Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Representative Ela Chapin]: Good afternoon

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: and welcome to the House Environment Committee. This afternoon we are going to hear from Peter Brewert from the University of Vermont on species introductions, reintroductions, for the record.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: That's it. Alright. Well, thanks. Good afternoon, everybody. Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Introduce yourself.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: So, again, yes, my name is Peter Bruit, and I'm a senior lecturer at UVM at the Rubenstein School and the director of the sustainability, ecology, and policy program there. My research focuses on the politics of ecological restoration, particularly in the last few years on the politics of species reintroductions, and that's what I'm aiming to share with you all here today. Hopefully, it'll offer some perspective and data that might be of use going forward. Before I do go forward, though, I I should make clear that I have not researched catamount reintroduction specifically. In fact, I've had I've had some conversations about doing that in the future, but so my presentation here will come from my research on other introductions and some other restoration as well. We'll look that soon. Now if if my slides were to go forward So just to give you an idea of what you're in for here, I'm gonna start out with a couple of baseline sort of concepts, then talk about a couple of the projects that I've worked on related to these issues, and then some kind of bigger issues to bear in mind, takeaways on the subject. Before I go further, I just wanna make everybody hear me okay. It's not a big room, but I taught a class earlier today, and so I'm a little hoarse. So you may have heard about the the idea of the sixth extinction, the idea that we're living through a time of massive extinction comparable with some of the big ones of the past. That topic is debated a lot, but what's not debatable is that we're going through a time of localized extinction, extirpation, that in practically every part of The United States and many other places, formerly resident or even common species have been eliminated with big repercussions for those ecosystems and the human communities that live there. In response to this and other problems, we're seeing in the last, you know, really, I'd say the last thirty years, rise in attempts to restore ecosystems and to do so through translocating or reintroducing formerly present species specifically. It's worth bearing in mind, and this is really the focus of what I'm going to be speaking about here, that these are political decisions, human decisions based on human priorities, and that for that reason, a decision to do it or not, the the program's success or failure and by and what constitutes success or failure is partly gonna depend on political support and on social support. To give you a little bit example of what what I've pictured here, so beavers used to be common across most of North America, were driven extinct in much of their former range, then they are ecosystem engineers, as I I assume you all familiar with beavers. So the desire to restore them was fairly common. The picture on your my right, your left, is a program in Idaho where they wanted to put beavers back into remote parts of that state but couldn't get in there through vehicles traditionally, so they they parachuted beavers into the backcountry with little boxes that kinda opened as they ended. You could see the beaver being like, oh. But at the same time, this kind of thing can be controversial. So in in England, beavers, similar species to our North American beaver, were once common, now are gone from the island. There's some halting efforts to try to reintroduce them, but this kind of thing is controversial. People don't are worried about the implications or or don't like change. And so, you know, we see one of the experimental efforts, and then this guy had his beavers kidnapped apparently by his beavers. So the the first predator reintroduction bit of work that I'm gonna share with you is is the the red wolf, canis rufus. Not a species that's terribly well known. Maybe I don't know if you're all familiar with it or not, but this was the native canid dog like animal of much of the Eastern US, from East Texas Florida up to Connecticut ish, although the ish is something we'll get into in a second. They were persecuted like most large predators and a lot of small ones well into the twentieth century. I when officially declared extinct in the wild in 1980, probably effectively extinct a while before that. And then they were actually one of the first species to be put on the endangered species list prior to the endangered species act, actually, and reintroduced in the Far East Of North Carolina in 1987. If you've ever been to the Outer Banks, this is the peninsula that's the closest mainland to that, and that's where they were reintroduced. About a dozen of them. For the following twenty years, Red Wolf numbers rose. And then in the mid two thousands, they began to fall from, as you can see, a peak of about a 130. The main cause of this was people shooting them. The nadir of the of the population was 2020, and there was about seven left. Over the course of this