How the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation Sold Out
Submitted by Ted Williams on Fri, 08/31/2012 - 16:19.
My friend Dave writes:
Here we go! Finally, other voices are joining Don Thomas, myself and a handful of others in decrying what has become of RMEF. As Stalling notes below, the trouble started back in 2000. Prior to that point I was the number-one freelance contributor to Bugle, the RMEF’s then-superb magazine; not necessarily in quality but certainly in quantity, in that I’d contributed more than 50 articles over the years and put together a special Colorado edition for Bugle. Then they hired one J. Dart as CEO, who was sitting director of Safari Club International, the “sportsmen’s” group that gives its members awards for executing caged wildlife, whose mascot is Ted Nugent, and and whose leaders seem frequently, like Nugent, to have real problems obeying basic wildlife laws. For that smart move, firing the leaders who made the group great and replacing them with Dart and cronies, we must thank the then-RMEF board of directors. And there the changes began. For one, the Bugle editor, Dan Crockett, was directed to “get rid of the voodoo and get more blood on the pages.” That “voodoo” was the thoughtful articles on hunting ethics and wildlife management that I, Dave Stalling and many others had long contributed. I knew then I was on the way out “by mutual agreement.” But what broke the wapiti’s back was when Dart accepted Bush Jr.’s invite to a select right-leaning collection of “sportsmen group leaders” to visit at the Texas ranch for a “sportsmen’s weekend” PR event intended to counter the major criticism the Bush regime was getting from legitimate sportsmen’s groups for his rape-and-run approach to opening prime public-lands wildlife habitat to gas and oil development, and other anti-environment, anti-wildlife, anti-sportsmen policies. Dart’s weak and warped ego (as proven by his association with SCI), of course, basked in this public light then came home to Missoula and wrote a glowing report on his weekend with his buddy Bush that came extremely close to saying “RMEF endorses Bush for re-election,” which of course is what the big weekend in Texas was all about. Soon after, the same letter appeared in Bugle. That’s when I walked away, kicking and cursing, sending an open letter to Dart (and everyone else I could think of) that began: “Dart, you arrogant ass” and got less polite from there. Still today I catch static from people who say I overstepped the bounds of civility. My response is that when dealing with bottom-feeding scum-suckers like Dart et al., civility is not an issue. But if I had it to do again I would have filed a complaint with the IRS that RMEF, via Dart’s overt endorsement of Bush to the groups’ members, breached the restrictions placed on 50lc(3) nonprofit groups. Now, it appears, RMEF is in bed with the anti-predator, pay-to-hunt, Palin-palled Sportsmen for Wildlife, which in turn is in bed with SCI, all in the same big brown swirling toilet bowl. If you are a member I encourage you to quit in protest ... and tell your friends to do the same. This group has now had 12 years to try and correct its mistakes, but instead continues to float itself deeper into the sewers.
And this from another friend named Dave:
STALLING: Once proud group has lost its way
Published on August 30, 2012 by DAVE STALLING 0 0 
Recently, the family of Olaus J. Murie demanded that the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation cancel the organization’s Olaus J. Murie Award. The surprising reason? The foundation’s “all-out war against wolves is anathema to the entire Murie family.”
I sympathize with the family’s position for several reasons. In 1999, while working for the Elk Foundation, I created the Olaus J. Murie Award, with the coordination and the approval of the Murie family. The award recognized scientists working on behalf of elk and elk habitat and was given in the name of Olaus J. Murie because he is widely considered the “father” of modern elk research.
Murie, who did groundbreaking work at the National Elk Refuge in Jackson Hole, Wyo., in the 1940s, also wrote Elk of North America, the first comprehensive and scientific treatise on elk and elk management.
During most of its 28-year history, the Elk Foundation and its more than 185,000 members, who are primarily hunters, avoided controversy. Instead, the group focused on its mission: “To ensure the future of elk, other wildlife and their habitat.” Most of the foundation’s leaders had solid backgrounds in wildlife biology, ecology and wildlife management, and they resisted the occasional pressure from hunters to get involved in issues such as gun rights or wolf reintroduction.
“We are not a hunting organization supporting conservation; we are a conservation organization supported by hunters,” former foundation director Gary Wolfe used to say.
But starting in 2000, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation’s board of directors changed, many staff members were fired, and the nonprofit group went through a string of short-term directors.
