I'm not talking about just the hunting opportunities. I'm talking about the agency as an entity.
1.) A former parks director hid millions of dollars in the hopes of establishing a new state agency only for parks. That led to massive underfunding of maintenance needs across all state parks. It also created a ton of animosity from the legislature because of the lies that went around on why the money did or didn't get spent.
2.) That agency is legally mandated to manage deer, elk, pronghorn and other species at or below objective. I don't know of any other state that makes it illegal to have an overabundance of wildlife. The legislative interference in how Montana manages wildlife cannot be under-stated. We've handed wildlife management over to the drunks at the Buckhorn.
3.) That agency suffers from loss of institutional history, short-timer's syndrome & being battered by the legislature. They're like abused kids. When you look at Fisheries, Parks, Con Ed, etc, those divisions all shine. It's wildlife & enforcement where the controversy comes from. That's part of the job, to be sure, but it's because that's where politicians make the most hay. There are some truly talented & amazing wildlife managers in that agency, and they don't all work on cornerstone species like elk & deer. The bird program, grizzly program, wolf program, fisheries, etc, are all top notch.
4.) Legislators who think they understand PR funding messed with warden pay so bad we had wardens doing fence work on WMA's, rather than looking for poachers & helping enforce the law.
There's a lot more to worry about at FWP than just season setting & license allocation. Martha saw that and tried to change the culture. I think she was pretty successful.
