The Trump Administration announced last month its plan to delegate significantly greater authority and discretion to the states for how grizzly bears are managed. The proposed new rule, which the Administration says is necessary to incentivize conservation of the species, would substantially reduce federal oversight and public accountability for grizzly bear management, while allowing states far more latitude to independently determine when grizzly bears could be killed or relocated. 

While a phased transition to state authority such as that proposed here certainly has merit, and is a management direction GTMA can support, any such hand-off must be done in a way that is legal and establishes a clear, transparent framework for how bears will be managed so that progress  toward recovery continues. At a minimum, this would include population-wide mortality thresholds (rather than only in limited monitoring areas as at present), and range distribution objectives demonstrating progress toward naturally connecting currently isolated populations, as required by law, along with clear accountability mechanisms. 

This proposed Rule doesn’t begin to pass the sniff test on any of those criteria. And while it may provide bear managers some needed flexibility and efficiencies, it will almost certainly lead to an increase in already unsustainable levels of human-caused mortality and unnecessary relocations, especially given the current political pressures and meddling in state management by certain elected officials, likely setting back recovery by a decade or more.

What does the new proposed Rule do?

• Establishes a tiered management framework: No Tier, “Tier 1,” and “Tier 2” with each level authorizing progressively higher levels of take (i.e. intentional or incidental killing) of grizzly bears, including for authorized agencies, individuals or trappers.

• In Tier 2, which presumably would apply to the Northern Continental Divide Ecosystem population, including bears in the Badger-Two Medicine and the rest of the Rocky Mountain Front, state or tribal management agencies could routinely kill or relocate bears without prior authorization from the Fish and Wildlife Service. Federal oversight would largely be limited to annual reporting requirements.

• For Tier 2 areas, the proposed rule allows states to determine allowable techniques and conditions for individuals to deter grizzly bears that the individual believes poses an imminent threat to livestock, property, or people, as well as avoid penalty if the selected technique leads to the incidental killing of a grizzly bear.

• For all Tiers, allows trappers who inadvertently kill grizzly bears while lawfully trapping other species in certain locations or times of year to avoid penalty.

How the Rule Would Affect Grizzly Bears

1. It’s unclear, and that’s a problem - The proposed rule uses overly vague and generic language, which makes it hard to fully understand its implications, including where it might apply or how it would change existing management. Critical terms like “imminent threat” are not defined, opening the door to exceptionally broad interpretations. Rather, the Rule defers most of the details for how bears would be managed to future memorandum of understandings or other technical agreements. It’s not clear whether these documents would be available for public review and comment. The public deserves, and has a legal right, to greater transparency both during and after the rulemaking process.

2. Increased human-caused mortality – Grizzly bears have experienced record or near record human-caused mortalities in recent years. The new Rule creates expansive permission for ambiguous “management activities” to result in incidental take by managers, including situations where conflicts have not yet occurred, as well as broader allowances for incidental take by individuals or trappers, all of which will likely drive human-caused mortality higher. Nor does it set any thresholds for mortality in areas where these do not currently exist (e.g. connectivity corridors, areas outside “demographic monitoring areas” such as east of US-89 along the Rocky Mountain Front), allowing for potentially unlimited mortality in these areas.

3. Hinder establishing natural connectivity – Sustained biological recovery depends on establishing natural movement and breeding between currently isolated populations, not managers relocating bears indefinitely. Unfortunately, the proposed Rule lacks any parameters to ensure this necessary, and legally mandated, outcome occurs. To the contrary, the Rule would allow managers broad latitude to preemptively relocate bears, including, most concerningly, out of connectivity areas, as decisions would largely be guided by the state’s grizzly bear management plan rather than federal regulations. Even more concerning, the Rule places no limit on allowable mortalities in connectivity corridors or outside core recovery areas, creating circumstances where bears could be eliminated from these areas without federal intervention.

4. Create less accountability for how bears are managed - Federal oversight of grizzly bear management in core recovery and connectivity areas would effectively diminish to review of annual reports. And it’s not clear what, if any, opportunity the public would have to hold the states accountable once the MOUs are in place.

Conclusion

While a phased delisting that slowly hands more authority to the states, and eventually full delisting, is desirable, the proposed Rule is not only likely unlawful, it fails to establish a strong, transparent framework with clear accountability mechanisms necessary to ensure grizzly bear recovery continues. Rather than incentivizing conservation as the Rule claims to do, it will most likely facilitate avoidable killing and unnecessary relocations that will set back recovery, which serves no one, let alone bears. At a time when grizzly bears face mounting threats to their habitat security from this Administration’s policies, like the proposed rescission of the Roadless Rule, increasing human caused mortality, and failing natural food sources, the Service can and must do better for bears and the public than this overly vague, permissive Rule to ensure the hard-won gains aren’t jeopardized for political expediency.