Industry Update | May 2022

The Idaho Legislature adjourned the 2022 session on Thursday without overriding any of Gov. Brad Little’s vetoes, about 1:45 p.m. ending 81 contentious days at the State Capitol in Boise. “Sine die” is the Latin phrase legislators use to indicate they are adjourning without announcing a meaning “without day” to reconvene. The Legislature is only able to reconvene if the Governor calls them back into a special session.
The Senate tried and failed to override Governor Little’s veto of Senate Bill 1381, the Coronavirus Pause Act, which would have blocked COVID-19 vaccine requirements for a year. The Senate needed 24 votes to secure the two-thirds supermajority to override the veto but the effort failed 21-14.
Some highlights from this session included the largest tax cut in Idaho history ($600 million). One of the largest increases in K-12 public school spending (about $258 million), in state history. In addition to cutting taxes, legislators tapped into a projected $1.9 billion state budget surplus to pay off state debts, invest in rainy day savings accounts, and make investments in roads, bridges and other infrastructure projects.
Lawmakers now pivot to campaign season, as things really start to heat up for each of them back home. Legislators, state officials and political challengers are gearing up for a six-and-a-half-week sprint to the May 17 primaries. The winners of the party primaries advance to the Nov. 8 general election.
With all 105 seats in the Legislature and all statewide offices (including governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general) up for election this year, the 2022 elections will play a big role in shaping Idaho politics for years to come.
The 2023 legislative session is scheduled to begin Jan. 9, 2023 and there will be significant turnover with 28 legislative races that don’t have an incumbent due to redistricting and retirements for this year’s elections.

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted unanimously this week (May 3) to pass the Simplifying Outdoor Recreation Act to the Senate floor, incorporated fully into the America’s Outdoor Recreation Act of 2022. The SOAR Act is flagship legislation for the outfitting industry that America Outdoors, and other partners, including IOGA has been advocating for more than a decade (special shout out to IOGA members Greg McFadden and Zach Collier for their years long advocacy on this one on behalf of Idaho, and to past ED and historical badass, Grant Simonds, for the same).

As AOA recently commented, the SOAR Act has seen considerable success in the U.S. House, but this is the first time that it has been approved by the Senate ENR Committee. The committee has not passed recreation legislation of this magnitude since 1963.

Some other highlights underscored in the AOA press release:

The SOAR Act contains many provisions to improve the permitting policy for outfitters and for agencies on America’s public lands. As incorporated into America’s Outdoor Recreation Act, the SOAR Act:

• Directs agencies to allow the inclusion of substantially similar uses in a permit activity without additional environmental review.
• Modifies the Forest Service use review formula to the benefit of outfitters and rewards the surrender of unused days to a use pool when applicable.
• Allows operators to follow state law regarding liability agreements and directs agencies to have consistent policies regarding these agreements within two years.
• Directs public lands agencies to contemplate additional Categorical Exclusions to streamline the special recreation permitting process. A Categorical Exclusion is the least cumbersome level or environmental review.
• Ensures that programmatic environmental reviews or recreational uses are not subject to cost recovery from permitted outfitters.

As many of our members know, IOGA has been supporting (and asking for your support, contacting our congressional delegation) an America Outdoors Assoc. effort regarding the incompatible nature of overtime requirements for our industry, and asking for support in a legislative remedy to this.

The push has been for a bill that would add a provision under the hours exception of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which would add seasonal recreation employees to the existing classes of exempt workers. On April 28, 2022, Senator Daines introduced, and Senator Sinema co-sponsored, Senate Bill 4092.

On the Outfitters and Guides Licensing Board (IOGLB) front, right now the board is working through redline drafts by obtaining feedback from all stakeholders—outfitters and guides, IOGA, and members of the public— through listening session and other means, and will conduct formal negotiated rule making starting June 15. Following that, the board will approve a redline draft to be published as proposed rules in the September bulletin. Once published, there is a 21 day comment period (on that proposed rule). From there, the board will have another negotiated rulemaking in the fall to develop a pending rule to come before the legislature. (Here again, a 21 day comment period follows.)

The key takeaways are these:

1. These are the rules that do and will govern your business and profession. This is important.
2. “The world is run by those who show up.” Your comments and participation in this process will determine the degree to which influence the outcome(s).
3. Don’t get too stuck on the different stages of the rule making process (proposed, pending, etc.). The board will take and consider comments throughout this process and timeline, but the earlier the better.

Upcoming Meetings and Listening Sessions:

• The next Licensing Board meeting, which is an interim meeting on Zero Base Regulation, is June 7 from 8:30 am to 3:00pm MST. The desired outcome is to have a redline draft of rules to make available to the public (industry, etc.) for review in advance of the June 15 Negotiated rule making.

Zero Based Regulation public listening sessions:

• LEWISTON – 5/13/22 9-12 PT – Click HERE for additional information.
• SALMON – 5/24/22 9-1 MT – Click HERE for additional information.
• IDAHO FALLS – 5/25/22 9-1 MT – Click HERE for additional information.

IOGA Rule Comment Draft: Leading up to the Spring Meeting, the IOGA Board of Directors went through all of the OGLB rules to identify areas for potential change, discussion, addition, etc. During the BOD meeting itself, the Directors and staff discussed areas in rule for comments to be submitted (i.e., for proposed changes). The idea was and is to develop a comprehensive set of comments from the Association on the IOGLB rules, to the end of eventual (hopeful) incorporation into the OGLB’s proposed redline rule. These comments from IOGA would not and do not replace individual outfitter comments. Rather, they will serve as a foundation; a set of things that the industry can and has come to some degree of census around. In addition to IOGA comments, it is critical that individual outfitters and guides submit your own comments!

Here is a DRAFT document with draft(!) Association comments for member consideration and feedback.

Please let us know what you think, if you have questions, etc. 

The Idaho Department of Fish & Game has published a notice of intent to promulgate rules — negotiated rule making in the April bulletin. As yet, meeting dates (one or more meetings) have not been scheduled, but will be posted once set.

Descriptive Summary

The following is a statement in nontechnical language of the substance and purpose of the intended negotiated rulemaking and the principal issues involved: 

This rulemaking balances outfitting industry and other economic and social interests in the Commission’s allocation of deer and elk tags for sale to outfitted hunters when the Commission sets tag limits for a zone, unit or hunt area with a history of outfitted hunter use. 

Under consideration are rule changes related to allocation of general hunt deer or elk tags for a zone/unit with tag limits for nonresidents but unlimited for resident tags: 

• Define an initial tag use number, based on verified outfitted hunter tag use history, which will remain the same for the zone/unit for subsequent consecutive years in which tag limits apply. 

• Allocate, annually or for a two-year period, a number of deer or elk general hunt tags reserved for outfitted hunters in each zone/unit corresponding to the initial tag use number, before the Commission adopts annual or biennial tag nonresident tag limits for the zone/unit.

• Subtract the initial tag use number from the nonresident tag limit set for the zone/unit, after which the Commission may allocate an additional portion (not to exceed 50%) of tags remaining in the nonresident limit for outfitted hunter use based on verified tag use history in the two years preceding allocation. 

• Make tags remaining after the allocation(s) for outfitted hunters available to nonresidents.