# Wyoming Fee Increase and 90/10 split (SF103) - Debate set for March 4!



## MWScott72 (May 23, 2011)

I know there a thread on this already, but I didn't have time to read it all yet. I have copied an email that I received, and it gives the email addresses of the Senators on the committee that will debate this. They take it up tomorrow, 3/4, so please take a moment to email them and voice your (hopeful) opposition to the bill.

I love to hunt WY and spend my $$ there ( and as Goob alluded to in the other thread). This bill, if passed, really knocks back NR opportunity and needs to be deep sixed!

Email below:

Wyoming Senator Larry Hicks has filed Senate File 103, a 90/10 license allocation and fee increase bill that would be devastating to your ability to draw a Wyoming big game hunting license in the future.

We need your help to contact members of the Senate Travel, Recreation and Wildlife Committee as soon as possible to share your opposition to the bill and how it would impact your ability to hunt in Wyoming. The bill will be heard by the committee at 8 a.m. on Thursday, March 4, 2021.

Please keep your messages focused and specific to how this appalling bill will hurt your future plans to hunt in Wyoming. Please let the senators know that you have made a financial investment in preference points and license fees and remind the Senators of the positive economic impact nonresident hunters, like yourself, brings to Wyoming.

Thank you for taking the time to reach out to these Wyoming Legislators it is critical they hear from you and how a 50 percent reduction in licenses would affect your ability to hunt and Wyoming's economy.

The Senators are listed below:

Chairwoman Affie Ellis (Cheyenne) [email protected]
Senator Mike Gierau (Jackson) [email protected]
Senator Tim Salazar (Dubois) [email protected]
Senator Bill Landen (Casper) [email protected]
Senator Wendy Schuler (Evantson) [email protected]


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

The 90/10 split will hurt those that have invested big bucks in the preference point system, especially for trophy game. My 66 year-old brother's quest for a nonresident moose tag is an example. He has like 20 moose points but missed getting one pref point a couple years ago and then fell way behind on the "waiting list". If they go 90/10 for nonresidents, instead of the old 75/25, he will fall further behind and most like not live long enough to draw a nonres moose tag. 

My brother puts in for moose, deer, elk, antelope and crane every year. The pref point fees end up being a ton of money and he had to drop out of sheep a number of years ago. Geeze, the nonres moose pref point alone is $150.....moose license would be $1997. He's got tons of $$ invested in pref points so he will just stay in the system and hope he lives to be 110 and gets both knees operated on.

The thing is a mess. The Fish n Game Department got stuck on their budget and wouldn't reduce tag numbers after 2 different horrible winters that killed off huge numbers of deer and antelope. So they over harvested deer and antelope. Then disease ravaged moose and sheep numbers. Then they discovered, duh, the Preference Point System wasn't fair to new hunters, youngsters, getting into the point system (uh...mathematically they'd have to live to be 150 to draw some resident tags while nonresidents were drawing the same tags.) and a percentage of tags were taken out and put into a computer draw pool. 

So we ran outta deer and elk and they had to, finally for crying out loud, reduce tag numbers...by a lot. Then, duh, Wyoming residents weren't drawing tags that historically were easy to draw......but.....nonresidents were getting some of those tags. Some of our legislators and their families weren't drawing tags they historically drew BUT NONRESIDENTS WERE DRAWING THOSE TAGS!!!! UH OH!!!! You get my drift.

Most all the people running the State are fiscal Conservative Tea Party States Rights....uh....individuals. Most want to sell off all the public land and drill for gas n oil and dig coal on it. Some hold the WG&F in contempt because they don't have complete control over them and can't get any of the Fish n Game Department's revenue. The 90/10 split will reduce revenue $$s for the WF&G Department. The Travel n Leisure Board has control and all revenue goes to the Department and the Department gets no $$s from the State. 

This thing comes up from every 5 years or so. The Board has outfitting, tourism, and ranching influence that usually votes against cutting license numbers for nonresidents.

It's a mess. Personally, I'm for the 90/10 split. 90/10 is in line with other states. (What is Utah's split?) My Wyoming resident grandkids will never live long enough to draw some tags yet nonresidents will draw. They'd have to raise nonresident tag prices to pick up lost $$s going to 90/10. Doesn't matter, they could double the prices of the nonresident tags and sell them all. They know that, it's a given.


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## toasty (May 15, 2008)

I'll be watching this closely as the kids and I have a a few pts and if this passes, I am probably going stop putting in. How will this affect antelope where residents pretty much get a tag every year? Will it will take a lot longer for non resident to draw?


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## CPAjeff (Dec 20, 2014)

Honestly, I like the move. Time to start taking care of the residents of a state instead of focusing mostly on the nonresident crowd. Even with the price increases, it's still inline with what other states are charging.

Regardless of the outcome on March 4th, I'll still be applying each year in Wyoming.


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

I figure that if this goes through then all they will get from me is the cost of a point. 

Then once I have enough points I'll draw a tag and then be done with Wyoming.


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## Packout (Nov 20, 2007)

90-10 for sheep/moose/mtngoats/bison seems like it should pass easily. It is the non-res LQ tags for some deer and elk hunts and all pronghorn hunts that will be the tough pill for non-res to swallow. General Deer and Elk opportunity won't take the same hit. It is their state, so an outsider's opinion is just an opinion. 

I personally have appreciated hunting in WY and their great State. I do wonder what the impact will be to local businesses. Last year we dropped a few hundred dollars in Kem and Evanston during our hunts. Other years we've spent four figures in small towns while hunting. Take half of that away and I'd imagine it is a real financial hit. 