Then in 2007, the foundation board hired David Allen, a former marketer for NASCAR and the Pro Rodeo Cowboys Association, as its director.
At first, it seemed that Allen would follow a path similar to former leaders.
“We are not a hunting club. We don’t intend to be a hunting club. We are a membership organization that has an overwhelming number of hunters … but we’re not doing wildlife conservation to improve our hunting,” Allen said when he took on the job.
That approach did not last long.
“Wolf reintroduction is the worst ecological disaster since the decimation of bison herds,” Allen said recently, as he claimed that wolves are “decimating” and “annihilating” elk herds. “To keep wolf populations controlled, states will have to hold hunts, shoot wolves from the air and gas their dens,” he said.
When asked about the utility of predator-prey relationships, Allen explained, “Natural balance is a Walt Disney movie. It isn’t real.” Under his leadership, the Elk Foundation recently offered the state of Montana $50,000 to contract with the federal Wildlife Services agency to “aggressively” kill more wolves. “And the next step is the grizzly bear,” he said. “We’ve got bear issues with elk calves in the spring — both grizzly and black bear. We can’t have all these predators with little aggressive management and expect to have ample game herds, and sell hunting tags and generate revenue.”
This approach has not gone over well with some conservationists.
Ralph Maughan, director of the Western Watersheds Project and the Wolf Recovery Foundation, said that foundation director “Allen has not only taken a strongly anti-wolf position, but he has done it taking an ‘in your face’ way to traditional conservation organizations such as those supported by Olaus Murie, which he now calls ‘extremist.’
“Allen has also expressed contempt for many of the concepts of ecology, as he seems to be moving the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation toward a single species, single value of elk (hunting) approach.”
There has been a lot of good, solid research on elk and wolf interactions, some of it funded by the Elk Foundation in years past. Most of it that shows that when wolves are restored to an ecosystem, both habitat and elk herds improve. Allen’s claims are not backed by science.
“Mr. Allen and his anti-wolf rhetoric has alienated him and his organization from many of the very organizations that have helped the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation — in subtle and profound ways — garner the successes it has over the years,” said Bob Ferris, a 30-year wildlife researcher who was involved in bringing wolves back to the Yellowstone ecosystem.
The family of Olaus J. Murie, the “father” of modern elk research and management, agrees with these criticisms. A foundation that once understood the complex relationship between elk and wolves has succumbed to the pressures of hunters who don’t like wolves.
———
Dave Stalling is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). He is an elk hunter, fisherman and wildlife conservationist and lives in Missoula, Montana.
The RMEF continues to
The RMEF continues to believe states have the federally-approved duty to manage wolves just like they do elk, deer, lions, bears and other wildlife. Today that list of states grew to include Wyoming.
It's too bad Mr Stalling and your friend "Dave" lost their jobs. I trust they were both well to do and didn't feel any financial pinch. Mr. Dart whom they seemed to dislike is gone. I too disliked former President Bush, but I disassociate my feelings for him from my thoughts on sustainable wildlife policy. The president today is Barack Obama.
Likewise there is a new Director of the RMEF named David Allen. I'm unaware of Mr Allen's politics and as far as elk and wolves and the Rocky Mountains it's irrelevant. Mr Allen probably better represents the many members of the RMEF than previous directors did. Mr. Allen also seems to get along well with the members of the current Obama administration who direct agencies that might affect elk populations in the US, good for him. I suspect a lot of the bleating I hear from Ms Stalling and others is simple jealousy. A better man heads the org they wanted to, a better man talks to Salazar and USFWS on a regular basis on issues elk and issues wolf.
Also.... Mr Allen heads an org that is truly conservation orientated. They conserve habitat, they conserve species. Six million acres to date.
In the above quoted text it speaks of conservation groups Ralph Maugham is not a conservationist, he heads a radical animal rights anti hunting environmental group. Simply look at his web site Wildlife News, they hate hunters with a passion.
I have to wonder the motivation of people who slander someone who took the job they wanted. Maybe more than simple envy, I'd have to read some of the 50 articles friend "Dave" penned. Did they make some very wrong predictions on elk and wolves?
Olaus Murie has passed on, he was a great man. Trying to sanctify a political position by enlisting his progeny to with hold their stamp of approval is silly.
