A plea to legislators: See through the character assassination of Board of Fish nominee

As this is being written, the legislative confirmation vote for the Governor’s Boards and Commissions nominees has yet to occur. I pay attention when Board of Fisheries and Board of Game nominees are being considered, especially if one or more are considered controversial.

I haven’t heard any buzz at all about the Board of Game nominees, so I’m assuming they will all, most probably, be confirmed by a majority vote during the confirmation session. One of those BOG folks is Orville Huntington, who happens to be a current BOF member. Mr. Huntington has a lot of knowledge of both fish and game issues and should do well on the BOG.

The Governor has appointed four folks to the BOF. One, Israel Payton, is a current member and has distinguished himself in his first term as a knowledgeable board member who listens to all user groups and who comes to the meetings well prepared to deliberate the issues. I would expect him to receive the legislature’s confirmation for a second term on the board.

The two “new” folks, whose names I don’t have handy, should also receive legislative confirmation. I listened to them explain their respective backgrounds to the various legislative committees holding hearings on the nominees and I was impressed with the knowledge and expertise these two folks bring to the BOF.

The fourth nominee, Judge Karl Johnstone, is a friend and former BOF member and chairman. Judge Johnstone left the board when former Governor Bill Walker announced that he would not reappoint Johnstone to the BOF. Governor Walker was looking to stack the board with commercial fisheries-oriented members and viewed Johnstone as too even-handed in dealing with the issues.

As it turned out, the person Walker wanted to replace Johnstone with was under indictment and later convicted in Montana of hunting violations and is currently facing felony charges in Alaska related to possible residency and PFD violations.

Given his many years sitting on the bench and his multiple terms as a member and chairman of the BOF, in 2015 the legislature issued a citation to Judge Johnstone saying, in part, “Mr. Johnstone’s record on the Board represents the gold standard of public service.”

As a BOF member, Johnstone listened to all sides, was always well prepared to deliberate issues, and often asked very pointed questions to get to the heart of a proposal. He based his decisions on scientific information and called “foul” when he heard biased or cherry-picked information, regardless of who was presenting it. He looked out for the fisheries resource first and didn’t worry whose toes got stepped on in the process. If a harvestable surplus existed in the fishery under review, Karl tried to allocate between user groups as fairly as possible.

In the recent legislative hearings for BOF nominees, the commercial fishing groups have lined up solidly in opposition to Johnstone’s nomination. They object to the fact that Johnstone is not biased in their favor on proposals, as a couple of current board members from the commercial sector are.

I once sat in a BOF meeting where a Central District drift gillnetter stated, in paraphrase, “Every fish that gets by my nets is a wasted resource!” Not all commercial operators are this way, but enough of them have the attitude that they own the resource and feel they should have exclusive use of it. Any potential nominee who is looking to protect the resource and the rights of all non-commercial resource users is viewed as an impediment to their receiving the maximum allocations possible for that resource. In a nutshell, that’s why the commercial sector objects to Johnstone’s possible confirmation.

At this point, I can only hope the legislators see through this character assassination of Judge Johnstone by the commercial sector and reread their citation issued to him for exercising the “gold standard of public service” for his previous service on the BOF. I hope the legislators understand the underlying greed being expressed by the commercial sector in their opposition to Judge Johnstone and realize the board needs a balance of all interests in making regulation decisions regarding our fisheries resources.

On another topic, the “1000 Point Match” for blackpowder handguns is scheduled for May 4-5 at the Matanuska Valley shooting range off the Glenn Highway, just south of Palmer. I hope to attend on Saturday and maybe a while on Sunday and do some shooting. I haven’t shot my muzzleloading handguns all winter because of my knee, so it’s time to get back in the action.