Colorado Wildlife Commission chairman Tim Glenn summed it up in a single sentence.
“Major changes tend to bring out the emotions in folks,” he told a packed auditorium waiting to learn the details behind Gov. John Hickenlooper’s proposal to merge the Colorado Division of Wildlife with Colorado State Parks over the course of the next year.
That counts double when it includes losing your job.
So far, that hasn’t happened — yet. Then again, the actual bill necessary to merge the two agencies under the direction of the Department of Natural Resources is already about a week behind schedule. A bipartisan bill is expected to hit the Legislature sometime this week.
That has allowed time for the tempest to take shape as Colorado sportsmen and conservation groups have begun to list their objections to the as-yet-undefined merger proposal, among them the concern that the planning won’t take place until after the plan to merge becomes official.
But that’s not entirely true, as details have begun to trickle out about the proposal, which is included within a broader swath of the governor’s personnel plans with respect to Senior Executive Service positions in the state government. There are about 96 such positions at the director or deputy director level within state agencies that are based on annually renewable contracts expiring at the end of June. Hickenlooper is effectively terminating all of those contracts come June 30, and requiring incumbents to reapply for their current jobs, along with outside applicants, next month.
Include current DOW director Tom Remington among that group, along with his State Parks counterpart, Dean Winstanley.
Remington may go down in history as Colorado’s last DOW director, since the role of the next director is likely to be more broad-based. Given that the objective behind this merger proposal is a more streamlined government, it stands to reason the new director will oversee all of the new Parks and Wildlife Division. And someone is likely to be out of a job.
“I intend to apply for this position whether it is my old job or much more likely the new merged job,” Remington stated in a recent memo to his staff. “And I very much look forward to that challenge.”
Whoever inherits the position will face both the challenges and the litany of grievances and misgivings already being aired by sportsmen statewide. Along with the financial concerns of sportsmen who worry their license fees will go toward propping up the considerably smaller and underfunded parks programs at the expense of wildlife, the perceived cultural rift between the two agencies has raised a few eyebrows at both.
“It’s easy for people to point fingers at the wall and say it’s ‘us’ and ‘them,’ ” Remington said in an interview. “But once you all get in the same room, you realize how much you have in common.”
The largest wrinkle to be ironed out comes down to dollars, and the plan to also grant State Parks enterprise status under the state Constitution’s TABOR amendment. In 2001, the legislature granted DOW enterprise status, exempting the agency from TABOR’s restrictions.
Colorado State Parks does not have enterprise status, but DNR director Mike King has announced that will change after the proposed merger takes effect July 1.
Sharing the status has rankled a few feathers in the sportsmen’s community, a portion of which believes it will become impossible to keep wildlife money dedicated to wildlife issues and not parks and recreation. Both King and Remington insist otherwise, but credit the sportsmen’s community for maintaining the dialogue that leads to necessary transparency.
“It’s good that they’re paying attention,” Remington said.
Scott Willoughby: 303-954-1993 or swilloughby@denverpost.com
