DENVER – A proposed merger of state parks and the Division of Wildlife moved forward Monday, despite running into its first significant opposition in the Legislature.
The House Agriculture Committee passed Senate Bill 208 on a 10-3 vote, setting up a final vote in the House in the next week.
Rep. J. Paul Brown, R-Ignacio, said he was initially skeptical of the merger.
“From the beginning, I’ve thought bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better,” Brown said.
But he waited to hear testimony Monday until deciding how to vote, and he’s satisfied that the state can save money by combining the agencies.
“This is something that we need to go forward with,” Brown said.
The bill sailed through the Senate last month on a 34-1 vote, but on Monday, two Democrats pressed merger proponents about the lack of information about how much money could be saved.
“We don’t have any evidence. We don’t have a single number in front of us to say what the efficiencies are going to be,” said Rep. Randy Fischer, D-Fort Collins.
The state parks division is suffering from a loss of taxpayer support, and Gov. John Hickenlooper had proposed closing or downgrading the service at four parks until the head of the Department of Natural Resources, Mike King, suggested the merger.
King said he could not offer details on cost savings until his employees combine the agencies, but several administrative positions are duplicated.
“On its face, it’s clear to me that the opportunities for efficiencies and savings exist,” King said.
Fischer tried to amend the bill to delay the merger for a year and study it, but the sponsor, Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg, R-Sterling, fought off the attempt. He said he trusted King and his staff to make the merger work.
“What are you going to study that they don’t already know? I talked about this four years ago, and Director King has been looking at these type of scenarios for a number of years. It’s not like he just woke up one night and said, ‘I got nothing to do, let’s try and merge these and have a little fun with the Legislature,’” Sonnenberg said.
Merger plans have stirred up Colorado’s outdoors activists, and around 20 witnesses waited up to seven hours to testify to the bill Monday.
Several hunting and fishing groups continued to oppose the merger. John Smeltzer, a former DOW chief, said people who hunt and fish are the only ones who consistently pay money for wildlife management.
“It appears to us that we are about to break a long tradition of faith with those customers in which their dollars are spent on the highest priority wildlife-management projects and not to bail out failing park operations,” said Smeltzer, who is now chairman of the Colorado Wildlife Federation.
King replied to merger opponents who think the DOW and parks rangers will have a culture clash in a combined agency.
King thinks the employees of the two agencies will find they have a lot in common, namely the protection of land and habitat.
“I could be waterskiing one day and fishing the next. I might be hiking one day and watching birds the next. Outdoor recreation needs to move past the activity and focus on the resource,” King said.
If the bill passes the House, the boards that govern the parks and wildlife agencies will be combined this summer.
