Loophole exists, said counsel for Legislative Rules Review Commission
The counsel for the N.C. Legislative Rules Review Commission said the disputed game-and-fish law changes for 2009-10 could be submitted as temporary rules and be in place for the upcoming hunting seasons.
However, Joe Deluca said no one from the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission had contacted the RRC to request such a designation.
By way of explanation, Gordon Myers, WRC executive director, sent a June 2 news release to “conservation partners” that noted the agency couldn’t use temporary-rule status to include all 2009-10 game-and-fish law change proposals as “temporary rules.”
“We do not have plans to implement H3-H9 as temporary rules,” Myers said in an e-mail. “As stated in the “N.C. Wildlife Update,” the contested rule changes will not be implemented this year and will not be reflected in the regulations digest.
“The email also stated our position that implementation of temporary rules should only be used when we can clearly demonstrate that there is a need for immediate adoption and that the provision should be used judiciously to serve compelling resource management objectives.”
The WRC, Myers said, is allowed to submit only proposals that deal with fishing or hunting seasons, no-wake zones and game lands as temporary rules. Others are not subject to temporary-rule status and can’t be considered by the General Assembly until 2010.
However, proposals H3-H9 apparently could have been submitted to the legislature as temporary rules. Those proposals include:
H3) Remove the daily bag limit for deer.
H4) Allow hunters to use archery equipment to harvest deer during the muzzleloading firearms season on game lands.
H5) Shorten the bow season by one week and open the muzzleloader season one week earlier to create a two week muzzleloader season.
H6) Deer seasons in the Northwestern deer season will be changed so that the regular gun season is extended through January 1. Deer seasons in the Eastern, Central, and Western deer season structures will remain unchanged.
H7) Deer seasons on game lands in the Northwestern deer season will be changed so that the regular gun season is extended through January 1. Deer seasons on game lands in the Eastern, Central, and Western deer season structures will remain unchanged.
H8) Open all private lands in the Eastern, Central, and Northwestern deer seasons to the maximum either-sex deer season.
H9) Assign all of Moore County to the Eastern deer season.
As of June 4, the WRC apparently had chosen not to ask for temporary status for proposals H3-H9 during 2009-10.
The agency’s 19 members met in Raleigh to approve changes in fishing, hunting and trapping regulations that had gone through an extensive public-hearing process during January. This past winter and spring, the agency received nearly 40,000 sportsmen’s comments at hearings, by e-mail and letters.
However, a rarely-used tactic allowed some of the proposals to be protested before the RRC. The process involved at least 10 letters of protest or verbal protests by citizens to the RRC. Even though the RRC doesn’t consider the letters nor verbal protests, it attaches them to the files when agency proposals are sent to legislature. However, as a matter of law, the General Assembly won’t consider protested rules until its next session in 2011.
Or so it was widely thought.
However, Deluca, counsel for the Legislative Rules Review Commission, said the WRC’s disputed 2009-10 proposals could be adopted “at any time” if the WRC requested they be accepted as “temporary rules” before the current legislative session ends.
“It’s (a) proven (tactic) for the Wildlife Commission to use temporary rule-making to put into effect changes in seasons, bag limits and certain hunting and game laws,” Deluca said.
In the past, the WRC submitted changes in wildlife and fisheries regulations as permanent and temporary rules with the Rules Review Commission at the same time. The double filing was done so legislators would know the proposals already been through the public-hearing process and consideration by the agency.
All state governmental agencies adhered to that format, so if an agency filed a temporary rule request. the legislature knew the tactic wasn’t an end run around the public’s wishes.
However, the legislature changed temporary-rule designation several years ago at the behest of developers and home-builders who wanted a way to speed up the process of obtaining building permits. The change also aided the WRC.
The legislature recognized the ever-changing, seasonal nature of wildlife management through bag limits and season changes, either lengthening or shortening them, depending upon research conducted and statistics gathered by its wildlife and fisheries biologists.
Joan Troy, the WRC’s current Rules Coordinator, also said the RRC allows the agency to catch a break when it comes to temporary rules.
“(The Commission) used to have to file all proposals with the legislature, but it was such a slow process,” she said. “It would take one to two years to get a proposal into law after the commissioners had approved it. The legislature finally amended the temporary rule process just for game and fish laws because they understood seasons and bag limits change every year and (the Commisson) has professional biologists who keep a finger on game-and-fish population numbers. We also go through the public-hearing process before the proposals are sent to Rules Review, so the public is aware of the proposals and has a chance to comment on them before they reach the legislature.”
In answer to a question, Troy said Myers didn’t ask her for input regarding temporary-rule status for 2009-10 game-and-fish proposal. Nor did any commissioners, including chairman Wes Seegars, seek her advice.
Troy said she could have advised Myers or the commissioners that temporary-rule status was available, but she wasn’t asked to provide input because she has been banned from attending WRC meetings.
She said Myers had indicated to her and her division chief, Col. Kenneth Everhart, that she wasn’t to attend WRC meetings.
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