time, political support fluctuated both in the Albemarle Peninsula and on the state and federal levels. Right now, there's about 30. Now it's an interesting factor here is that the arrival of coyotes complicated the situation a lot. You can see from the image that coyotes are not identical to red wolves but look pretty similar. And one of the other things to bear in mind here is that coyotes can interbreed with red wolves and produce fertile offspring. All the big North American canids, domestic dogs, gray wolves, red wolves, coyotes, can produce puppies with each other, those puppies can go on to have puppies. So two this raised two issues. One is hybridization. If you have a puppy that's half red wolf and half coyote, what is that legally? The other is if somebody is intending to shoot a coyote and they shoot a red wolf, it's an understandable accident. If someone intends to shoot a red wolf, they can say they thought it was a coyote, no one can contradict that. So what I took from a look at the perspectives of stakeholders in this. Unsurprisingly, some number of people were afraid of wolves. Wolves have a big scary place in our culture, the big bad wolf and so forth. Others were concerned about the role that they might have in reducing game species, particularly deer, and, what it might mean later on for coyote hunting. One of the one of the big, issues starting the decline of the red wolf population was the threat to change the regulations around coyote hunting. People didn't like that. Over time, the folks involved in this issue got to to question whether or not the red wolf was a real animal, both in terms of being native to North Carolina, but also in terms of whether it's it was a distinct species or whether it was really just a big coyote. Part of the problem here is that when Europeans arrived in what became North America, the people didn't have any vocabulary for a large wolf looking thing other than wolf. It's a bit debatable how much genetic variation there was between coyotes in the West, red wolves in the East, and indeed the Eastern or Algonquin wolf that formerly lived in Vermont. There is debate on the subject amongst scholars. But amongst red wolf opponents, it became pretty well established that that this is not a real animal, that this is an animal that's been been been foisted upon the people of the region by the government for vague but negative purposes was the the the perspective. This sparked opposition that then made its way into influencing state and federal perspectives that affect the way the program is run. So that's that's the Rutland story. Across the water, the the other program that I wanna talk about a little bit here is back on our map. Boom. I tell my my students that if you wanna have something, then you should get a good acronym. This is a program that was looking to reintroduce or reinforce 12 different, locally extinct or rare species in the Northwestern Part of England. England is about the most biologically degraded country in the world for its size, but Old England does have a few lessons for us here in New England. One of these was the European pine marten, again fairly similar to the pine marten that we have here. And one of the things that distinguished this program was that the goals were not just ecological, but they were just as much social to try to engage and educate and and inspire and benefit local people, local communities, local stakeholder groups as part of this reintroduction program. Part of this was the choice of species themselves. They started out with a list of more than 100 potential candidate reintroduction species, and through a long process of community consultation, boiled it down to the selected 12. The martens, as the only predator, were a bit of a special case. They there's a bird called a corn craig that was also a feasibility study, but you don't need to hear about So because of the extra difficulties reintroducing predators, they went in as a feasibility and educational program, Reaching out to various members of the community, trying to speaking to different organizations around the area. Most particularly, I'd point to the feasibility study giving out two surveys. One, to the people of the region in general, how do you feel about having pine martins back? What are your priorities about it? And one focused specifically on interested parties, farmers and landowners. Pine martins are they're not very big. They don't take sheep or anything like that, but they eat chickens. They looked not just at how people felt, but also to try to understand the context of the way that people in that region live. How do you deal with pests now? Get an idea with some texture of the environment into which they would be reintroducing pine marns. They did a variety of other efforts at outreach as well. The result of the surveys indicated broad support, including within farmers and landowners for Martin reintroduction. And so as a extension of the project, pine martins were reintroduced in 2024, and there's now more than 30 of them. Two of them, just in the last six months, have disappeared. I put suspiciously in quotes because that's the term the police use for the disappearance of these tagged martins. So that's those are the the two projects. And so I'm gonna go into here. Do I have a timer on here? Am I am I on track for the time that you have? Yeah. We're good. We have

