On Friday at 8:30 a.m., the Office of the Legislative Auditor will release the Board of Animal Health’s Oversight of Deer and Elk Farms to the Legislative Audit Commission.
The document comes two days after the Star Tribune's Tony Kennedy reports Farm deer escapes concern Department of Natural Resources because deer may carry chronic wasting disease and one day after Rep. Rick Hansen, DFL-South Saint Paul, introduced HF4447 to allow for an optional, voluntary, state buyout of existing deer farms. The bill comes as Chronic Wasting Disease spreads in Minnesota and Hansen works for legislative relief to guard the state's beloved wild whitetail herd.
The DFL Lead on the House Environment and Natural Resources Committee, Hansen released the following statement about the bill:
Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) has been a slow moving, persistent problem in Minnesota and elsewhere around our country. However, its accelerating presence in the captive and wild whitetail herd is a threat to our environment and economy. It is increasingly clear that we need to take every step we can to prevent the spread of this horrible disease.
With the unknowns of this disease, preventing expansion of infected deer throughout is not only prudent, but necessary. By offering deer farmers, a voluntary option, a fair price for deer, we can reduce risk and benefit our state. Minnesotans expect us to take every action we can to stop Chronic Wasting Disease and this is one step in delivering that for them.”
First-term Roseville Democrat and avid outdoors woman Jamie Becker-Finn, who has pressed committee chair Dan Fabian, R-Roseau, for action on protecting the state's wild deer herd, is co-author of the bill.
Kennedy's article in the Strib illustrates why Hansen and Becker-Finn are fighting for Minnesota's deer hunting tradition and public herd. In Farm deer escapes concern Department of Natural Resources because deer may carry chronic wasting disease, we read:
A troubled Winona County deer farm recently described by the state Board of Animal Health as having “a good history of CWD surveillance” reportedly lost a buck that was killed by a neighboring hunter and never tested for the disease.
The escaped 10-pointer was shot in 2007 by an Illinois man who kept its ear tag and mounted the deer’s head and antlers. The ear tag links the deer to the same deer farm reported by authorities last month to be wholly infected with chronic wasting disease (CWD).
The long-delayed hunting report from a neighbor of Winona County deer farmer Bruce Hoseck is the third report received recently by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources (DNR), raising suspicions of farmed deer escaping into the wild. It’s an issue likely to be addressed Friday by Legislative Auditor Jim Nobles when his office reports on how the Board of Animal Health has carried out its oversight duties of deer and elk farms.
The DNR has complained that the Board of Animal Health is too cozy with deer farmers to ideally protect the state’s invaluable wild deer herd from infected game farm deer. The contagious and fatal deer and elk disease has taken hold in Wisconsin and Iowa and is now appearing in wild deer in Minnesota’s Fillmore County.
One of the issues to be covered in the legislative auditor’s report is to what extent the Board of Animal Health and DNR have coordinated efforts to contain the spread of CWD.
“For us it’s indicative of what might be a larger problem,” Lou Cornicelli, DNR wildlife research manager, said of the recent cases.
He said increased public awareness of the issue is resulting in more reports of escaped game farm deer. ...
In the Environment committee on Thursday, Hansen moved an amendment to give the DNR more power to inspect and take action on deer farms, offering the following comments in committee:
“This is related to the chronic wasting disease appropriation that allows the DNR to conduct some of the activities related to inspection. This brings in the ability for the DNR to enforce provisions of the Farmed Cervidae so if there’s an inspection they have the enforcement ability to act on that rather than just the inspection.”
The amendment failed on an 11-13 vote, with all DFL members and one GOP member, Chaska's Joe Hoppe, voting in support of the amendment.
Session Daily notes in Environment committee moves omnibus bill forward with split-voice vote:
Sponsored by Rep. Dan Fabian (R-Roseau), the bill would make a number of policy changes and appropriate $750,000 to address chronic wasting disease.
According to its Supplemental Budget Request, the agency had requested had requested $1.56 million in emergency funding for FY 2019 from the General Fund.
Photo: A deer suffering from CWD.
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