Legislation that would have given Colorado lawmakers the ability to increase hunting and fishing fees died in a Senate committee last week.
As The Denver Post reports, House Bill 1321 would have helped Colorado Parks and Wildlife raise money to avoid reducing access to hunting and fishing areas, closing fish hatcheries, slashing license allotments and reducing conservation work.
Colorado Parks and Wildlife hoped the legislation would have given the wildlife commission the ability to raise residential hunting and fishing fees by as much as 50 percent in order to help offset a $22 million shortfall in funding by 2023.
Last summer, Parks and Wildlife officials toured the state and held meetings in which they expressed the need for license fee increases to ensure that the state’s hunters and anglers did not see a dramatic reduction of services.
The bill passed through the House but the five member Senate Finance Committee voted Thursday to indefinitely postpone it.
