During our meeting with the senior Leadership of WDFW on the 26th of Oct, the department's legal representative said that the sport fishing community is responsible for the current situations between the Tribes and WDFW. The situation meaning things like: The ramp at Point no point, the loss of the Skokomish river and having the observers thrown out and kept out of the NOF process since 2013! He explained that the sport fishing community "upset" the tribes by their comments on the various fishing boards, and therefore the Tribes "clam up" and refuse to cooperate. WDFW asks that we STOP upsetting the tribes. The Director says their strategy is to "cooperate and wait" meaning, they will continue to build the relationship in hopes that sometime in the future the tribes will see all the good will and respond.

SO, I apologize for forgetting my place. After all, I AM only a citizen of this state, and it is not my place to ask for fair and transparent fisheries management. I'm sorry if I've hurt the tribal co-managers feelings and hope they will not use the permits as a tool to punish the sport fishing community.

Nevertheless, they persisted.

I will have to agree that the performance of many along the Skok was not the Poster Boy example of how anglers should behave in public.

LMFAO.......Grays Harbor has the "Wynoochee Mitigation" going on, $2.4 million setting in a fund for steelhead and Coho on this river.

Current Director likes to "cooperate and wait", well kiss my ass....the wait part has been going on since 1992, that is 25 YEARS. Those of us that have spent time with local Region 6 staff and have taken the time to make presentations before the WDFW Commission, have a feeling about "wait" from WDFW Staff........grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Seems like WDFW's legal representative needs to take stock of who WDFW works for. Annoys the hell out of me when public employees forget what public service means.

Lord folks the tribe or agency is always upset with the public in particular the Rec who pays the bills. Your rocking the happy little process boat. If not that they would find something else to blame but never look in the mirror and admit both the tribes and agency are the problem. Always have a fall guy is how it works.

I need a name please....

Tribe's want to play in the Big Leagues then they should expect a few that are high and tight. Grow the **uck up. If their feelings are that easily hurt.......

Please tell us that meeting was taped.

Unfortunately no, the meeting was not taped. We thought about it, but in the end decided it would seem too confrontational.

However, what I said can be corroborated by four others who in the meeting with me.

Thats funny, blame the people you serve, who's taxes and fees pay your salary, who you exclude from participation or being witness to any and all negotiations, for poor relations with the co-managers. So blame the people who you negotiate on behalf of for doing a poor job.

This sounds really reasonable.

It’s the perfect solution for the WDFW leadership. Tell the Sportsmen it’s all there fault. That way they take no responsibility AND they feel good about not representing us because we’re just a bunch of trouble makers.

Hey Ned, not sure what you mean by needing a name, but the person who made the comment that the sports are responsible for the Tribes not wanting to play nice is. AG Mike Grossmen. I believe he is then Assistant District Attorney assigned to the Department.

Oh, so this guy "mike Grossman" works for that NAZI ball licker "Bob Ferguson", no wonder he is a self empowered disrespectful prick who would never take responsibility for his own actions. Well this explains a lot, it also explains the reason we are in this position and why the people we pay to represent our interests are only serving themselves. I wonder how much "casino" money they receive in "brown bag payments" and how many "VIP" on the house" visits they get to the casinos?

Nothing surprises me anymore, especially in this state where a lifelong serial child sex predator can run for high political office, be voted in, hold the position and then ride away into the sun set with nothing to worry about when the poop gets too deep.

These are the things we should expect in this state unfortunately.

" I believe he is then Assistant District Attorney assigned to the Department."

The title is Assistant Attorney General (AAG), assigned to the Department.

I agree with Mr Grossman. It is our fault we are in this situation.
Who else should we be blaming?

Wdfw works for tribal and commercial special interest groups with deep pockets. If there buddies need something done it will get done.
At the expense of the resource they are supposed to be protecting.

Tribes are winning this battle but the fish are losing the war.

But the Tribes are the First Conservationists and make their management decisions seven generations into the future. Least that is what our mandatory training told us.

Yes, sorry for the error...

This is pathetic and disgusting but nothing new.

This is the culture of this states government, you saw it with the "safe injection sites" with King County, corrupt judges decide that the people have no voice.

Nearly 20 years ago as a tribal police officer I tried to report proof of fraud to WDFW, proof was waiting for them, frozen in the fish house, (4200 wild steelhead with heads and tails cut off) frozen and stacked like cord wood, waiting to be transported as it had been sold as Halibut bait headed to the Alaska commercial fishery. Instead of thanking me for the information and taking some type of action, they refused to even come look at it, instead they accused me of lying and called me names. That is the culture we are dealing with here in Washington.

We have massive corruption on all levels, every branch is totally compromised. The only thing that matters is money.