Level of the NRA
Thank anon: Nothing you have written gainsays what my friends have written. The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation has descended to the level of the NRA--i.e., lower than whale scat. Kill the wolves. Really! This is 2012. Hello!!! Your definition of “conservation”-- killing off predators to make game is a bit outdated. Like the 1920s. It didn’t work then; and it doesn’t work now. I do read Ralph’s web site. Spot on. He understands what the Inuit understand--that the wolf make the caribou [elk] strong.” The RMEF used to get that before it got body snatched.
Yet the primary mission remains in focus
I also disagree with RMEF with respect to some of these issues, but in the end, I view things such as their stance on wolves as peripheral. The primary mission of the Foundation is to preserve elk habitat, and they continue to execute that mission very well. For hunters such as myself, who primarily pursue game on public land and don't pay for--and would not wish to pay for--high-cost ranch hunts which take a lot of the challenge and "hunt" out of hunting, the "main enemy" is the real estate developer who breaks up migration corridors, destroys winter range and impedes public access. The Elk Foundation's consistent success in helping to acquire land and bring it permanently into the public domain is reason enough to overlook any transient silliness about wolves, etc. Yes, I liked the "old" RMEF a little better, but I still support the current incarnation, just because the effort to set aside important habitat continues unabated. Unfortunately, as I age I learn that most organizations stray a bit from their ideals--with some straying more than others--and RMEF is no exception to that rule. Notions of "hunters rights" and "anglers rights" are corrupting more than one once-admirable organization. But so long as it continues to keep some important habitat out of the developers' hands, I believe that it is worthy of support.
Image
Trashing the Earth and the Truth
http://www.hcn.org/issues/40.23/trashing-the-earth-and-the-truth/article_view?b_start:int=0&-C=
Maybe it's wishful thinking
I keep hoping that things like the wolf issue will eventually settle out, and that sportsmen will be rational about conservation/environmental issues again. But to be fair to RMEF, in the past few years I've seen a number of organizations pander to the least common denominator in their membership, probably in response to the increased difficulty in getting membership renewals in these economically troubled times. I keep hoping that, as times get better, rationality will return.
Pandering
Yes, indeed. The RMEF has no corner on that.
Muries and RMEF
As one of the main drivers behind the Murie letter to RMEF, I thank Ted and Dave for writing their pieces. In my view as a hunter, conservationist, and wildlife biologist this is all by way of an intervention. Our hope being that RMEF returns to path that relies on sound science and an ethical philosophy. Given where they are now, this will be a difficult and painful task, but one that is absolutely necessary. Unfortunately, their board and current leadership might not truly understand their peril because it is not reflected in their bottom-line, but it will be.
Thanks,
Bob Ferris
Executive Director
Cascadia Wildlands
Please see and the associated links for more details:
http://www.cascwild.org/muries-rebuke-elk-foundati...
http://www.cascwild.org/rocky-mountain-elk-foundat...
Well said, Bob
Thanks Bob. I recall when the RMEF gave $100,000 annually to what was then called the Wildlife Legislative Fund of America (now the U.S. Sportsman's Alliance)--a wise-use front that could be counted on to be on the wrong side of every environmental issue. They're the sorry outfit that intimidated Outdoor Life into spiking bear biologist Tom Beck's op-ed on bear baiting even though they hadn't read it. That caused the editor and assistant editor of Outdoor Life to quit in disgust and me to stop writing for that rag. This was in the 1990s, so any "return" on the part of the RMEF will have to go WAY back.
NRSA
Yes, way back 16 or 17 years ago when I was with Defenders of Wildlife (which for the millionth time is not an anti-hunting group) and we all worked together on the Natural Resources Summit of America. That effort--sponsored largely by BASS Masters--formed when Gingrich came into power and all of us knew we had to work together or all was lost. (I think you and I interacted some at that point on the mute swan issue or perhaps on Yellowstone bison.) I certainly miss those days when all of us in the collective conservation and environmental communities came together to talk about issues and looked at the science rather than the politics. Wedges have been purposely driven between the various elements so we fight over wolves rather than deal with more important and wildlife-damaging issues such as public lands grazing, climate change, coal/LNG exports, and fish farming/GMO fish. Hopefully, we can realize that we face the same peril that we did in the mid-1990s and find a way to talk and work together again.
