By Lindy Browning | Contributing Writer. Rocky Mountain Voice
More than 300 residents from Garfield, Eagle and Pitkin Counties flocked recently to the New Hope Church in New Castle at the invitation of the Garfield County officials.
The purpose of the meeting was to allow them to hear more about the imminent release of up to 15 wolves that are being captured from British Columbia, Canada, and transplanted into their ranching and agricultural community in January 2025.
Elected officials in attendance included Garfield County Commissioners Mike Samson, John Martin, Tom Jankowski, former Commissioner Russell George, current state Sen. and newly-elected Commissioner Perry Will, newly-elected state Sen. Marc Catlin, and newly-elected U.S. Congressman Jeff Hurd, among others.
To say that the mood of the room was somber would be the understatement of the year. With passions running high and tension so thick that you could almost see it in the air; more than 80 people signed in to speak at the meeting it was clear that the attendees were there to send a strong message to their government officials, and to Colorado Parks and Wildlife employees. The message being sent to CPW and the governor was resoundingly, “We don’t want these wolves!”
Newly-elected Garfield County Commissioner Mike Samson opened the meeting by stating, “More than 80 people have signed up to speak and I don’t know how we are going to hear everyone. Please be considerate and respectful to each other.” Samson was referring to the fact that the meeting was only scheduled for two hours and that time was limited. He also didn’t want the employees of CPW blamed for what he and others say the governor and urban voters did.
Travis Black, the Northwest Regional Manager from CPW, gave a brief summary of the current and imminently planned capture and release of Canadian Wolves into the area. He went over what they had seen and experienced with the first release into Grand County and how that would inform the agency on management going forward.
As a part of that summary, people learned that of the original 10 wolves that were transplanted into Colorado, only seven are still alive, one of the females that had been active in the killing of livestock had been captured with four of her pups and has been held in captivity. With only seven wolves, the wolves had managed to travel into most of the counties north of Interstate 70. One female eventually crossed south of I-70 and is still in the area around Leadville.
Black continued talking about what factors into decisions concerning the locations that ultimately are selected for release.
“We have to locate the release on state-owned lands or on private land with an owner’s permission. We’re not really getting landowners in this area that want to have wolves on their property,” said Black, with an attempt at humor.
Then came this jaw-dropping statement: “We did not go through the federal NEPA process, so we can’t release the wolves on federal lands. The reason this is jaw-dropping is because they had just shown the area of travel across all of Northern Colorado and it was blatantly obvious that the wolves were interacting with federal lands.
Federal lands are regulated by federal agencies that lease that land in grazing allotments to livestock growers, and who should have been involved in the decision making due to the impacts to their leases. “It is not uncommon for wolves to travel 40 miles a day,” said CPW officials. With that statement, there was an audible intake of breath from the attendees.
He went on to say that the agency decided that the NEPA process would have been too expensive and taken too much time. He also said that they have to locate the wolves at least 60 miles from the Utah state line because if the wolves cross into Utah, the taxpayers of Colorado would also be saddled with the cost of sending CPW to Utah to trap and return the wolves to Colorado. They don’t want them going into Wyoming because, in Wyoming, wolves are not protected.
One of the people in the crowd said, “Garfield County voted 63 percent against the wolves, Eagle County voted 54 percent against them, and Pitkin County voted 64 percent for them. Why don’t you put them in Pitkin County, where they want them? The room exploded in applause.
Getting down to the nitty-gritty on locations, CPW confirmed that there are only a couple of places that they can release the Canadian wolves. The options are limited to Rifle Creek State Wildlife area, and Garfield Creek, both on the east side of Garfield County, where more than 65,000 people live.
There was quite a lot of discussion from CPW about making sure that the wolves were located where they had natural prey to eat. East Garfield County is home to large herds of deer and elk. Ironically, CPW is not only tasked to manage the voter-mandated wolf program, but they are also tasked to manage the other 903 species of wildlife in Colorado.
To that end, CPW told the group that they are currently using helicopters to count the numbers of deer and elk in Colorado to have a baseline number so they can see how wolves will impact the elk and deer herds.
If a person was to follow that to its logical end, knowing that wolves have decimated the elk and deer herds in other states, it stands to reason that as wolves eat the elk and deer, the number of hunting licenses available will be reduced to almost nothing when the goal of 150 wolves are achieved to satisfy the language of the statute.
In asking that question of one of the employees with CPW, whose name is being withheld by Rocky Mountain Voice given that other employees were fired for speaking out, the employee confirmed that was likely to be the result; hunting licenses would have to be reduced in order to preserve the elk and deer herds.
“The governor has given the middle finger to the West Slope of Colorado,” said Perry Will with passion. He went on to say that he had worn the uniform of the CPW for 40 years and that he does not hold the local field employees in any way responsible for this mess. He blames the ignorant urban voters, the governor and the out of state money that funded a campaign that he believes was deceitful to voters in 2020.
“I ran SB-255, concerning compensation to livestock owners, and it passed with 100 percent of the vote in the legislation. I also ran SB-256 (that prohibited the reintroduction of gray wolves unless the United States secretary of the interior promulgates rules making the gray wolf population a nonessential experimental population.) It passed with 70 percent of the legislators. Gov. Polis vetoed both of those bills,” said the Senator.
Congressman-elect Jeff Hurd appeared to be greatly moved by the testimony from the attendees and the disregard for federal law on the issue.
“I take federal law seriously. The translocations of these wolves need to follow federal law and go through the NEPA process. I think it’s not only appropriate, but necessary to pause this… I am going to stand with you on this,” he said. “Having said that, I have not been sworn into office yet, when I am, I will be talking with the Department of Interior and pushing to delist wolves under the Endangered Species Act.”
He told the audience that he needs their help and guidance in order for him to effectively help them.
“The best way is to provide me with fact-based and objective letters that help me persuasively engage with federal, state and local entities,” he said.
Sen. Marc Catlin said, “I’m sorry that science-based (wildlife management) has taken a back seat to politics. We are going to work for a pause.”
“We don’t want your stinking wolves in Garfield County,” said Commissioner Tom Jankowski, speaking for the group through the media presence at the meeting to Gov. Polis.
John Martin outgoing Garfield County Commissioner added, “You can’t be silent now, take all this passion and respectfully use your voice, write letters and make a difference. You can make a difference.”
Samson said the issue may need to be put back on the ballot, but that it will take a lot of money and it will take a Herculean effort to reverse Prop. 114.