Are female game wardens an endangered species?

wardens patch colorFor decades, we’ve been talking about problems in the Maine Warden Service. While it seems that Colonel Joel Wilkinson has quickly set aside the most recent criticism about undercover tactics, it is my hope that this flare up will allow a thoughtful examination of problems and issues that have been raised over the last 25 years in a series of reports, some of which included lots of recommendations.

My suggestion is for the legislature’s Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Committee to appoint a commission of thoughtful people – some with law enforcement experience – to examine the current issue of undercover tactics, review all of the reports and recommendations issued over the last 25 years, give current and former wardens a chance to express their opinions and thoughts, and create a set of recommendations that can move us forward.

And when the IFW Committee and DIF&W get those recommendations, they need to implement them.

Today, I’ve raised some of those problems in my editorial page column in the Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel, titled Are Female Game Wardens an Endangered Species? You can read that column here.

 

George Smith

About George Smith

George stepped down at the end of 2010 after 18 years as the executive director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine to write full time. He writes a weekly editorial page column in the Kennebec Journal and Waterville Morning Sentinel, a weekly travel column in those same newspapers (with his wife Linda), monthly columns in The Maine Sportsman magazine, two outdoor news blogs (one on his website, georgesmithmaine.com, and one on the website of the Bangor Daily News), and special columns for many publications and newsletters. Islandport Press published a book of George's favorite columns, "A Life Lived Outdoors" in 2014. In 2014, George also won a Maine Press Association award for writing the state's bet sports blog. In 2016, Down East Books published George's book, Maine Sporting Camps, and Islandport Press published George and his wife Linda's travel book, Take It From ME, about their favorite Maine inns and restaurants.