Of Course
Yes, Bob. I remember well. And I appreciate all the help you gave me in those days. I used to write for Defenders as a freelancer in the days of Frank Sartwell. I have spent 40 years trying to convince people Defenders isn't anti-hunting. Try to tell that the the RMEF. I do wish my friends at Defenders would admit that the gray wolf is recovered so we can spend energy and money on species that really may go extinct.
It would be easier if enviros didn't give the idiots excuses
As Ted once wrote in "Guns and Greens" and as I've said on numerous occasions, enviros and sportsmen should be natural allies. Enviros want an abundance of life, and hunting and fishing are a lot more fun when you're not seeking your quarry in a near-empty forest or dead sea.
However, there are those, usually who have some economic skin in the game, who are willing to see natural resources dwindle in the long term in order to derive some short-term profit. Such folks, who often seem to lead unemployed or underemployed minions who have nothing better to do than spend hours on various internet chatboards spewing their particular brand of venom, see it in their interest to drive wedges between anglers and hunters on one hand and enviros on the other. Unfortunately, the enviros make the idiots' job easy by being entirely tone-deaf to the way their actions will play out with sportsmen.
We saw this in the wolf debate, where unneeded lawsuits were filed by various groups who claimed a place under the broad enviro banner, which sought to delay or prevent the management of what, based on all of the hard data, was a recovered species that could safely be subject to regulated sport hunting. The suits accomplished little, got a Congress already generally hostile to conservation initiatives involved in species-specific legislation and played right into the hands of those who wanted to drive a wedge bwetween hunters and mainstream conservation groups.
I'm more involved in marine fisheries management, and you see this sort of thing happen all the time in that arena. Marine protected areas are probably the greatest example; perhaps in some situations, complete harvest situations may be justified, but in most cases here in the United States, the need is to protect some variety of long-lived, low-fedundity groundfish, yet the first thing you hear from the enviros is that all fishing, including angling for pelagic species that quickly transit the closed areas and are caught higher in the water column than the groundfish ever venture, must be prohibited. Such efforts make it easy for the demagogues in the angling community to argue that "Enviros are trying to end sport fishing and keep you off the water," and those arguments ring true to a lot of people, based just on what they see in front of their face, and another wedge is successfully driven home.
I'm a hunter and an angler, and one of those folks who agrees with the west coast sportswriter who said that in these times, "a sportsman who is not also an environmentalist is a fool." However, I also believe that any environmentalist who believes that his or her goals can be met without the active support of sportsmen--or worse, in the face of their active opposition--is also a fool. It would be hard to find any major environmental initiative that succeeded at the national level without the sportsmen's support, and in these more fractious times, the need for some unity between the groups is even more important. Enviros can't afford to just say, "You know where to find us if you want to talk," and sit in their ivory towers pushing blindly ahead with the faith that they have truth and right on their side. They must reach out to sportsmen with a truly sympathetic ear, and do their best to reach a compromise that will leave ecosystems intact while recognizing the fact that humans evolved on this planet and, as predator and sometimes as prey, are a part of those ecosystems, and not some sort of alien invader. And sportsmen have to realize that bag limits, size limits and seasons are here to stay, that the way it was in 1980 probably caused a lot of the problems that we have today, and that the way things were done in the past is not going to be resurrected--which is probably a good thing.
Because if enviros and sportsmen aren't willing to make some allowances for each other and work together toward those points they can agree on, the idiots are going to take advantage of the rift and take over, and only the developers, drillers and such ilk are going to like the results.
10-4
I can’t disagree with a thing you’ve written, Charlie. There is as much disparity in the enviro ranks as in the sportsmen ranks. The difference between radical, counterproductive outfits like the Center for Biological Diversity and, say, the National Wildlife Federation is the difference between the NRA and, say, TRCP. The lawsuits by the Center, Defenders and others to keep the completely recovered gray wolf on the ESA put the ESA itself at grave risk and did nothing for wolves. And I am sure you may recall (in fact, I might have even interviewed you about it) when the NRDC, without an hour of outreach, announced that it would be a swell idea to set aside everyone’s favorite inshore fishing hole on the East Coast as a Marine Protected Area.
Very well put, Charles.
Very well put, Charles.
Good stuff as always, Ted.
Post new comment