Wolf petition submitted

[QDM MARS]

www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/598165/

[yesdeer]

Awesome! Let's hope it goes through.

[ridge]

I am so split on this one.  That the wolf hunt is needed is obvious.   That the NRC does not need more power or already has too much power is also obvious to me.  If the legislature had any guts they would establish the wolf season on their own and not continue to give the NRC almost unlimited power.  I will be surprised if the nuts, excuse me, the antis, do not file actions in court to try to get around the petitions.

[QDM MARS]

I think they just did that last Thur. They called it a legal petition.....................I could not come up with just exactly what a legal petition means??

[ridge]

I do not know what it is either, but I also heard about it.

A source that I do not have permission to quote also has informed me that some Detroit politicians will be introducing legislation that supposedly will change the make up of the NRC.  That should grab the throats of a few MAPR folks that said there would be no reprisals by the antis.  The trophy thing deer and wolf, real or not, has the antis in a frenzy and I believe they will go for broke this time.  It has also been said that the antis may seek federal court action against several states at once because other states also have wolf hunts.  I have absolutely no support for the antis but things could get down right interesting during the next 6 months to a year.

[QDM MARS]

A source that I do not have permission to quote also has informed me that some Detroit politicians will be introducing legislation that supposedly will change the make up of the NRC.

Hey Ridge

Are you free to share via a private message? I understand if not.

Here is the article about the legal petition submitted to the Natural Resource Commission by the anti group Keep Michigan Wolves Protected

Keep Michigan Wolves Protected submitted a legal petition to Michigan’s Natural Resources Commission demanding that it rescind its order that added wolves to the list of game species, which led to Michigan’s first wolf hunt in decades. The petition states that the NRC’s decisions on the wolf hunt were based “on false, deceptive and exaggerated claims--not on principles of sound scientific management as required by law.”

In light of Upper Peninsula farmer John Koski’s recent no-contest plea agreement on charges that he neglected and starved animals given to him by the DNR to deter predators, the petition asks the NRC to permanently remove his farm’s numbers from the overall statistical analysis of wolf/livestock conflicts in the region. When Koski’s wolf depredation statistics are removed from that evaluation, the actual amount of cattle losses to wolves in the U.P. averages fewer than four per year between 2006 and 2012.

The NRC designated the wolf a game species on July 11, 2013, claiming a hunt was needed to address wolf conflicts with livestock and complaints about proximity to humans.

“Evidence demonstrates that the NRC unlawfully declared the wolf a game species based on Koski’s skewed statistics and other misinformation,” said Jill Fritz, director of Keep Michigan Wolves Protected. “The NRC should re-examine and rescind its order adding the wolf to the list of game species and authorizing a hunting season on wolves.”

In addition to the state’s poor handling of the Koski situation, the petition charges the NRC with:

· Basing its decision on two high-profile claims of wolf-human encounters that never occurred;

· Violating provisions of the Michigan Wolf Management Plan that call for the “presentation of accurate, unbiased information” to help resolve wolf-related conflicts;

· Violating the NRC’s legal obligation to involve interested members of the public in decision-making by deleting more than 2,000 email comments on the subject of the wolf hunt, and never opening more than 10,000 others.

In the waning days of the 2012 legislative session, lawmakers approved a bill to allow the trophy hunting of wolves. In response, Keep Michigan Wolves Protected collected more than 255,000 signatures to correct this mistake and place the wolf hunting law on the statewide ballot. The Legislature then passed a second law to give the power of game species designation to the unelected, politically-appointed Natural Resources Commission, making an end run around the voter referendum because the commission’s decisions are not subject to any voter referendum.

Last August, Keep Michigan Wolves Protected launched a second petition drive to overturn that second law, and on March 13, 2014, turned in another 229,000 signatures from voters in all 83 counties. Those petition signatures have just been certified to place the second referendum on the November 4 ballot.

Keep Michigan Wolves Protected is supported by humane organizations, more than 100 Michigan veterinarians and veterinary hospitals, Native American tribes, conservation groups, faith-based organizations, the Detroit Zoological Society, leading wolf biologists including Michigan Tech professors Rolf Peterson and John Vucetich, rank-and-file hunters and many other concerned Michiganders.

[ridge]

My Guess is that the NRC may look at it to appease the antis but I see no way that they will do anything with it.  I will get back to you on the other, at least to what I know, by messaging.