Privatization kills both Resident and Nonresident DIY hunting opportunity

[bulldawg10]

I think this sounds fair. Keep the outfitter tags in the draw so anyone can draw them. I'd like to see it a straight 90/10 split with the rules above.

Why? If you eliminate Unit wide you lose access to almost 600,000 acres of Private land that is currently available to the public, and who knows how much access to public lands by way of unit wide ranches and properties. In the draw, NM residents do get approximately 90/10 split already (of draw tags). Non-residents can't draw a cow or WMAs. When you put that back into the equation, residents are already getting about 90% of the draw opportunities.

And why would you want to limit non-resident land owners too? You eliminate any incentive for them to come into the state, their focus is almost certainly on elk, and they are going to do many habitat improvement to be able to get elk tags. Which benefits every elk hunter, and hunters of any species that use that landowner created resource.

I bet the vast majority of non-resident land owners are doing more for elk and elk hunting than the vast majority of New Mexicans that are just entering the draw and contribute nothing else.

 

[sjl2012]

Wildlife in Arizona is not privatized. Access to real property, is a right that comes with owning real property, and property owners get to determine who has access, and can charge accordingly. That is like one of the basic fundamental principles of our nation. It is entirely different than the idea that wildlife can be bought and sold by private individuals for financial gain, because wildlife is a public trust resource, and not a real property right.


In addition to that, almost all of the good hunting in Arizona is on public land, with the exception of a large ranch in one of the limited opportunity bundle units and a couple smaller ranches in unit 10. There’s also the private big Bo Ranch that offers public access for damn near free.

I didn't say wildlife was privatized, just the ranch that it's on. And the people that have access to it pay handsomely for it at times. That's the point entirely, if you put tags in the general draw and don't designate them as "private land only" then the management of the elk herds that live on those private ranches becomes extremely difficult and even more expensive than it already is in NM. Look at the North Central portion of the state(NM), how do you manage that without a designated draw or vouchers? The majority of the eplus tags go into the units that have vast amounts of private property. If you put 1000 tags in a unit is mostly private and only a handful of people draw that can afford to pay to hunt on private what do you do? Do you overhunt the public in that unit, if there is any?

That second comment is why eplus exists, there's no comparison between Arizona and New Mexico between private/public elk habitat, unless you include the reservations and we all know they just give those tags away in both states to poor locals only. It's because there is a large percentage of privately owned elk habitat in New Mexico and by issuing the vouchers to the landowners they can at least attempt to manage the elk populations, which I think they do a good job of for the most part. Is there corruption in it, name something that doesn't have corruption in it.

 

[ImBillT]

In NM land owners get authorizations they can sell, and for the most part they don’t kill elk or ask to have them eliminated.

In AZ land owners get nothing out of having elk on their property, and as a result elk are being essentially eliminated from unit 3A. I noticed some 3A only tags last year, as well as a portion of 3A going OTC. This year they added more 3A only tags, and opened almost the entirety of 3A to OTC hunting. I called and spoke with a game manager and he said that private land owners have been asking for relief from the elk. They conducted a small population management hunt last winter, and added 3A only tags, but the land owners were still not happy, so this January they ran 150 hunters on a population management hunt that had over 60% harvest success, and another 150 in February. March 1st it goes unlimited OTC. The game manager told me “by the time the draw tags for 3A start there will be no more elk in 3A. I advocated not to put them in the draw, but they were added via contract before AZGF decided to resort to the population management hunt and cannot legally be removed from the draw”. 3A has a TON of public land in it. It’s about to have 0 elk though. My guess is that if you gave those AZ land owners(there primarily two in 3A) some tags they could sell, as long as they allowed the public to have access if they draw a tag, those land owners would be much more tolerant of the elk.

Anyone who thinks that AZ not giving landowners any form of tags is resulting in 100% positives for hunters with 0 downside is flat wrong. There are problems with E-PLUS, but eliminating it will only result in hundreds of thousands of acres that just don’t get hunted. NM will still hand out about 30,000 elk tags in the draw. The private tags will not suddenly become available in the draw. A very high percentage of them will just go away because the same landowners that lock the public out today, will lock the public out when E-PLUS goes away.

 

[The Hedgehog]

hardly any non-resident permits in NM. I applied for antelope, with about a 1% draw odds. Nice there's no point scheme, but it's still all but a waste of damn money.

