Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, September 10, 1993 TAG: 9309100189
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RON BROWN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Game Warden Lt. Karl Martin helplessly watches as the staff he commands dwindles.
He has nine fewer officers than he had four years ago.
He has four fewer patrol boats than he had last year.
At Smith Mountain Lake, boating accidents are on the rise; the lake has had more than twice as many accidents this year as in 1992.
Two people have died this summer in lake boating accidents, compared to none last summer.
Martin argues that having fewer patrols means more accidents.
"We've had Fridays where we've had no one patrolling," Martin said. "There've been Saturdays where we've had to choose between patrolling [at] night or day."
Privately, some game wardens say the cutbacks in manpower and equipment reflect an agency that's placing wildlife studies over public-safety concerns. There has been some clamor in the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries' law enforcement division for a state police takeover, which would put cops in charge rather than biologists.
That's not likely.
"I'm not aware of any proposal that would incorporate game wardens into the state police," said O. Randolph Rollins, Virginia's secretary of public safety. "It sounds like something generated by someone's imagination rather than reality."
Martin's case is bolstered by the Smith Mountain Lake Association, a citizens' group that decided Wednesday night to draft letters urging legislators to give the department more money so more game wardens could be hired. The Smith Mountain Lake Policy Advisory Board - composed of members appointed by the boards of supervisors of surrounding lake counties - also has expressed concern.
Martin asserts that public safety is not the department's emphasis.
"The emphasis has been to reduce law enforcement, and money has been spent in other places instead of public safety," he said.
Larry G. Hart, the department's deputy director for administration, said that's simply not the case. In fact, he said, the department's wildlife management division has been the hardest hit.
Hart said Martin has some legitimate concerns when he worries about the dwindling number of game wardens in the state - from 210 to roughly 150 since 1988, according to Martin. But like many state agencies, the department has had to make tough choices.
Unlike most departments, the Department of Game and Inland Fisheries depends on the revenue it generates. Each year, it collects about $16 million in hunting- and fishing-license fees. Boaters pay about $10 million in state fees and taxes.
And that's where the budget rub begins. While the entire $16 million from hunting and fishing fees is returned to the department, it receives only $1.7 million of the $10 million paid by boaters.
Yet the department spends about $4 million annually on its boating program.
Neither the watercraft titling tax - estimated at $2.3 million - or motor fuel tax paid by boaters - estimated at $4.7 million - goes to the boat program. Both go to the state's general fund.
The department is looking for ways to take a bigger chunk of the fees boaters pay to the state.
Leon Turner of Fincastle, a member of the state's Games and Inland Fisheries Board, said Martin is not giving credit to the department for some of the positive things it has done.
"He's taking a negative approach," Turner said. "We need more manpower. We certainly know that."
The department is taking applications and plans to hire another 10 game wardens statewide early next year, Turner said.
"We need police everywhere," Turner said. "I think that is true everywhere. We can't provide it if we don't have the funds to provide it."
The board also is setting aside $1 million to upgrade the radio communications system used by game wardens and has allocated another $300,000 this year to buy new boats, Turner said.
Turner said the board may have to look at increasing boating fees as recreational boating takes a bigger part of the department's budget.
Most boat owners pay much less in fees than hunters and anglers. The average boater pays about $7 annually in fees as compared to $19 for anglers and a top fee of $50 for hunters.
"We'll be looking to the General Assembly for some help," Turner said. "We'll be contacting our representatives. They control the purse strings."
Control of those purse strings by Gov. Douglas Wilder may have put the department in a pinch.
Three years ago, as Wilder battled a budget shortfall, he requested that the department give up $600,000 in increased boat titling fees for two years. That left the department's boating program with a $1.2 million shortfall.
This June, the state's general fund started paying that money back.
With that money, "we're buying boats, hiring game wardens, building boat landings and increasing our boat safety program," Hart said.
Martin said the critical problems at Smith Mountain Lake dictate that the department move quickly to bolster its work force.
With fewer patrol officers and fewer boats, the department's once highly touted march against drunken boaters has been slowed to a crawl, he said.
For most of the summer, that effort was bolstered by sheriff's deputies from Franklin County who were paid by a $10,000 transportation safety grant. When that money ran out, Martin said, the effectiveness of the drunken-boating program hit rock bottom.
"It has been completely neutralized," said Martin, who over the Labor Day weekend had to call off sobriety checkpoints at the lake simply because he didn't have enough officers and boats.
That diminished work force comes at a time when boat traffic, from all appearances, has increased dramatically, Martin said.
An accurate tally of the boats on the lake on any given weekend is not available. The last official survey of the number of boats on the lake was done two decades ago, Martin said.
With more boats and fewer officers, game wardens have been forced to play a shell game with public safety, trying to convince boaters that more patrol officers are available than actually are, Martin said.
On any given weekend, about six game wardens are available to patrol the lake.
And while game wardens spend three days a week on the lake, they are away from other duties, such as approving special licenses for farmers to kill wildlife destroying their crops.
"Our priority is the lake," said Sgt. Steve Pike, who works for Martin. "We neglect calls we get in the county."
by CNB