N.C. Senate Stops House Attempt to Raid Commission Funding

Editor's Note: This article has been reprinted with permission from the August issue of North Carolina Sportsman.

By CRAIG HOLT

North Carolina’s sportsmen, its wildlife and the agency responsible for managing the state’s inland game and fish apparently dodged a bullet aimed at it by the House of Representatives during June.

The tactic had been tried (and adopted) in other states and, according to a N.C. government source, isn’t unusual. However, never before had a legislative body attempted to divert all N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission financial support to the General Fund.

Last year the Clean Water Management Trust Fund, created in 1997, sent $26 million to the WRC to protect watersheds by adding them to the WRC’s game-lands program. However, the House’s proposal to divert CWMTF funds was only part of a House budget bill would have transferred all N.C. Wildlife Resources income — including license fees and federal excise taxes on hunting and fishing equipment and marine fuel — into the General Fund, where it could have been spent on anything, including attempts to balance the budget or pork-barrel projects.

Since 1947 the WRC — which manages sportsmen’s dollars for wildlife conservation, education, habitat improvements, and land acquisition — has been funded by the sale of hunting and fishing licenses. Later on, subscriptions to “Wildlife In North Carolina” magazine, grant dollars, federal funds, Wildlife Endowment Fund proceeds and private donations were earmarked for the WRC.

The 2004 House budget amendment would have rendered the state ineligible for Federal Aid Funds, the Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson excise taxes on hunting and fishing equipment, which return 10 percent excise taxes sportsmen pay for hunting and fishing gear to the states on a proportional basis. It also would have assessed a 10 percent fee for sale of surplus property, such as timber sold from state game lands and other WRC property. Such WRC property is now exempt from the fee.

“Just the license fees alone would have added up to $12 to $14 million annually,” the source said. “Timber sales from game lands and the sale of surplus equipment also are a significant amount.”

The House budget amendment was authored by Reps. Stanley Fox (D-Granville, Vance, Warren) and Roger West (R-Cherokee), who requested passage of the bill and received it in the House.

However, on June 23 the government source told North Carolina Sportsman that “strong friends of the (Wildlife Resources Commission) in the Senate corrected every provision in the House budget that would have hurt the WRC.

“The important thing now for the (WRC) is that it be able to hold this position in the (joint-legislative) conference committee.” The senators who helped remove or water down House amendments of the budget bill included Senate pro tempore Marc Basnight (D-Dare); Tony Rand (D-Cumberland); David Weinstein (D-Hoke, Robeson), who is the chair of the Natural Resources Budget committee; Linda Garrou (D-Forsyth); Charlie Albertson (D-Duplin; Harnett, Sampson); David Hoyle (D-Gaston); and John Kerr (D-Green, Lenoir, Wayne).

However, the source indicated he didn’t believe the House actually was serious in attempting to raid WRC funds.

“I think it was a straw man,” he said. “It was a Statue of Liberty play (a football play in which an apparent pass is actually a run play, in essence, a “fake-out” strategy).

“What the House a lot of times does is say something like ‘We’re going to eliminate the Wildlife (Commission) budget,’ when in fact, they know the Senate will shoot down the proposal. But it makes the Senate use up
(political) favors and time. Then (the House) later can bargain for something it really wants.”

After the Senate adopts its budget, it appoints members to a “conference” committee (with House members). That committee must iron out differences in the two budgets.

“If (budget provisions) are agreed to in the House and Senate, they don’t go to the conference committee, which only sees areas of difference,” the source said.

The final agreement will require the signature of the governor to become law.

The source said he had seen a letter from House co-speaker Richard Morgan (R-Moore) that revealed the House amendment actually was an attempt to free up WRC money to help pay for underground fuel-storage tank repairs.

“When there’s a leak (in a service station’s underground gasoline tanks, for example), those people now have to pay for the cleanup,” the source said. “Normally the people who put the tanks (in the ground) have to pay for cleanups.

“My guess (as to the underlying cause behind the House amendment) would be the petroleum industry said (to the House leadership), ‘Why don’t you (the legislature) use Clean Water Trust Fund money instead of making us pay? You can get $26 million from Wildlife if you can divert the money and, of course, it’s not exactly out of the purview of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund because it deals with clean (underground) water.’”

Bill Holman, director of the CWMTF, said the House wanted $15 million of its grant money to bail out the Underground Petroleum Storage Tank program.

“That program is supposed to be self-funding,” Holman said, “but it’s broke. It’s state insurance for the oil industry. So (the legislature) probably needs to increase the premiums (the petroleum industry pays).” Besides wildlife projects, CWMTF dollars also are earmarked for poorer municipalities to buy park lands, build greenways and construct water treatment plants.

“If (the House version) had been adopted, it would have created a lot of opportunities for mischief,” the source said. “A lot of money could have gone for inappropriate projects.”

The source said the House routinely makes similar budget moves each year, but the Wildlife Commission usually isn’t caught in the middle.

“It was a power play,” he said. “It may not be Wildlife (that’s targeted) each year. It’s actually a sneaky way to get laws passed. Instead of going through the normal legislative process, somebody will just include an item like this in the budget.”

The source said he thought the Senate version that protects WRC funding would prevail this year “because North Carolina has good, strong wildlife programs and (the WRC) has several good friends on the Senate side.”

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