Mealey Outburst Ends Idaho Game Hearing Chairman Has To Silence Director In Face-Off With Sportsmen

Fish and Game Commission Chairman Fred Wood put an abrupt end to a public hearing this week, in the middle of an angry speech by Fish and Game Department Director Steve Mealey.

Mealey shouted at sportsmen who said state political leaders had damaged the independence of the agency charged with protecting Idaho’s wildlife. He called the accusations “irresponsible and unhelpful.”

Mealey’s outburst late Wednesday came after Gene Bray, of the Idaho Watersheds Project and the Committee for Idaho’s High Desert, asked commissioners to fire him. The two conservation groups cited Mealey’s muzzling of his staff as the catalyst for the call for his firing, but his longterm failure to protect wildlife was the chief reason, Bray said.

“The Fish and Game Commission must move resolutely and quickly to recover control over the department and restore its prominence as an advocate for Idaho’s wildlife,” he said.

The commission had a closed-door session Thursday to discuss Mealey’s performance.

In mid-1997, Mealey was suspended without pay for two weeks and received a letter of reprimand from the commission for feigning “mooning” the shoreline of Lake Pend Oreille.

The incident occurred on a tour boat chartered by the commission.

Also at Wednesday’s meeting, Charles Ray, a McCall logger and steelhead fisherman, criticized the department for allowing the fisheries staff to be quieted by the governor’s office and other officials.

In response, Mealey asked fisheries chief Virgil Moore if his or his staff’s position ever was “filtered or changed” by Mealey or the governor’s office. Moore said that he and Mealey reached consensus about their messages but that their scientific integrity never was compromised.

“I’m damn sick of your irresponsible rhetoric,” Mealey said to Ray. He then went on to question Ray’s commitment to conservation.

Wood gaveled the hearing over as commissioners protested Mealey’s comment.