North Dakota Outdoors: Advisory board meetings

Outdoor enthusiasts have many ways to communicate with Game and Fish personnel, including face-to-face.

Since the 1960s, the Game and Fish Department advisory board has held public meetings across the state in spring and fall to listen to concerns from hunters and anglers and provide information on agency programs.

"There are eight Game and Fish Advisory Districts and each district has a board member appointed to those districts by the governor. And by law, each one of those advisory board members is responsible for holding a meeting in their respective districts twice a year," said Scott Peterson, NDGF deputy director.

At this time of year, the meetings are usually held right after the deer gun season, and spring meetings are typically held in late March and early April. The first hour of the meetings is set aside for public input, followed by Game and Fish presentations.

"This year we're going to be giving an update on aquatic nuisance species. We're going to be talking about an update on chronic wasting disease in the state of North Dakota. We're going talk about some proposed changes to our fishing proclamation, which is coming up next spring. And we're going to talk about an update on bighorn sheep management in North Dakota, because we have some changes that we want to get out there to the public," said Peterson.

Advisory board meetings are designed to get face-to-face local feedback in each of the eight districts.

"The meetings are set up primarily as a forum for local sportsmen and women to air local issues. Things that that they see out there that they maybe just have a question on why we do things the way we do them. Or maybe there's a local issue that they'd like to propose a change. And the meetings are set up as a forum to talk about those kinds of things, question and answers. They can air any kind of concern related to hunting, fishing, trapping that they want to at those meetings," said Peterson.

Game and Fish has representatives from each division at the meetings to answer any questions that come up.

Dates and locations of upcoming meetings can be found at: gf.nd.gov