 

[ImBillT]

That's an interesting take on equal opportunity.

If I were a New Mexican, I would be pretty sour at such a viewpoint. Equal opportunity should apply to the beneficiaries(New Mexicans) of the Trust( New Mexico's Wildlife). Not the beneficiaries + the rest of the United States of America. At that point, the trustees have implemented a system that fails the beneficiaries in my mind.

It does apply to the beneficiaries of the trust. The landowner is usually a resident, and thus a beneficiary. He also pays much more of the cost of having wildlife than someone living in town. Then, if the tag is sold to a non-resident, not only did it benefit the landowner(a beneficiary of the public trust) but it benefits all NM residents by funding NMGF at a level of roughly 10X what it would have if a resident had purchased the tag.

Landowners are beneficiaries of the public trust(if they are residents), and funding NMGF benefits the beneficiaries of the public trust. Selling tags to non-residents is not a violation of the public trust doctrine. That said, it is the beneficiaries(residents in this case) who hold the trustees to account, and thus the trustees should manage it in a way that is satisfactory to the beneficiaries.

 

[David58]

Wildlife in Arizona is not privatized. Access to real property, is a right that comes with owning real property, and property owners get to determine who has access, and can charge accordingly. That is like one of the basic fundamental principles of our nation. It is entirely different than the idea that wildlife can be bought and sold by private individuals for financial gain, because wildlife is a public trust resource, and not a real property right.


In addition to that, almost all of the good hunting in Arizona is on public land, with the exception of a large ranch in one of the limited opportunity bundle units and a couple smaller ranches in unit 10. There’s also the private big Bo Ranch that offers public access for damn near free.

Well put. NM is allowing landowners to in effect sell elk.

David
NM

 

[David58]

I'm not making your point though...Nobody is trying to take tags from the NM Draw and give to landowners to sell. We are talking about an entirely different system. The NM authorizations are essentially the right to hunt elk on that private land, derived from the habitat and herd numbers that use private lands. The authorizations that landowners can sell are essentially trespass fees.

And in the event they are Unit Wide, that means the private land is open to the public, which is every elk hunter with a tag in the unit. That's better than the select few that otherwise would have permission only thru a trespass fee. This also increases access to more public lands too.

The incentive improvements of private lands have increased elk numbers to allow for public land tags to expand as well.

So, if the tags are basically the equivalent of trespass fee, why not simply put the LO tags back into the draw, and then the landowners charge their $2-10K for access? That would be a win-win, right?

The key to this is that the State trumpets the high percentage of tags going to residents, where just right at half of the tags go to landowners, and 75% of those go out of state. That means that almost, but not quite, almost 50% of elk tags in NM go into the hands of nonresidents. As you have correctly stated, more money into the coffers, but in a state as corrupt as NM, the key words are "more money."

NM resident hunters should have the same opportunity to draw a tag as residents in CO, or AZ, or other western states. You can make all the arguments that you want, but in the end it is about being able to continue the collusion with all those folks that are making bank off of this unethical program.

Are you a NM resident, bulldawg87?

David
NM

 

[CowboyLeroy]

There's some real mouth breathers in this thread

 

[Nameless Range]

It does apply to the beneficiaries of the trust. The landowner is usually a resident, and thus a beneficiary.

Landowners who benefit from privatized elk are a small subset of the beneficiaries, relative to the whole.

 

[rogerthat]

There's some real mouth breathers in this thread

Go on

 

[CowboyLeroy]

Go on

Kings deer

 

[belshawelk]

I give my tags away to folks that deserve it. From the no mola ranch. Rancho No Denero! LOL

same here. Last 4 years I took new hunters that have never seen an elk let alone harvested. took some youth that have never seen elk. I have never sold a single tag. I get asked all the time to rent it out for hunting. I have only spent money on my land, never taken a dime. Its my reward for working my ass of and I enjoy sharing with others.

 

[ImBillT]

Landowners who benefit from privatized elk are a small subset of the beneficiaries, relative to the whole.

