Report Summary 



Program Accountability 



Due to concerns about landowners issuing permission slips to 

 hunters for multiple days when they only hunted one day, family 

 members counted as a hunter day on the family ranch, etc., the 

 department created policies to make the program more accountable. 

 Each region created the forms and process it would use to meet 

 policy requirements. As a result, the process is fairly standard and 

 regions are consistent in their use of surveys. The policies and 

 procedures followed provide program accountability. 



Outfitting on BMAs 



Statute does not allow land for inclusion in the program if outfitting 

 or commercial hunting restricts public hunting opportunities. Rules 

 state outfitting may not take place on a BMA unless public recreation 

 and hunting opportunities are not restricted and the landowner and 

 regional supervisor approve the activity. We reviewed department 

 and Board of Outfitters and Guides information to determine how 

 many BMAs have outfitters use them, how much the BMAs were 

 used, and if the outfitters had permission to use the land. From the 

 information available, it appears outfitting on BMAs is following 

 block management statute and rules. 



Communication with 

 Landowners and 

 Hunters 



Communication is an integral way for the Department of Fish, 

 Wildlife and Parks to promote landowner/sportsperson relations. 

 One of the major means of communicating with landowners and 

 hunters are the regional tabloids and individual BMA maps. We 

 reviewed tabloids and maps to determine how easy both publications 

 would be to read and understand. We found maps and tabloids tend 

 to be confusing and difficult to read. In most cases, the information 

 was confusing and there is little consistency in presenting it among 

 regions. We recommend the department/regions initiate a process to 

 review tabloid and map information to make information more 

 consistent/standard and easier to understand. 



Locating BMAs 



In cases where no permission is required to hunt a BMA, or 

 permission is granted by the landowner someplace on the BMA, 

 maps provided by the regions are the only means a hunter has to find 

 the BMA. We used some of the maps received from the regions to 

 try to locate BMAs. We could not find one BMA, some were not 

 signed properly, and some maps were not correct. We recommend 



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