Stafsholt calls for audit of fish and wildlife account as deficit looms

Earlier this year, the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) announced it would have a $16 million deficit in the Fish and Wildlife Account by the year 2026. The announcement prompted considerable concern. Now a coalition has been formed to look at ways to shore up the funds in that account and legislators have even gotten involved, calling for an audit while sportsmen and women across the state are calling for license fee increases. As a stop-gap measure, funds were moved to cover the deficit.

The state budget included a one-time funding of $25 million from the department’s forestry account to help shore up revenue for the fish and wildlife account. This account funds approximately 20% of the DNR’s workforce, or 500 positions. The revenue shortfall is said to be due to lagging license sales. While fishing licenses increased by 3.6% from 1999 to 2017, deer license sales dropped 5.8 percent. It was also reported last year that revenues from fish and wildlife fell approximately $79.5 million in 2021 to $70.7 million in 2022. This fund is the department’s primary source for funding fish and wildlife management as well as law enforcement. There has not been an increase in license fees in many years, and sporting groups have come out to say they would not be opposed to an increase in these fees.

The 2023 state budget did include some increases for non-resident licenses as well as some combination licenses. However, many in the outdoor community have asked for resident license increases for a number of years, with those requests falling on deaf ears in the name of “increased opportunity.” The increases in the non-resident archer and crossbow licenses is estimated to increase revenue by $409,000 for the Fish and Wildlife account. But that falls short of the deficit.

Senator Rob Stafsholt (R-New Richmond) called for a comprehensive audit of the fish and wildlife account before raising any hunting, fishing and trapping license as a fix for the problem.

“Before we consider license and fee increases to address the account deficit, I would like to first see the Legislature require a full accounting of the spending of the dollars we already have coming in,” he said in a statement.

This review would also include federal money  from both the Pittman-Robertson Act and the Dingell-Johnson Act which are tied to a federal excise tax on hunting and fishing gear purchases as well as all firearms. The Pittman-Robertson Act uses federal excise taxes on firearms and ammunition to fund state wildlife agencies for habitat restoration, research, and hunting education.

Dingell-Johnson funds are derived from federal excise taxes and import duties collected on various items and placed into a special account known as the Sport Fish Restoration and Boating Trust Fund. These funds are used by states for outdoor recreation and wildlife conservation. In 2023, Wisconsin received $13.1 million from Dingell-Johnson and $33.7 million from Pittman-Robertson.

This is not the first time an audit has been mentioned, but Stafsholt has now made an official request of the co-chairs of the Joint Legislative Audit Committee Senator Eric Wimberger (R-Green Bay) and Representative Robert Wittke (R-Racine) to direct the nonpartisan Legislative Audit Bureau to conduct this comprehensive audit and to identify any mismanagement or inefficiencies that have influenced this deficit.

Wisconsin Wildlife Federation second vice president Mark Kakatsch said he felt the audit would be a positive thing. Kakatsch sits on a coalition that has also been looking into ways to shore up funding for this account and to ensure its solvency long into the future. He said he felt conducting the audit to ensure funds are being used properly and efficiently would help the public to be more comfortable with the underlying issues that may be affecting this account. Those could include decreases in hunters and outdoorsmen overall, and could point to a need to find additional funding from license increases or even to be able to include non-consumptive users in some fashion in providing that funding. 

“There are some DNR staff and other people already calling for more hunting and fishing license fees to be increased, even after the increases we did to some of the non-resident hunting and fishing licenses this session,” Stafsholt said in a statement. “I believe additional increases should be a non-starter until we have a full understanding on where sportsmen and sportswomen’s dollars are going now compared to where their priorities are. A comprehensive audit must be done so long-standing programs, like the trout stocking partnerships, are not abruptly ended due to inefficiencies and lack of planning at the DNR as we heard happened last week.”

As reported in The Lakeland Times, the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) informed trout stocking partners that the program would be put on hold. 

They also announced a marked decrease in stocking of both walleye and musky large fingerlings. Stafsholt’s office said the process would take “quite some time,” but that it had already begun.

Beckie Gaskill may be reached via email at [email protected].