Pantheraman
Well-Known Member
Study: Most Yellowstone, Grand Teton visitors support added fee for wildlife conservation - WyoFile
"Researchers analyzed 991 responses. Just over 75% of respondents cited wildlife viewing as a primary reason for their trips to Yellowstone and Grand Teton. The majority also supported the idea of paying extra for conservation — with 93% supportive of a voluntary donation; 75% supportive of a tax or fee on goods and services; and 66% supportive of a mandatory wildlife conservation fee."
Now, this article is a few months old, so I'm pretty late with posting about it. But I wanted to put it here due to its relevance to wildlife conservation.
All of us on here are very well aware of the change our current administration has proposed for the Endangered Species Act, that change being that while it'll prohibit the killing of endangered species, the habitat won't be protected. An example of what's unfortunately a corrupt cycle: Special interests lobby the federal government, the federal government intentionally underfunds the ESA, then the government uses the resulting incompetence and mistrust created by said incompetence as excuses to weaken the ESA, eventually leading to one less pesky little regulation for special interests to deal with.
Simultaneously, at the state level, the task of caring for game animals is well funded. But the conservation of non-game species doesn't have enough funding to prevent those species from becoming endangered. And the reason the state agencies only spend on average 10% of their budgets on non-game species is that, in short, that's not what they're being paid to do. When a person buys a hunting or fishing license or when they receive Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson funds, they're being paid to look after game animals.
With most visitors going to these parks being willing to pay an extra fee for wildlife conservation, I see no reason to not have visitors to national parks, national forests, BLM land, and national wildlife refuges pay a $10 conservation fee each time they visit federal public land. And use that money to fund wildlife conservation at both the state and federal levels. In fact, you could argue that with the dumb things people do in national parks, charging $10 might be a bit generous.
"Researchers analyzed 991 responses. Just over 75% of respondents cited wildlife viewing as a primary reason for their trips to Yellowstone and Grand Teton. The majority also supported the idea of paying extra for conservation — with 93% supportive of a voluntary donation; 75% supportive of a tax or fee on goods and services; and 66% supportive of a mandatory wildlife conservation fee."
Now, this article is a few months old, so I'm pretty late with posting about it. But I wanted to put it here due to its relevance to wildlife conservation.
All of us on here are very well aware of the change our current administration has proposed for the Endangered Species Act, that change being that while it'll prohibit the killing of endangered species, the habitat won't be protected. An example of what's unfortunately a corrupt cycle: Special interests lobby the federal government, the federal government intentionally underfunds the ESA, then the government uses the resulting incompetence and mistrust created by said incompetence as excuses to weaken the ESA, eventually leading to one less pesky little regulation for special interests to deal with.
Simultaneously, at the state level, the task of caring for game animals is well funded. But the conservation of non-game species doesn't have enough funding to prevent those species from becoming endangered. And the reason the state agencies only spend on average 10% of their budgets on non-game species is that, in short, that's not what they're being paid to do. When a person buys a hunting or fishing license or when they receive Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson funds, they're being paid to look after game animals.
With most visitors going to these parks being willing to pay an extra fee for wildlife conservation, I see no reason to not have visitors to national parks, national forests, BLM land, and national wildlife refuges pay a $10 conservation fee each time they visit federal public land. And use that money to fund wildlife conservation at both the state and federal levels. In fact, you could argue that with the dumb things people do in national parks, charging $10 might be a bit generous.