By Walter Mares
Greenlee County will not be joining the Arizona/New Mexico Coalition of Counties in litigation involving a new federal plan involving Mexican wolf recovery.
After an hour-long executive session at its Feb. 17 meeting, the three-member Greenlee County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously not to become involved with the coalition’s intent to sue the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service over its plan to greatly expand wolf recovery territory.
The wolf recovery area had been limited to the Blue Wilderness area in northern Greenlee County in southeastern Arizona and Catron County in western New Mexico. The counties border each other.
In January, Fish & Wildlife announced a new rule that increases the wolf recovery area to cover about two-thirds of Arizona and two-thirds of New Mexico.
Fish & Wildlife had been sued by certain environmental groups for not having developed a new plan. The Arizona Game & Fish Department also threatened to sue Fish & Wildlife over the same issue and had issued a letter of intent to engage in litigation if a new plan was not established.
The Greenlee supervisors’ take on the coalition suit was that if the action were successful, it would only take the wolf recovery program “back to step one,” when the wolves were first introduced, and would do little, if anything, to stop the new plan introduced by Fish & Wildlife.
“We don’t see how joining in the coalition’s litigation would benefit Greenlee County,” said Supervisor Ron Campbell, R-Dist. 2. Campbell’s district encompasses all of northern Greenlee, including the Blue Wilderness wolf release area.
“Money that would go toward litigation can instead be used for needs we have here in Greenlee,” Campbell said. “We also have to look at budget cuts that are undoubtedly coming from federal and state sources we will receive. We’ll also be making our own budget cuts.”
A new count by Fish & Wildlife of the existing wolf population came up with higher numbers than were probably expected. The count had been estimated at 83 wolves in the wild. The recent count tallied a wolf population of 109.
The wolves — about 11 — were first released in Greenlee County in 1998. Wolves were later released in Catron County.