Biologist calls wolf resolution weak

The Montana House passed a resolution last week calling for the de-listing of gray wolves from the Endangered Species Act on a 99-1 vote. The lone dissenter was Democrat Mike Phillips of Bozeman. House District 3 Republican Jerry O’Neil supported the resolution, which goes onto the state Senate.

O’Neil said he expects the Senate to pass the measure as well.

Will it have any impact on federal lawmakers?

It probably won’t have as much as I wish it would,” O’Neil said.

Phillips, who has spent much of his career working on wolf restoration in the West, said he does not oppose delisting. He said he believes the state can and should manage wolves.

But this resolution, he claimed, would accomplish little. He said he offered amendments that would urge the state of Wyoming to come up with an acceptable management plan. He also said the Legislature should have urged the federal government to complete more sound science on wolf recovery that would hold up under a court challenge.

In addition, he noted there’s a provision in the Endangered Species Act that would exempt the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service from wolf management, which in turn, would put it in the state’s hands.

But none of his amendments were allowed by Republican leadership, he claimed.

The resolution does not have the weight of law, but sends a message to Montana’s congressional delegation that something should be done about Montana’s wolf population. The wolf is currently a federally protected species, but many people agree that wolves in the state are a recovered species. The debate hinges on what levels the population should be maintained on their own over the past 25 years from Canada, some Republicans have called for their extermination. Environmentalists, in turn, say the population across Montana, Idaho and Wyoming should stay between 1,200 and 1,500 animals.

The resolution supports the transfer of gray wolf management to the state; urges Congress to quickly pass federal legislation that will result in the immediate removal of the gray wolf from the endangered species list in Montana and ensure the ability of the state to continue its successful management of the species; and urges President Obama and the presidents administration to fully support such legislation.

Locally there are several packs of wolves. At least two inhabit the west side of Glacier National Park, where wolves originally gained their first footholds in the late 1970’s in Montana, after being wiped out by hunting, trapping and poisoning by the 1930s.