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: you till two.

[Representative Ela Chapin]: What was that?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Oh, This question is quite I'll just carry on. Alright. So what my data from looking at archives, interviewing stakeholders and so on, have shown from these projects, and I'm also going to draw a little bit on research from other ecological restoration projects, is the following factors that I found to be important in the political progress of reintroduction and restoration. One of them is that community engagement makes a huge difference, but I would particularly point to engagement at really each step of the process. It's fairly common now for restoration projects to engage with the community. And if before it starts and right during the initial burst of it, you know, to try to try to make a receptive community for it. But involving the public during implementation, during monitoring, and into the further future, then just what we're doing at the beginning mattered a lot. One of the things that was striking from the the BOOM project was, that a lot of different community groups, some of which didn't have a lot to do with the environment in and of themselves, found a lot of benefit and buy in from being part of the reintroduction of these various species as as as an activity, as a way of connecting to heritage and and and those sorts of things separately from the ecological impacts of whatever the species was. Term two. Obviously, all of the science is really important in all of this stuff. What is there gonna be enough genetic diversity for your reintroduced species to establish itself effectively? Is what's how's it gonna matter for the rest of the environment? What are the knock on effects, trophic cascades going to be? And communicating all of this really at all levels of relevance in the in the project is is important, but it's not enough. There's sometimes scientists will will who are involved with these things will say, well, you know, we told them, and that isn't that what else can you do when there's there's more you can do? Obviously, it's fairly obvious, but as as long long the as people understand what the goals of the project are and and what the outcomes are going to be in the short term and the long term, then there's there's less likely to be opposition. But it's human for to sometimes prioritize your own preferences and then work your understanding of science around those preferences. In the sociological literature, this is sometimes called barstool biology. I'll give you two relevant examples here. One is on my right, your left, there's a video that was has I forget how many millions of views on on YouTube. Some of you might even have seen it. It's got got a lot of hype where after the reintroduction of gray wolves canis lupus in Yellowstone National Park in the Northern Rockies, trophic cascade wherein wolves changed the populations of their prey animals, elk and so forth. These species moved across the landscape differently. The opening opportunities for other species, plant species, which then affected the flow of rivers and just generally portrays the reintroduction of wolves as a kind of a magical cure for the ailing ecosystem. This is not totally wrong, but it's not nearly as right as the as the video would make people feel either. This kind of impact was patchy across different areas and and more complicated than you would think. So that so sometimes people on the one hand latch on to science that agrees with them. On the flip side, this is a community demonstration during the the ramp up to the wolf reintroduction, and I've always wanted to speak to the the person with the yellow sign about how they came to this conclusion about gray wolves, which are resident across the whole northern third of the world, not being in Western Wyoming. But it's obviously something that somebody believed, felt strongly about, and actionalized, politically. Restoration projects tend to bank on either small organizations that are really involved with the issue or smaller units of large organizations. So, there's a lot of individual interaction or small group interaction between the people who are making things happen or not and the personal qualities of the individuals, aside from their technical training and so on, in engaging with people and interviewing them, I've seen time after time, is the difference between success and failure. That someone who's a good communicator, who's open minded, who's organized, is more likely to bring people closer to their viewpoint and make people understand their perspective better, form partnerships between organizations, and generally do the kind of work that restoration on a landscape is likely to require. Obviously, this is challenged sometimes by the constraints of whatever organization you work for, you can't go beyond that, and whatever finances you have, that's a hard limit as well. I would point in particular to landscape fragmentation, which I'll talk about in a minute. If you have a landscape where there's lots of different uses and owners and jurisdictions, then it's going be necessary for there to be more personal connection with the people who oversee those different jurisdictions. If you have a landscape that's mostly large chunks of federal land, like if you live in Northern Nevada or something like that, then it might be a bit different. On the flip side of that, there's likely to be some number of people who oppose whatever your restoration project is regardless of anything else. Some of this is will have to do with the specifics of the project, but one thing that happens pretty consistently is that people like the landscape that they're accustomed to and prefer that. And then that's that's often a deep seated feeling that that is difficult to to change and that that just have to accept as part of the political landscape, so to speak. In the American political system, a motivated individual or small group can keep Oh, yeah. Keep fighting for their side more or less indefinitely. You can sue. You can lobby. You can raise awareness in the community. You can do a lot to delay or halt a project. The image here is from the people who didn't like red wolves, was one guy who was kind of the face of