Missoulian: Baucus, Tester introduce bill for state control of gray wolves
Montana’s Senate delegation has introduced a new attempt to put gray wolves back under state control.
The one-paragraph bill by Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester would short-circuit a court decision by Missoula U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy that has kept wolves under federal Endangered Species Act protection in Montana, Idaho and Wyoming. Molloy ruled last year that wolves could not be delisted in Montana and Idaho while Wyoming was still under federal management.
“This would essentially roll back the clock to before Judge Molloy’s decision,” Tester spokesman Aaron Murphy said on Thursday. The bill would make the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s April 2, 2009, wolf delisting final rule permanent. In doing so, it would return wolf management decisions to the state wildlife agencies of Montana and Idaho. It would also delist gray wolves in parts of Utah, Washington and Oregon.
