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The spectacular rise of Alaska wildlife manager Corey RossiEditor's Note: This is the first of a two-part story. Read Part II: How investigators busted Alaska wildlife manager Corey Rossi When Alaska State Troopers showed up at the door of Kenai big-game guide Joe Dilley in December wanting to ask him questions about possible outlaw hunting done by the state's wildlife director, Dilley had no idea who they were talking about. Dilley doesn't follow state politics closely. If he did, he would immediately have recognized the name of Corey Rossi. Rossi is a controversial figure in the north, a big proponent of what was years ago labeled "intensive management.'' Intensive management is built around the idea of maximizing populations of moose, caribou and deer in Arctic and sub-Arctic environments. The main way to do that -- other than through the use of habitat-modifying tools like fire, which people tend to dislike because it burns down cabins -- is to kill predators: Wolves, black bears and, in the biggest Alaska wildlife controversy of the moment, grizzly bears. Grizzlies are an endangered or threatened species in the few others states and Canadian provinces where the animal survives. But it wasn't just Rossi's advocacy for predator control, as opponents of intensive management prefer to call the activity, that made him controversial. Nor was it involvement with Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife, a collection of high-rollers who spun away from established hunting and conservation groups with reservations about intensive management. No, what really set Rossi apart was how he landed the high-profile job as director of the Division of Wildlife Conservation in the once prestigious Alaska Department of Fish and Game. Rossi got that job not because of what he knew, but who he knew: Chuck and Sally Heath, the parents of Sarah Palin. Once Alaska's most-popular governor, Palin became one of the nation's most controversial candidates for vice president. That, however, didn't happen until after she was elected governor with a vow to clean up government at a time when the state was in midst of scandal. Bill Allen, the head of the oilfield service company VECO, had been caught trying to manipulate state legislators in all sorts of ways to encourage them to hold down oil taxes. Palin promised to put an end to such shenanigans and come down hard on the oil companies, which she did. Proud, rich historyPalin also brought into government one of the most crony-laden administrations in state history. Rossi, a man with neither a college degree nor any wildlife management experience, was one of those cronies. Despite his weak resume, Sally Heath lobbied her daughter to have family friend Rossi named Commissioner of the Department of Fish and Game. Sally emailed Sarah and the new governor's staff that "Corey Rossi would be hard to beat. Some things to think about. The people that are saying it's (Fish and Game) too big for Rossi to manage are the very same people who said the same thing about you ..." Rossi was never going to get the commissioner's job, however. Even as the decade drew toward a close, the state agency remained a prestigious though fading organization. It would be years before anyone lacking a strong background in fish and wildlife management would be named to run it. As late as five years ago, it was an agency still proud of its rich history, an agency not far removed from the time when it was one of the most respected fish and wildlife management organizations in the world. In its heyday, what was formerly known as the Fish and Game's "Game Division" (now the Division of Wildlife Conservation) was “the" place where almost anyone seriously interested in predator/prey relationships in northern ecosystems wanted to work. For years, much of the leading research on wolves and grizzly bears was done by the agency. Today Cora announced that Dale Rabe was replaced and that Doug Vincent-Lang is now Acting Director of Wildlife Conservation Division. Oy vey. Rossi's a great gopher choker, probably helped Alaska moose herds more than 68 wantabe ex-gopher chokers !! Really good articles. It would be interesting to examine Rossi's role in accelerating the direction of ADF&G toward snaring, trapping, shooting brown bears over bait, using helicopters to transport hunters, aerial shooting of bears, etc. Today the board removed the prohibition against aerial shooting of bears from the statutes, leaving only poison as a prohibited method. This is so that ADF&G staff can annually shoot up to 20 brown bears of any age or class in Unit 26B using helicopters and fixed wing aircraft. They hope to kill any bear they catch threatening or killing a musk ox. It's not an intensive management plan, because musk ox aren't covered as one of the ungulates determined to have high human use. If it works, in 7 years there might be 3-9 musk ox permits. Those will be some mighty expensive musk oxen. But the whole intensive management philosophy is a farce anyway, even beyond the weak research behind it. The moose population and harvest on the Kenai is already well within the IM objectives, but the BOG approved wolf control to "reallocate" moose from wolves to people. Not that we're game farming or anything. And? Ever review the current commercial fisheries program, with Palins set net Chairman on the Board of Fish? It's very interesting that after the CFEC, wrote an Optimum Number Study for the Bristol Bay Drift Net Fishery, that's being applied in Bristol Bay Set, Kodiak Set, Cook Inlet, and a very very interesting South East Alaska Purse Seine Buyback Program, using Federal Funding from the NMFS, with NO Optimum Number Study, as required under Alaska statutes of the CFEC. Yes just own a set net sight in Bristol Bay, from the Palin Family Tree, and then discriminate against the Drift Fleet, by using the favored "allocation within a single fishery" as explained by the Alaska Supreme Court in Grunert. That Old 14th Amendment of 1868, always confusing to any so called Alaskan, with William H. Sewards signature, shortly after 1867. Define