the anti red wolf movement, and he hired a plane with a banner that said, Google Red Wolf Restoration Scandal, and it went in the newspaper. And so I did. It worshipped on me. And this created a there was an Internet chat room sort of where people that this brought you to and that that became a location, virtual location, but real enough politically, where people who opposed red wolves got together to plan action, to inform each other, and so forth. There weren't that many people who were actively involved with this, but those people have an impact. An important issue to think about, especially in a mostly privately owned landscape like North Carolina or Northern England, is spatial scale. Mean, if the project is successful, then the species will eventually spread. And if it's a mobile animal species, it'll spread potentially relatively fast. This will bring it into different people's land that's being used differently and eventually, probably, onto areas that were not part of any initial consultation or coordination. So planning around how the species might expand is one of the big challenges politically, and the other is temporal scale. Human time humans are impatient as a species, and grants, which often are what funds projects like this, grants or appropriations, don't tend to last for that long, you know, a few years, whereas the ecology may need decades in order to resolve itself. So how to manage for the long term in a way that is going to be effective for whatever the ecological goal is, but is affordable and continues to engage the necessary parts of the community to make things work, is a big challenge. We see this with the dam removals where most of the dam removals that I've worked with have to deal with trying to restore salmon to upper reaches of the river. But the expectation is that it'll take twenty to twenty five years before the salmon get to whatever their next state is going to be. Most funding, monitoring, and so forth is not likely to last nearly, though. So, with that, I'd be very happy to answer any questions to the best of my ability.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Thank you for your, presentation and sharing your work with us. I'd just like to start with a little bit more about your work. You said, you know, like in the last slide, projects you've worked with. Are you engaging with these projects? Are you a researcher or a consultant? Researcher. Okay. You're just following their process. You're not advising.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Yeah. That's to this is a this is a common tension amongst amongst researchers is how involved to be, but I well, I like to think of a personable guy. I feel like I need to not be on anybody's side in order to have my data kind of stand on their own. So I engage equally with all the different parts of it, and then, hopefully, what I found is it provides value kind of in and of itself.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: How many projects have you been involved with?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Depends on how you cut it. Eight, nine.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: And can you generalize? You talked a little bit about, like, the individuals. Like, are these projects how have those eight been motivated? Like, what what was the impetus for them?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Why did I wanna do the No. Not you. Oh. Oh. Oh. How how did they start? Oh. Well, it this sounds a little silly, but I think it's accurate. It starts because of sadness. So along the same lines that an opponent can block progress for a long time, a motivated proponent can do a lot kind of starting from zero. Usually, there'll be a small group of people who kind of look at the state of the landscape and know that it was different before and think, We can fix this. And then there's not a lot of laws to guide restoration. Most of our kind of environmental laws say, Stop bad behavior rather than sparking good behavior. So they look for opportunities within whatever laws exist, within whatever public lands might be possible, and kind of piece it together a lot of the time, especially in the early days of some of these projects would have been in the eighties, you know, politics is different. People kind of making it up as they go.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Have all of your projects been in this country?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: A little bit in England.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Can you do a little compare, contrast there?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Yeah. I would say that so if you've you've seen photos of of Moppelia, honestly, from, like, 1880, Northern England looks like that now. No trees. Many sheep. And they have almost no native biodiversity. If you think of the English countryside from the movies of Jane Austen novels or something like that, many people find it lovely, but it's there's hardly anything there. So they have but in in the in the kind of ecological or environmental communities there, there's a a growing sense of of the desire to rectify that and some high profile successes as well that that have motivated people on. Here, speaking very broadly, I would say that part of the American sense of itself is that it was wilderness when, you know, when the pilgrims arrived, that kind of thing. You know what I mean? You know, that's that's a little bit debatable because the indigenous tribes managed most landscapes actively. However, that sense of that it was that this land, wherever in America you are, is was wilderness recently, and the idea that you could that that was, to some extent, part of the the creation of the country and that you could take some go back to some of that and and gain the value from it is a motivator, especially in cases where the loss of the species was relatively recent. I mean, were wild redwoods in the last population was on the Texas Louisiana border, bayous there, in the nineteen sixties. So, you know, well within living memory. The same kind of thing with some of the salmon runs in the West Coast. Does that make sense? But Mhmm.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Other questions? Representative Austin?

