Governor orders Fish and Wildlife Commission investigation; group calls for removal of WDFW director

An investigation has been ordered into Washington’s Fish and Wildlife Commission and now environmentalists want the Department of Fish and Wildlife’s director gone.

Gov. Bob Ferguson directed Washington State Human Resources Office to investigate the conduct of Washington Fish and Wildlife commissioners, a spokesperson said Friday.

The investigation, first reported by Columbia Insight, came after Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Kelly Susewind sent a letter to Ferguson requesting the investigation. Susewind pointed to recently released internal documents that he said “call the conduct of several Commissioners into question.”

“I have reviewed a sufficient number of these documents to believe further investigation is warranted,” Susewind wrote.

Now environmental groups are calling for Susewind’s removal.

When the nine-member panel met Friday and took public comment, several environmentalists and animal rights activists bashed Susewind’s decision to send the letter and called for his removal.

Franscisco Santiago-Avila, of Washington Wildlife First, said the letter indicated Susewind was aligning himself with the Sportsmen’s Alliance, which has petitioned Ferguson for the removal of four commissioners.

“We were shocked by this audacious and irresponsible play for power,” he said.

Calls for the director’s removal open a new front in the battle for control of wildlife management in Washington.

The commission oversees the state Department of Fish and Wildlife and makes decisions on wildlife conservation and hunting and fishing regulations. It also has the power to hire and fire the agency’s director.

Hunters have raged over commission decisions over the past few years that limited or removed some hunting opportunities, such as the vote to end spring bear hunting. They believe several commissioners are in the pocket of anti-hunting organizations.

Meanwhile, animal rights activitsts and environmentalists still feel commissioners favor hunters’s interests in their decisions. They also feel Susewind, who has served as director since 2018, has always tilted toward hunters.

Conflict between the two sides has been simmering for years and has become the norm during commission public comment sessions, with both hunters and animal rights activists turning out in droves to lambast decisions they despise and praise those they like.

Both sides have also targeted specific commissioners at times for removal. The Sportsmen’s Alliance sued Commissioner Lorna Smith of Jefferson County in 2023 because she simultaneously held two appointed positions – her seat on the commission and a spot on her local planning board. Smith ultimately resigned from the planning board.

This past spring, after Ferguson reappointed Molly Linville of Douglas County, Washington Wildlife First deployed the same tactic against her – she was serving on her local school board at the time and later resigned that position.

The Sportsmen’s Alliance petition, filed in May, asked Ferguson to remove four commissioners: Smith, Barbara Baker, Melanie Rowland and John Lehmkuhl, who was elected vice-chair of the commission Friday.

In the petition, the group cites internal correspondence obtained through a public records request to argue the four commissioners subverted open meetings laws, disregarded tribal input and violated public records laws.

Environmental groups have framed the alliance’s petition as a “smear campaign” targeting commissioners hunters don’t like.

Little has come out of the governor’s office since the petition was filed. Baker, who was chair of the commission until a new chair was elected Friday, said at previous meetings that she had met with the governor’s office.

Susewind’s letter is dated Aug. 8. It does not name specific commissioners but says he’s concerned about the documents that the Sportsmen’s Alliance released.

“As you are aware, documents produced pursuant to recent public disclosure requests call the conduct of several Commissioners into question. I have reviewed a sufficient number of these documents to believe further investigation is warranted,” Susewind wrote.

Columbia Insight reported that Smith and Rowland wrote to the governor calling Susewind’s request “highly inappropriate.”

Multiple public commenters on Friday thanked Susewind for writing to the governor, and thanked the governor for ordering an investigation. Meanwhile, several environmentalists backed Santiago-Avila’s calls for removing Susewind and joined him in urging the governor to make sure the investigation to includes all commissioners and the director.

The investigation’s full scope is unclear, but it will be meant to address Susewind’s concerns, according to Brionna Aho, a spokesperson for the governor’s office.

“Investigators will follow up with Director Susewind to better understand those concerns and determine the scope of the investigation,” Aho said in an email.