Most of my understanding of town halls comes from watching the smug condescension of Reverend Shaw Moore in Footloose
By David Conrad
It’s a Monday evening, and I’ve signed in to Zoom to listen to the third-and-final Virtual Town Hall on the 2023 Coastal Steelhead season hosted by Washington’s Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW). The previous two events have been open forums where the WDFW has both shared their ideas and solicited new ones for managing an already-scarce resource. Tonight, is the big reveal where the regulations will be announced.
Like all virtual events, it’s awkward, lacking the authenticity and connection of in-person gatherings. And like the previous events the WDFW has hosted, it’s also painful because these processes are about compromise to ensure as many people get some part of what they want while knowing that nobody will get everything they want. Nobody yells, but the frustration is palpable, even through pixels on my computer screen.
I’ll confess that most of my understanding of town halls comes from watching the smug condescension of Reverend Shaw Moore in Footloose (the 1984 version kids, keep up) and the small-but-vocal group of disenfranchised students who just want to shake their asses. And to an extent, it holds true.
As people start to weigh in, I imagine this will conclude with at least a few stiff drinks for the department hosts once they’ve ended the meeting. You have a group of people who are there to debate the science of the problem or who take issue with the data accuracy. Not much can be done to placate this group. There’s no point in debating with folks who haven’t quite come around to this idea of “science.” Regardless of the data accuracy, it’s the dataset used to make decisions, so you must work with it. And if the data are dire enough for the agency (who’s beholden to forces such as license sales that can over-tax the system and carve out as much opportunity as possible) to worry, you might assume the problem is much worse in reality.
Then you have another group who are there to express outrage at the reality of the situation. Their gripes are veiled with “first of all, I want to say how much I appreciate all the work you put into this,” which is inevitably followed with “BUT…”. I expect these will continue to compound and spiral, one angry angler enabling the next until the meeting is forced to end early.
However, something different takes place. The attendees genuinely acknowledge the challenging situation we find ourselves in with Washington’s coastal steelhead fisheries. And once they’ve had a moment to share their discontent, nearly everyone seems to find acceptance and even make peace with regulations that will impact their life or livelihood in some way. Some even go further, asking about ways to directly help the Department with research and enforcement.
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February 16, 2023 at 08:38PM
Frog Fishing Lure 