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: I think one of the concerns when I read the report from Fish and Wildlife was the lack of research, you know, to do a feasibility study. And I'm wondering, you know, where would you find compelling research on either side? You know, what organizations or, you know, what data would support either side? For catamounts? Mhmm.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Well, honestly, replicating the kind of approach that the Pine Martin feasibility study took would I would say would be wise. I don't know enough about or maybe the plans aren't even far enough along where a reintroduction site might be or where what people would be most directly involved. But I would say that surveying Vermonters in general and people near the near the reintroduction sites, particularly people with, you know, cattle farmers or or or dairy farmers, rather, are an obvious example, would be a good step to take before the reintroduction of almost any species, particularly one that could feasibly be calves.

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Is there a process that is there a process that you would recommend after trying out different processes with groups or individuals? Is there a process that you would recommend that seems more successful?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Well, I think it would would depend on what your data showed, really. I mean, if if if it if you go through a community consultation and indicates that people are eager to have catamounts return, then you can act on that and then look into the specifics. If it shows that people are opposed, then you you may not have the buy in from the populace to be able to have the kind of social support and public funding and so forth that would that would make it happen. If you have mixed results where it shows that people are kind of open to it, then you'd have to really go in on the specifics and and and and look at things like and this is the guy again, this is taken from the Pine Mart and stuff. What do people what are people expecting out of it? Are they do they think there's gonna be positive impacts, and what are they? Do they think there's gonna be negative impacts, and what are they? Are they would they how would they react if Hein Martin took their chickens? You know, would they would they put up poison or what? And then and then get into a textured account of how the society would react base base your plan off of that, I would say.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: What reintroductions are you following now or researching now?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Well, I've had a lot of thoughts of looking into cat so I was pleased to be here. I've talked with I've talked with some of my students about maybe about looking into this stuff, but that's just in the kind of idea stages. Yeah. The other project that I have kind of in mind is Colorado has reintroduced three predators in recent years, wolverines, lynx, and wolves. And I'm curious to look at the reaction to each of them. My my hypothesis sitting here in this room without having looked at any data is that people are okay with the two medium sized ones and violently opposed or excited about wolves. But I'm I'd be curious to go in more on that and see if there's if people are more up for medium sized predators rather than big predators.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: When you say recently, what what does that mean?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Oh, goodness. I don't remember. So the wolves are just a couple of years ago. They're looking to expand the wolverine program about now. Lynx, I feel bad saying this on on the record because I don't have the I can't remember the year exactly, but I would I would guess twenty years ago.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Reintroducing lynx. I'm not sure where you get the population of lynx to reintroduce them.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: In Colorado, I think they they presumably went to Canada. But I again, I haven't that's the project that I've kind of been piecing together in my mind but haven't actually started up. The project I'm working on right now is more is this one that a student brought to me about what gets people to do conservation based on her ideas. I'm supporting her in that, and that's that's my main research effort.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: What does get people to support conservation?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Oh, we haven't finished analyzing all the data, but we broke it into whether you're framing it as being good for people or good for nature in general. Well, you'll see the paper for sure, that people have I I was expecting people would side more on this is supposed to be good for the community, where, in fact, they seem they seem to be embracing conservation for nature's sake a bit more. Yeah, the the analyses are finished.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Others have questions? Representative Chapin and then Richard.

[Representative Ela Chapin]: I would just love to hear a little bit about your experience, and maybe particularly what's relevant for Mid Carolina with the red wolves situation, with such a large predator, with such a large tendency to move. And then I'm sort of interested in the regionality needed to support a successful reintroduction of such animals, such large territories, as well as the sort of public university, the different players in the space of bringing information and looking at feasibility analyses, you know, if our State Department doesn't feel like it's the right move for them, you know, would UVM take a lead on a feasibility study without the state partner or vice versa? Or is it really important? Have you seen in your process work and research that it's really important to have sort of both those players as well as community partners at the table together? What in terms of the early stage process makes it possible, makes it most successful, or is it not always important to have all the players on the same page in such an early stage? For example, if a university is really gathering that input or that kind of research that you're talking about, just to even understand how the public feels in general, is that a perfectly good starting place even if other parties aren't really ready to undertake a feasibility study or is the feasibility study the key piece? Then after that, is the right time to bring all the different players? Just what have you seen in terms of that really early stage process, particularly Vermont's a small state. We've got another country just north of us. How critical is it, or is it not critical, to be trying to work more regionally on something like this?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Well, it's a little bit chicken and egg. But I would say that in general, engaging with all the different relevant voices are pretty important. With the red wolf, it's a bit different because it was a lot of it was a federal role. They were reintroduced on a wildlife refuge. They're federally endangered, so it was the Fish and Wildlife Service that was the main agency that worked there. North Carolina, the Department of Wildlife is what they're called, didn't have a lot of it was news didn't have a lot of responsibility early on. At the same time, I I would say that if the project is to be successful, then you're you're gonna need buy in from from the state. You're gonna need buy in from, well, big constituents or stakeholder groups. And I'd say that at least the opportunity of being part of it is is would be important for all those people because no I mean, nobody likes to be ignored. And when people feel that they're being ignored or marginalized, this tends to turn them against the project separate from any merits the project might have. As far as the feasibility study, I mean, it's the the sort of thing that even in the absence of any legal action that somebody like me might do out of academic interest. So you could have a feasibility study that would do the same kind of thing, but it wouldn't be as part of a public program. Does that make sense? Representative Pritchard. Thank you. This was this was great.