But they are still beneficiaries, and thus when people make claims that giving land owners tags that could possibly be sold to a non-resident does not benefit the beneficiaries of the trust it is completely incorrect(not to mention the tag can just as easily be given or sold to a resident). Furthermore, the land owner(still a beneficiary) incurs in a disproportionate cost to having wildlife. It’s easy for someone who owns no land to desire and lobby for wildlife at very little expense, but the person trying to make a living by farming or ranching often times incurs very significant and very real cost. To claim that he must incur disproportionate cost, and yet receive equal benefit is not making landowners any more friendly toward wildlife, hunting or public access.

 

[ImBillT]

NM resident hunters should have the same opportunity to draw a tag as residents in CO, or AZ, or other western states. You can make all the arguments that you want, but in the end it is about being able to continue the collusion with all those folks that are making bank off of this unethical program.

That’s a great sentiment, but reality isn’t as pretty a picture.

AZ residents don’t get nearly the access to draw tags that NM residents do. Sure they get a higher percentage, but the total number is substantially lower. AZ is also not the shining light of elk management it’s being touted as. They are currently eliminating elk in a unit that is 30% public land, and mostly checkerboard. They’re eliminating them because of landowner intolerance. I suspect that landowner intolerance could easily be cured by allowing the landowners to sell some tags.

CO is dramatically more generous to non-residents than NM in the draw, and it’s only the private land authorizations that skew the numbers toward non-residents in NM. The state doesn’t say the authorizations should go to NR’s. Most of that is a result of outfitters, most of whom are NM residents themselves. CO can afford to be more generous, because they have more elk. I’m not sure where to find residence information on OTC sales, but I bet CO is closer to NM in total tag% to residents. CO gives 20% landowner preference(which can be sold just like E-PLUS authorizations) and 35% to non-residents in most draw units, for up to 55% of tags going to non-residents, and that doesn’t even account for OTC.

If NM does away with E-PLUS, most of those tags aren’t going into the draw. Most of them will simply go away. The land owners who currently lock the public out will continue to do so, and some who currently allow the public in, will lock the public out. You won’t be seeing a huge increase in tags. You’ll just be urinating on land owners because you don’t like them getting tags. The first question leads me to a second. Were the tags that are currently in E-PLUS ever in the public draw? Did the number of tags in the draw ever go down when E-PLUS was instituted? If not, then what are we arguing about?


I do not own land, and likely never will have the means to do so. I hunt on private land entirely out of the generosity of land owners who have allowed me to do so. I do not pay for access. I have knocked a lot of doors and chased a lot of tractors, and have been blessed with access(in more than one state by the way) to good hunting spots without paying any money for access. I’m in favor of maintaining public land and public access and I’m especially in favor of increase public access to land locked land. I do not like the monetization of wildlife, but I’m not 100% against it because I do see the cost of having wildlife. When a landowner incurs a cost to having wildlife, and see no benefit, good things are not on the horizon. I try to be generous, and give to others, and I like to think that if I owned land I would behave as @hank4elk or @belshawelk, but I’m not going impose such behavior upon others, even if I wish that all landowners would behave that way.

 

[Nameless Range]

But they are still beneficiaries, and thus when people make claims that giving land owners tags that could possibly be sold to a non-resident does not benefit the beneficiaries of the trust it is completely incorrect(not to mention the tag can just as easily be given or sold to a resident).

Trustees making decisions that disproportionately benefit a very small subset of the beneficiaries is a failure the trustees' role. In New Mexico's case, it sure looks like a deeply unbalanced distribution of trust assets. We could get into the minutia of the disproportionate cost they incur in very specific instances and certainly not broadly, but from the Trust's perspective I think @abqbw has made a very solid case that the vast majority of the beneficiaries are being hosed relative to the cost, or let's be real, benefit, landowners abide.


Like I have said before, equal allocation in the drawing process is the crux. As time goes on, and New Mexicans have more and more Americans to compete with to aquire LO-generated tags, less New Mexican's will have a proportional access to their trust assets relative to folks who aren't even beneficiaries. That's sad.

 

[Big Fin]

Trustees making decisions that disproportionately benefit a very small subset of the beneficiaries is a failure the trustees' role.

^^^This. A beneficiary inures nothing from the trust on account of any preferred standing. Every beneficiary is treated equally for purposes of trust benefit. The latin phrase is Cestui Que Trust, meaning equal in benefit.

