thing. We have plenty of those programs already.
Finally, this strikes me as an area where nonhunting purchasers of duck stamps could chime in. Easements benefit bird-watchers in the form of more birds, but fee title produces access in the form of refuges and waterfowl production areas where legions of bird-watchers march with their fine binoculars.
However you benefit from the federal migratory bird stamp, let your Congressional representative know you don’t support language that would require additional dollars to be used strictly for easements. Some might argue, "Don't let perfect get in the way of good, Rob." Well, I'm not buying it. Allowing politicians to codify how the USFWS can apply expenditures from the duck stamp is a slippery slope that could tie up best waterfowl conservation practices for decades, or longer.
The bipartisan bills were introduced by Sen. David Vitter, R-La., and Rep. John Fleming, R-La., or find your own U.S. senator or House representative.