[Representative Christopher "Chris" Pritchard]: You you talked about public opinion and and doing surveys and stuff. I'm just curious how the mix of those surveys occur. I guess what I mean with that is a rancher in Montana is going to answer that survey a little bit different than somebody living in Bozeman or Whitefish, Montana, which tends to be the larger population. So how do those things occur without being skewed? Because the person in Whitefish Montana or Bozeman, Montana is a lot less worried about the cougar than the rancher in Montana. So when that opinion is formed, how do those surveys usually work? I mean, what how do they?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Yeah. Well, this is one of the things that I I found worthwhile from from the Pie Mart and stuff, is that they did two surveys. One was the the whole population of the area, which presumably you could do a survey of Vermonters overall, I mean, in the same kind of way that you do political polling. But then the other was a targeted survey and looking specifically at people who would have an economic concern about this sort of thing. So it would be, you know in Montana, would be as if you if you surveyed, you know, just ranchers maybe or maybe ranchers and out outfitters that that had concerns about what it would mean for health. Here, think you'd probably wanna survey again, I haven't done catamount work, so might be leaving something out. You'd wanna survey, livestock farmers, you know, anybody who had sheep, cows, and so forth, and potentially, hunters because the effect on the on the game population is is gonna be part of the conversation. So then you end up with two bodies of data. One is here's how Vermonters feel about it, and then the other is here's how economic stakeholders, I mean, I don't know what umbrella term you might use.

[Representative Christopher "Chris" Pritchard]: But wouldn't that skew it if you just took the hunters? Obviously, they're going to have a lot different opinion. And I guess that way I'm trying to figure out is how do you do that fairly to really get a good And should it be based on the numbers anyways because of the geographic makeup of the state?

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Yeah, well, it'd be part the part of why you'd have to be in discussing your results, you'd have to be pretty clear about it being two different bodies of data. So it's not so it's two you have two numbers, basically. One broader, one more focused, and maybe straightforward about this is a survey of these particular people. The other thing that I would suggest in this case would be if there was an area that you would go, Oh, wow. I don't know where they would release catamounts if it came to fruition. Cream Mountain National Forest or or maybe somewhere in the, oh, Silvio County Wildlife Refuge perhaps, surveying the towns in the area and then producing these more focused bodies of data. And and, again, not letting them skew each other, but letting them be different from each other and and being transparent about that.

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Representative Austin? Can you talk a little bit more about the sixth extinction? What does Well, that

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: it's it's probably comes from the title of a popular book by Elizabeth Colbert, the environmental journalist. The idea being that in the history of the world, there have been five big extinctions. The the most famous one is the dinosaurs sixty five million years ago, where a large percentage of the world's species went extinct. And there's a discourse out there that here are living through the sixth of those now. It'd be as human activity drive some species extinct. There's debate about the extent to which whether that's accurate, but that's part of part of the perception that helps motivate restoration in some ways. I don't have a dog or a cat in the fight on whether or not we're going through the sixth extinction. On a local level, we're as I as I said, to be clear, we're we're on in local areas, we've seen the disappearance of a lot of species, but that those species, most of them, still live but in a much reduced range. That's my take on it.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: This question may be a little bit out of your wheelhouse, but you've touched on a couple of this. Guess as we've explored wildlife topics and tried to understand human perceptions of abundance, I just was looking at some of the Mars stuff, and it's like it was it was abundant. But that's so it's so based on the observers and our perception. I guess I'm wondering if you can speak to that. I mean, humans, they wanna see certain wildlife, and they don't wanna see other one.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Yeah. It it's a it's a moving target. How what what constitutes a healthy population of whatever the species is. And that was actually one of the one of the things that motivated the guy who hired the plane for the red wolves was he had a vacation home out there where he'd been accustomed to see deer that really had no stress, that you know, large herds of deer that walked around. And then unhappy when the deer were more skittish and not as not as present. I think that as far as as a management concern, if you're trying to manage for abundant populations of whatever species, It's what in a in a democracy, it's the closest approach to what the people want. It's hard to tell what that might be, but that's the task of of ANR or or, you know, eventually ANR, if the species becomes a state managed species, how many of these do we want and and how well how closely can we manage for them? Is it that catamounts, presumably, even if they were fully populating Vermont, would never be that abundant in terms of people seeing them all the time. But the knowledge that they're there would be relevant, whether that's exciting or terrifying. The effect on the you might one one thing that you might see, which, again, comes from the red wolf stuff and also from gray wolf work that I've been a little bit involved with. If a large herd of elk or deer or whatnot seems normal, then perhaps ecologically, might have a healthier population of those ungulates with predators on the landscape. But if the baseline is that there's a lot of them and then there's fewer, then people might think that that's that's bad. So so balancing those perceptions and those preferences is the task of management agencies and all the stakeholders who are involved with these things.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Thanks so much for joining us. Thanks, Sharon.