The Trustees can/should enter into transactions to improve the trust assets. Those transactions can be with beneficiaries of the trust, but are not a function of that person's standing as a beneficiary. Whatever value comes from those deals is due to the value each party brings to the transaction.

Most land is held in a corporation or an LLC. Those entities are not public trust beneficiaries. Many want to conflate being a landowner or an owner of an entity that holds land, as being a beneficiary. Thus is not the case.

 

[hank4elk]

Take the tags.

You can double the tags ,and hunt on less lands. Like 40% out of 60% of the private.
It will still not benefit NM residents on the whole. Or elk.
Make it 90/10 like before and NM residents will still loose.
Because G&F will loose and therefore be in remiss as a executor of the TRUST. Lost funds.

Sorry.
I'm just a poor old retired guy but, NM residents are just too cheap. Entitled is what I call it.
Step up or shut up. Provide a alternative that is realistic.

 

[schmalts]

The UW wide tag situation in NM is out of control. Guys with a 20 acre field getting bull tags to sell. Outfitters making deals to buy most of them up when they already have the garbage guided draw pool that gets more tags than someone who needs no babysitter. The prices pushed the average guy out of buying them. Draw odds in the regular draw would go up if they were all put back in the draw pool. It's not good for resident hunters or nonguided NR that want to go on a lighter budget.

 

[TheTone]

My offer still stands to any landowner completely overburdened by having a ranch and having to put up with the horrible wildlife that I can trade them my quarter acre city lot devoid of wildlife except songbirds and the occasional raccoon

 

[bulldawg10]

That’s a great sentiment, but reality isn’t as pretty a picture.

AZ residents don’t get nearly the access to draw tags that NM residents do. Sure they get a higher percentage, but the total number is substantially lower. AZ is also not the shining light of elk management it’s being touted as. They are currently eliminating elk in a unit that is 30% public land, and mostly checkerboard. They’re eliminating them because of landowner intolerance. I suspect that landowner intolerance could easily be cured by allowing the landowners to sell some tags.

CO is dramatically more generous to non-residents than NM in the draw, and it’s only the private land authorizations that skew the numbers toward non-residents in NM. The state doesn’t say the authorizations should go to NR’s. Most of that is a result of outfitters, most of whom are NM residents themselves. CO can afford to be more generous, because they have more elk. I’m not sure where to find residence information on OTC sales, but I bet CO is closer to NM in total tag% to residents. CO gives 20% landowner preference(which can be sold just like E-PLUS authorizations) and 35% to non-residents in most draw units, for up to 55% of tags going to non-residents, and that doesn’t even account for OTC.

If NM does away with E-PLUS, most of those tags aren’t going into the draw. Most of them will simply go away. The land owners who currently lock the public out will continue to do so, and some who currently allow the public in, will lock the public out. You won’t be seeing a huge increase in tags. You’ll just be urinating on land owners because you don’t like them getting tags. The first question leads me to a second. Were the tags that are currently in E-PLUS ever in the public draw? Did the number of tags in the draw ever go down when E-PLUS was instituted? If not, then what are we arguing about?


I do not own land, and likely never will have the means to do so. I hunt on private land entirely out of the generosity of land owners who have allowed me to do so. I do not pay for access. I have knocked a lot of doors and chased a lot of tractors, and have been blessed with access(in more than one state by the way) to good hunting spots without paying any money for access. I’m in favor of maintaining public land and public access and I’m especially in favor of increase public access to land locked land. I do not like the monetization of wildlife, but I’m not 100% against it because I do see the cost of having wildlife. When a landowner incurs a cost to having wildlife, and see no benefit, good things are not on the horizon. I try to be generous, and give to others, and I like to think that if I owned land I would behave as @hank4elk or @belshawelk, but I’m not going impose such behavior upon others, even if I wish that all landowners would behave that way.

Great take, also the EPLUS program encourages the opening of private lands with the exchange of access for public, with unit wide designations. Which is more land for everyone with a tag, and more access to public by way of private lands.

The answer is no, those tags didn't come from the draw and the habitat improvements of landowners have ADDED a lot of the tags to the public draw by supporting drastically larger elk herds, which filter in to public too. Every member of the public benefits, and the elk benefit and all other wildlife benefit from the landowner program as it is....by providing value to the elk, for landowners

That's why Arizona doesn't have more tags as you mentioned.