Washington Forest Protection Association
Agriculture and Forestry Education Foundation program
February 4, 2004
Jeff Koenings, Director,
Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife

Agency Organization

The Department of Fish and Wildlife is the state's largest natural resource agency.

We are not a direct reporting agency, i.e. to the Governor, with agency oversight by a 9 member citizen Commission. Passage of Referendum 45 in 1995 vested responsibility for basic policy direction in the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission.

The nine-member Commission is appointed by the Governor, confirmed by Senate, and it is the Commission that appoints the Director.

The department has roughly 1,700 employees statewide, and the majority of these employees are assigned to three resource programs - Fish, Wildlife, and Habitat, and the Enforcement Program.

Besides Olympia, we have six regional offices throughout the state where a majority of our staff is located. Each region is under the direction of a Regional Director who reports to me. They are the policy leads in the region where we want decisions to be made that affect the regions fish and wildlife.

The department, along with the state's treaty tribes, co-manages the harvest and hatchery production of fish populations. Co-management principles are laid out in legal opinions such as US vs. Washington (Boldt decision) and US vs. Oregon (Baloney decision).

Scope of What We Do

The Department's roles and responsibilities include managing fish and wildlife populations and setting fishing and hunting seasons. We base our management decisions on a sound science-based framework.

We operate about 100 hatcheries statewide.

We enforce laws pertaining to fish and wildlife and their habitats.

We manage approximately one million acres of land for fish and wildlife.

We have "hydraulics authority:" we permit construction activities in waterways that might affect fish; and we have authority to protect bald eagle habitat.

We are the keepers of the state list of species of concern rare threatened and endangered fish and wildlife.

If you were to pick up the newspaper or turn on television news lately, you've probably read or seen that legislators this session are dealing with a number of issues affecting the Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Two issues are directly related to the earlier passage of statewide initiative ballot measures, which directly affected our management capabilities.

Cougar Management is one.

Furbearer Management (Trapping) is another.

Wildlife damage is a third issue.

Besides these issues, the Department is involved in a number of other important ongoing issues you've undoubtedly heard or read about.

One, of course, is wild salmon recovery.

A major priority of the Department right now is the writing of regional recovery plans for listed fish; e.g. the collaborative Puget Sound Shared Strategy.

We've reached a point where the proverbial petal has to hit the metal.

Recovery plans due to federal fisheries or NOAA in 18 months.

Chief priority of WDFW fisheries scientists is to work closely with all players - cities, counties, volunteer organizations and others - to craft watershed recovery plans by the deadline.

Plans have to account for all the 4H's ---hatchery, hydropower, habitat and harvest.

One key component to making sure all four H's are dealt with, specifically the habitat H, is the science-based Forests and Fish Agreement that the Department helped draft. We feel that this is a good agreement that will get better over time through adaptive management.

Other Department initiatives:

Hatchery Reform, an effort aimed at ensuring state, federal and tribal hatcheries meet dual mandate of wild salmon recovery and sustainable fisheries.

Hatchery scientific reform is an unprecedented initiative in terms of its collaborative nature and its foundation based on independent science conducted by the Hatchery Scientific Review Group.

The department also continues to make significant progress in its selective fisheries efforts, the cornerstone to successful recreational salmon fisheries in this century.

Since the 90s, the Department, through mass marking of hatchery fish, has created more than 50 recreational selective fisheries, thereby proving protection for weak wild runs and fishing opportunity on abundant wild stocks.

One last Department initiative I'll mention.

People don't often associate a natural resource agency with the economic health or economic growth of our state.

We're trying to convince people otherwise.

The department is working with both public and private entities to secure and hopefully expand the economic opportunities created by recreational fishing, hunting and wildlife viewing.

Fishing, hunting and wildlife viewing are big business in Washington State - when you add it all up, they generated $2.18 billion in spending in 2001, according to federal figures.

A lot of this spending occurred in our economically challenged rural communities, where the activities took place.

The department, under the direction of the legislators, recently completed, with help from the state Department of Community Trade and Economic Development, a strategic plan to increase economic opportunities in rural areas associated with wildlife viewing. And we think that this has incredible promise.

Finally I hope to expand our activities and with Doug and Linda establish a new public-private partnership in natural resource education through the schools called the Pacific Education Institute.

I feel education emphasizing natural resource science and management is critical to future decision makers. The Institute grounded in both the natural sciences and successful learning methods, emphasizing full research, is the best place to reinvent conservation education.

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