Confederate Party? Has anyone ever herd of Petersburg, and their ties to the Corrupt Bastards Club in Alaska? And the White Knight is talking backwards Say we separate the political from the legal and biological for a moment. If the man broke the law then he needs to be held accountable. The fact that he was a Palin appointee is irrelevant to his breaking the law(s) and to game management. Consider the once mighty Kenai Moose Refuge and surrounding game units. They tell me 10 legal moose were taken this season. Last count (at Christmas) on the road between Kenai and Homer they killed 200. The reason draconian rules were put in place for this years hunting and possibly next is predation by bears and wolves in the interior of the Kenai. As one who hunted 16A & 16B which at one time had more moose per mile than any other areas of AK, I have seen the results of enlightened management there, and on the Kenai i.e. a frickin disaster. Overrun with predators and selective hunting for trophy animals. You guys talk with forked tongue. I am no fan of trophy big game hunting and that would be my first departure with Rossi, but shooting predators and maximizing the moose for resident consumption is a big plus for me. We got the 50" and 3 brow tine 20 years plus ago and if you research such policies it favors big game or trophy hunting and means less killed in the short run, but a crash in the game populations long term which is exactly what we are seeing in South Central Alaska. A 33" moose eats as good as a 53" moose. I know from experience. When you kill across the gene pool instead of targeting the biggest and best or merely the fork spikes you get a better cull and more meat on the table which is the right of Alaskans urban or rural. But then again I am just a communication/business major so I my thoughts and experience don't count. I know damn well I could manage the game better with all due respect to the biologists etc. Leftist hunting policies are not good for the game populations or the human. Unless your goal is to kill more moose on the road and people. No. Excuse me I read the game management report when it was announced last Spring released by the game board. They actually said "don't be fooled" by the number of moose along the road system. That the distressed moose were back in the hills due to wolves and bears and recommended predator control be stepped up. It was in the local news etc. I didn't grab it out of my azz. I thought that Palin's platform was that she put an end to 'old boy' cronyism. I guess I misunderstood her, what she meant was that she got rid of those old corrupt bastards to bring in some of her own choosing. I don't like to admit that I voted for that gal, but I re-learned a valuable lesson that what you see is not always what you get. -TomClark Shameful. Here's a prescient Juneau Empire commentary by author and photographer Nick Jans from two years ago about Rossi. My turn: Rossi simply isn't qualified for wildlife director position A recent Empire headline read, "Wildlife Director Leaving Juneau." More to the point, scientific wildlife management seems to be leaving Alaska. Last week, Alaska Department of Fish & Game commissioner Denby Lloyd asked Doug Larsen to step down as director of wildlife conservation, and named in his place assistant commissioner Corey Rossi. Though no official reason was given, the story is plain as a blood trail on snow: Larsen, a respected scientist with more than three decades of ADF&G experience, was summarily replaced by a man brought into the department by former Gov. Sarah Palin to direct part of ADF&G's predator control program. Predator control, properly informed by rigorous science, can be a valuable wildlife management tool. Unfortunately, that specific, study-driven approach has been fading steadily in the rear view mirror, under the pressure of special interest groups who are bent on shaping wildlife management to their own ends. With the appointment of Rossi, it's clear that science isn't driving this bus anymore. When he was first named as assistant commissioner in December 2008, ADF&G's own press release was conspicuously mum on the subject of his academic credentials. In fact, Rossi turns out to be a high school graduate who's taken a string of college courses from the Berryman Institute in Utah. Rossi doesn't even have a bachelor's degree in biology, let alone the advanced scientific credentials that characterized past directors. In fact, Rossi's school record wouldn't qualify him to be hired as a junior field biologist. The sum of Rossi's bona fides (besides being a close friend of the Palin family) is that he worked for the USDA overseeing the control of undesired animals - as one ADF&G biologist put it, a "gopher choker." While his past employment history may qualify him to snare bears with a baited bucket, the Director of Wildlife Conservation position demands a far wider range of scientific knowledge and experience. Rossi's hire marks the point at which ADF&G has crossed a threshold that should alarm all Alaskans, as well as the scientific community. In this brave new world, a paralegal can head a law firm; a nurse can direct a team of surgeons, and a high school grad can direct a scientific agency. Though I'm sure some will come forward to defend Rossi, the point stands: he's simply not qualified for the position to which he was appointed. Of course, Rossi did not appoint himself. Commissioner Lloyd is ultimately responsible for this decision, which can only cast serious doubt on his leadership, and upon the credibility of ADF&G. This credibility only becomes more strained when we come to the matter of Mr. Rossi's connection to the special interest group, Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife/Habitat. Following his initial appointment to ADF&G, the programs for which he lobbied at the behest of SFW/H (notably the wide-scale, virtually limitless killing of black bears in Unit 16B) quickly became ADF&G policy-a startling development, considering that SFW/H is not a scientific organization. Founded by Utah businessman Don Peay, SFW/H makes no secret of its goals to re-shape