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Yeah. Thank you.

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: Thank you for having me.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Can whoever has a notification on turn it off, please, wherever that's coming from out there in the

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: It is somebody gonna show up. Sign out. One final questions. Oh, sure. Do you have a dog or a cat?

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Oh, I have a dog. Yeah. Oh,

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: I think we're switching out

[Peter Brewitt, Senior Lecturer, UVM Rubenstein School]: that we have Renee. Oh, because I said I didn't have a dog in this. Oh, no dog in the fight, but I do have a dog in Hubbard Park.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Please join us, Renee.

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: I don't have any pretty pictures,

[Representative Ela Chapin]: so you'll have to just have me today.

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Chair Sheldon and committee members, thank you so much for the opportunity to testify today. I believe you all have a copy of my testimony. I am here to testify in support of H-four 73, as well as propose some changes to the legislation. For the record, my name is Renee Secor. I'm from Chittenden, Vermont. I was going to start with a joke that despite it being a pretty good snow day at Killington as I drove by this morning, I hope you guys see my commitment to this initiative and this issue by showing up here today. You can understand the magnitude of that decision. Relate to that commitment thing. Yes, yes. So I serve as the Northeast Rewilding Director for the organization Mighty Earth. Mighty Earth is actually a global environmental advocacy organization working to protect wild nature and secure a stable climate through a variety of diverse campaigns. My professional background is in carnivore conservation, coexistence, and environmental advocacy work, and my work has focused on advancing science based approaches to living alongside large carnivores while addressing ecological, social, and community considerations. At My Dears, I lead our wildlife restoration efforts and currently direct our Bring Catamounts Home campaign, which is active in Vermont here on the ground and focused on supporting thoughtful, science based conversations around the long term future of catamounts in the Northeast. It's in this capacity that I speak with you today to offer our support for this legislation and our willingness to address any questions and assists as you may wish. At the onset, I just want to emphasize our respect for the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department and for the professionalism and expertise of the department staff. We recognize that Vermont Fish and Wildlife is the state authority on wildlife management, and we view this legislation, H-four 73, as an opportunity to support and collaborate with the department's work through a science based analysis of examining the potential restoration of catamounts back to Vermont. We also believe that the question of catamount restoration and the study of its feasibility in particular warrants timely and serious evaluation by the department. The catamount is a native species and an important part of Vermont's ecological and cultural history, extirpated from the state in the late 1800s under very different conditions than exist today. Many of you may be aware that the preserved remains of the last Catamount killed in Vermont in 1881 outside Barnard can be seen right down the street on public display at the Vermont Historical Museum, alongside an exhibit that actually documents the species' ecological and cultural presence in our state. So although absent from our forests for more than a century, the Catamount has remained a cherished cultural icon in Vermont, embedded in our place names, our imagery, and our shared identity as a wild and resilient landscape, and reflected obviously most visibly as the mascot of the University of Vermont. And then a shout out to the Middlebury panthers too, which is I don't want to forget the panthers. Catamounts are an apex carnivore as well as a key stone species that play a crucial role in ecosystem dynamics. For millennium, they've helped shape Northeastern landscapes by influencing prey abundance and behavior, supporting forest regeneration, and providing carrion, which is carcasses, that sustain a wide range of other wildlife species. Research also suggests that intact predator prey systems can contribute to reduced disease risk and enhanced biodiversity. The return of this missing native species could help restore some of these ecological functions and just overall contribute to a healthier, more resilient forest ecosystem. Since the time of extirpation, Vermont's landscape and ecological context have changed significantly. Forest cover has rebounded from historic lows to roughly 75% of the state, and large connected tracts of habitat now exist across Vermont and the broader region. Whitetail deer populations, the primary prey base for catamounts, are abundant and in some areas overabundant. Scientific understanding of large carnivore ecology and coexistence has advanced substantially. And the public interest in catamount restoration is strong, with recent polling showing a roughly 12 to one ratio of strong support to strong opposition in Vermont specifically. Much of this research and the context was actually subject of testimony that this committee received from large carnivore researchers and academics in the first half of the biennium. Taken together, this research and the current landscape conditions raise legitimate science based questions about whether conditions in Vermont today are adequate for the restoration of this missing native species and what benefits its restoration would provide to our ecosystems. Across