Alaska Wildlife Alliance Files Petition To Challenge State’s Controversial Predator Control Process

One of the most controversial topics around Alaska these days is the on-again, off-again, on-again Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s predator control process that would eliminate bears, wolves and other predators in an attempt to protect caribou herds. But the system has been opposed vehemently by some conservation and environmental groups, which won a court battle when a judge ruled the system was unconstitutional, though an Alaska Board of Game ruling has temporarily authorized the state to proceed.

Now, an Alaska environmental group is taking legal action against the state. Here’s the Alaska Beacon with details:

The Alaska Wildlife Alliance last week filed an application for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction barring the state Department of Fish and Game from starting its planned bear- and wolf-killing program in late spring and early summer. If the predator control takes place, it would be the third year of a state program that has so far killed 180 bears and 19 wolves.

The program is aimed at boosting the population of the faltering Mulchatna Caribou Herd. The herd, which in the 1990s numbered about 200,000, is down to only about 15,000, according to the Department of Fish and Game. Hunting of those caribou has been closed since 2021.

Even though a state judge ruled on March 14 that the program violates the Alaska constitution, the Department of Fish and Game is preparing to embark on its third year of bear and wolf removals. The Alaska Board of Game on March 27 approved the department’s emergency petition to resume the program.

Department officials, in arguing in favor of the emergency determination, told board members that they needed to be able to get into the field in time for the caribou calving season to make sure that bears are not preying on newborn calves.

The decision by the BOG readopting the previous MCH predator control program by emergency regulation [RC 010, attached as EXHIBIT 5] previously struck down by this court is (1) inconsistent with the Superior Court’s ruling that the BOG must comply with the Due Process and the Sustained Yield provisions of the Alaska Constitution, and (2) fails to satisfy the requirements for an emergency under the Administrative Procedures Act (“APA”).

AWA has raised serious and substantial questions about the manner by which the BOG authorized ADF&G to kill bears in this case. The BOG’s recent attempt to authorize continued predator control according to RC 010 violates mandatory legal standards, as follows:

1

a. The BOG did not conform to constitutional due process requirements prior to and during the process that purportedly authorized the bear kill, namely adequate public notice and a meaningful opportunity to be heard at a meaningful time and place;1This is from the legal brief filed:

b.

c.

The BOG failed to engage in the kind of reasoned deliberation and conscious application of rational analysis, including consideration of important, relevant material factors regarding bear sustainability prior to adopting this most recent authorization to perpetuate a program previously struck down by the judiciary;2 and,

The BOG adoption of a program to continue killing bears and other predators according to the “emergency” rubric is inconsistent with law, and fails to satisfy the requirements for an emergency under the APA.