wildlife management departments in lower 48 and Alaska through political pressure, in order to promote what they call "abundance-based management"-basically a euphemism for Maximum Sustained Yield, a wildlife Ponzi scheme that would make Bernie Madoff proud. According to SFW/H's philosophy, producing the greatest possible number of meat animals for human hunters is all that matters. All other wildlife issues and other user groups, consumptive or non, are subservient at best. Though SFW/H claims to adhere to science, they mean only the science that supports their viewpoints and ends. As illustration of the very real pressure they bring to bear on the department, consider an email SFW/H spokesman Dane Crowley sent to Denby Lloyd (and cc'd to Rossi) on July 14, 2009, identifying career biologists by name that he wanted disciplined or fired-basically telling ADF&G its business in a very specific and vehement manner. Lloyd's surprisingly cordial response (obtained through a public documents request) concludes with, "I look forward to continued cooperation between ADF&G and groups such as yours in meeting ... wildlife management objectives for Alaska." When the lines between an extremist special interest group and a state agency become this blurred, something's deeply wrong. It's time for concerned Alaskans to demand a full official inquiry. I knew you were capable of good reporting Craig! Keep up the investigative journalism. This is just the tip of the iceberg. Rossi has made it his living exterminating wildlife. Now, he will sit accused and face the consequences. Question is: With Cora Cambell and that "Deer in the headlight" interview, who will be chosen next? Which family friend of Parnell will rise to the challenge? Hard to imagine anyone more under qualified then Rossi.....but there probably is! Rossi unqualified to be Division Director? Funny, I don't recall this level of whining when Governor Knowles appointed an ENGLISH MAJOR who had worked for a while as a land planner, to be Commissioner at ADFG. Oh, that's right. Frank Rue was opposed to predator control, so that made it all OK with the environmental moon bats. What hypocrites! Just to set the record straight, there is a good argument to be made that Rue was the least qualified ADF&G Commissioner prior to Cora Campbell. But Rue had a masters degree in landscape architecture/planning from University of Massachusetts at Amherst. That degree requires some study of basic ecology. And Rue served a lengthy apprenticeship -- about a decade -- studying fish and wildlife issues in Alaska, first with the coastal-zone management division in the Department of Natural Resources and then with ADF&G. He was named ADF&G commissioner only after years as director of the Division of Habitat and Rehabilitation in Fish and Game. As Habitat director, Rue supervised a sizable professional staff. Rossi has no degree, never supervised a professional staff, and spent only a short stint in a specially created position at Fish and Game before taking over as Wildlife Division director. There are a lot of good things that can be said about Rossi. He was hugely successful at the politics of wildlife management in Alaska. But his qualifications to run a major state agency were thin. Grizzlybear, whoever you are, you are probably as qualified as Rossi to run the Wildlife Division. And this being a democracy, it should be recognized there is nothing inherently wrong with putting unqualified people in charge of government. We regularly elect them, and often they do good works. But facts are facts. Rossi got to where he got based not on what he knew, but who he knew. Sometimes, too, that works out well for everyone. That does not appear to be the case this time. Craig, While I think that we agree that Rossi Probably has done something that should not ever be tolerated of someone in his position and I for one hope that if proven guilty he gets a lot stiffer punishment than that normally seen, I really think you ought to do a little more research prior to writing. Lets check out exactly what it was that he did for the Feds... Remember that EWACS aircraft that ingested all those geese that were being raised by the city of Anchorage? (killed a whole planeload of air force crew) If you lived in Anchorage you might notice that those geese are no longer around in anywhere near the numbers and are now not much of a threat. (Rossi created and managed the program). Airports all over the state now have viable wildlife control programs. (Rossi...Again) oh yeah by the way... those program are not based on killing the wildlife. They were designed and implemented by his staff of biologists. and you know what? they work and work well. If you insist on writing this stuff please fact check first. Lots of us want to agree with you but, well, we keep finding these errors and omissions and we just cannot trust what we see.... "...in the once prestigious Alaska Department of Fish and Game.... I couldn't agree with you more. I have watched in dismay as this Dept has fallen into the sewer of politics. I have had more ADF&G friends & acquaintances over many years than almost any other group of people. Science, responsiveness to the public, and accountability have all taken a huge nose dive in this Dept. Not to mention the managerial pettiness & retaliation running rampant, causing folks to look over their shoulders. Do you know how hard it is to get a biologist or a bear hibernation guru to care about politics? I hope Rossi's inevitable fines are huge and debilitating - he's a bully and he has stolen resources from us all. Any hunters joining him and acting in like manner also need to reimburse Alaska for their greed. So should Sarah Palin for that matter. She'd be writing checks til she kicked the bucket for all this dead weight left behind to suck up state resources. Book 'em Dano! Shooting a bear with a paw snared in a bait trap shouldn't meet any legal definition of hunting. Amazing to think of the psychology guiding ones actions to think of it as moral. Must be part of that whole man's dominion over nature rant. |
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