Makes me think fishing and bird hunting looks more attractive than Big Game Tag hunting......

...


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## alpinebowman (Sep 24, 2007)

CPAjeff said:


> Honestly, I like the move. Time to start taking care of the residents of a state instead of focusing mostly on the nonresident crowd. Even with the price increases, it's still inline with what other states are charging.
> 
> Regardless of the outcome on March 4th, I'll still be applying each year in Wyoming.


CPA, the problem is that they also charge you $50 for just a point for deer and antelope. do that for even a low end 6 or 7 point unit and you are paying $700 for the tag. With the price increase it goes up to a grand and that is quite high for a speed goat or a deer. I can go to the deer mecca of CO every year for about $500.


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## alpinebowman (Sep 24, 2007)

And I just contributed by sending 3 emails.


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## MWScott72 (May 23, 2011)

Packout said:


> Makes me think fishing and bird hunting looks more attractive than Big Game Tag hunting......
> ...


This ^^^^! The way things are moving, I will be hunting alot more waterfowl in years to come. If states can't figure out how NOT to screw NRs, they won't get any support from me (which really bums me out because I think WY is a great state, and I have enjoyed hunting there immensely off and on the past 15 years).

Pretty soon, only the choice few will be able to hunt big game outside their own states' borders. Glad I got a lifetime license in OK. Between that and Utah, I will make things work. Only wish I hadn't invested 13 years in elk points in WY. Once those are burned, I won't be going back to the well a second time.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

toasty said:


> I'll be watching this closely as the kids and I have a a few pts and if this passes, I am probably going stop putting in. How will this affect antelope where residents pretty much get a tag every year? Will it will take a lot longer for non resident to draw?


Yes, it will take nonresidents longer to draw.

There are no preference points for WY Resident Antelope. It is the luck of the computer draw. Some WY residents may get certain doe tags every year, but many like myself may go 5, 6, 7 years without drawing a buck (type 1) tag. Some may be lucky enough to draw Type 1 tags a number of years in a row.


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## CPAjeff (Dec 20, 2014)

alpinebowman said:


> CPA, the problem is that they also charge you $50 for just a point for deer and antelope. do that for even a low end 6 or 7 point unit and you are paying $700 for the tag. With the price increase it goes up to a grand and that is quite high for a speed goat or a deer. I can go to the deer mecca of CO every year for about $500.


For me, it's not about the money, it's about the experience. Hell, a person can't take their money with them . . . the Egyptians tried and we are still robbing their tombs.

I'd gladly continue to get points every year in Wyoming for the species I want to hunt.


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## MWScott72 (May 23, 2011)

CPAjeff said:


> alpinebowman said:
> 
> 
> > CPA, the problem is that they also charge you $50 for just a point for deer and antelope. do that for even a low end 6 or 7 point unit and you are paying $700 for the tag. With the price increase it goes up to a grand and that is quite high for a speed goat or a deer. I can go to the deer mecca of CO every year for about $500.
> ...


Problem being Jeff that if you can't draw a tag but once every blue moon, it's hard to have those experiences.


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## Steve G (Nov 29, 2016)

Guess I'll just have to move to Wyoming so I can hunt my own land.


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## CPAjeff (Dec 20, 2014)

MWScott72 said:


> Problem being Jeff that if you can't draw a tag but once every blue moon, it's hard to have those experiences.


I completely agree with you ^^^. My response to Alpine was about the money aspect of it.

Sure, if this bill passes, it'll be a major kick in the huevos for the nonresident hunting crowd and for some outfitters. But, it'll be a huge win for the resident hunting crowd. I don't know a whole lot of folks that call Wyoming home, but they should have better, and more, hunting opportunities than those that don't call it home.

No matter which side of the coin a person is on, there are pros and cons.


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## Packout (Nov 20, 2007)

The Bill failed in Committee. BUT- it will be back and isn't going away. So if you have points in WY as a non-resident then you have 2 years to spend them. At least that is how I see it.

All who I watched testify in favor of the Bill mislead the committee with their testimony. Kind of sad to watch. I think they would have got it thru if they had stuck to sheep, mtn goat, grizzly, bison, and moose.

.


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## DallanC (Jan 13, 2009)

Steve G said:


> Guess I'll just have to move to Wyoming so I can hunt my own land.


About 12 years ago I was taking a serious look at land around Sheridan. That land is now probably 3x in price what it was then.

-DallanC


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## turkinator (May 25, 2008)

If this passes will it take effect this year?


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## weaversamuel76 (Feb 16, 2017)

Its dead and going back down for more input from wildlife committee

Sent from my moto z3 using Tapatalk


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## MWScott72 (May 23, 2011)

What I have heard from several residents that they hate the random aspect of the tags that are allotted to residents. So this begs the question, if Wyoming residents hate the random aspect of drawing resident tags (sometimes taking several years to draw due to the randomness factor), then why don't they implement a bonus or preference point system so that there can be a little more certainty as to when they are going to draw a tag?

When non residents fund over 75% of your budget with the fees that they pay into the system, it makes no sense to punish them by trying to taking away tags, or maybe I should say take away too many tags. This doesn't even include the money that non residents put into Wyoming's economy to pay for everything else that is associated with a hunting trip to their state. While I agree that non residents should have an advantage over non residents in the tag drawings, don't they get that by having the vast majority of tags allotted to them?

I am glad that the current iteration of this bill did not get out of committee, but I can see something on the horizon that will likely be very unfavorable to non residents. So, as Packout said, I will start looking to burn my Elk Point's so that the system doesn't screw me out of 12 or 13 years worth of putting into it.

On a related note, do we know which legislators voted for and against?


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