the country, state and federal wildlife agencies have used what is called a feasibility study or feasibility assessment to thoughtfully evaluate the return of native species once lost from their landscapes to their former ranges, helping to inform careful place based dialogue, based decisions grounded in science and public process. We believe that Vermont has the opportunity to show similar leadership. Authorizing a feasibility study does not commit the state to a particular outcome, but it does affirm Vermont's willingness to ask informed questions, to reckon thoughtfully with past ecological losses, and to consider what kind of conservation legacy it wishes to leave for future generations. We also view this initiative as supportive of the department's broader conservation work. As outlined in Vermont's State Wildlife Action Plan draft, which was recently published, as well as the Vermont Conservation Design, the department has prioritized maintaining and restoring intact, functioning, and connected landscapes as a core strategy for conserving biodiversity, supporting climate resilience, and sustaining healthy ecosystems. Evaluating the feasibility of catamount restoration aligns directly with the department's goals. Research shows that native apex carnivores can help promote ecosystem resilience, influence prey behaviour and distribution, and support biodiversity across landscapes, outcomes that are fully consistent with the Department's mission and long term conservation vision. A feasibility study allows the Department to assess whether and how this missing native species could contribute to those objectives under modern conditions. We do not believe that leaving these questions unanswered or deferring their evaluation indefinitely is sufficient, and what we mean by that is simply that the department now has enough information and enough change in underlying conditions from the time of extirpation to warrant a structured evaluation. A feasibility study is the tool for how wildlife agencies responsibly determine whether further action is appropriate. Without that assessment, the questions remain unresolved, and neither the legislator nor the public has the benefit of clear, agency led, science based analysis to inform future decisions. So feasibility study, a feasibility study, as proposed in this legislation, is precisely the appropriate mechanism for the Department to assess whether restoration is viable based on existing literature, as well as the benefits and interest in doing so. Beginning that process now allows Vermont Fish and Wildlife to lead the conversation as it moves forward and identify where scientific and management uncertainties remain rather than leaving those questions unresolved. H-four 73, as introduced, directs the Department to conduct a feasibility study examining the potential for restoration of catamounts to Vermont. The bill does not mandate reintroduction, and I just wanted to repeat that point that the bill does not mandate a reintroduction of catamounts. I think it's an important point to emphasize, as the bill's current title, an act related to the reintroduction of catamounts, might feel confusing or misleading on its face. So instead, the bill asked the department to evaluate a foundational question, which is whether restoration is feasible ecologically, socially, and economically given present day conditions. In our view, this bill presents a prudent and thoughtful first step in this process. It places the leadership within the Department's hands, within Vermont's existing wildlife management framework, and allows trained wildlife professionals to assess the issue using best available science, public input, and importantly, regional consultation with wildlife professionals in other states. We also suggest a few changes to the legislation to respond to concerns that have been raised by the Department and other stakeholders. We recognize the Department's stated capacity constraints and its need to prioritize ongoing conservation responsibilities. Changes to the bill can help strengthen implementation while preserving the bill's exploratory scope by reinforcing that this effort is focused on information gathering and assessment. Importantly, we suggest changes that outside funding and partnerships may be used to support the feasibility study to allow the work to move forward without reliance on public funding and without diverting staff capacity from the Department's other conservation priorities. I just briefly want to address two questions that have been central to this conversation, the first being, why is a feasibility study an appropriate first step in a process like this, and what does a feasibility study entail under H-four 73? So that first question of why is this an appropriate first step? Feasibility studies in particular are a standard tool used by wildlife agencies in assessing the potential restoration of native species to parts of their historic range. They are often initiated before any decision to restore species. Across the country, wildlife agencies have actually used feasibility studies as a tool to evaluate species restoration such as black footed pheasant, black footed ferrets, grizzly bears, elk, American marten, and red wolves. These studies have allowed agencies to evaluate key ecological, social, economic, and administrative factors, including things like habitat suitability, potential ecological impacts and species interactions, the potential economic costs of restoration as well as the benefits, and map out conceptual management pathways for introduced species. And lastly, social consideration, including public attitudes and stakeholder concerns. They also provide an opportunity for structured public and stakeholder engagement to inform the assessment and ensure transparency, and they help identify information gaps and areas requiring further study. Importantly, feasibility studies do not assume or require a particular outcome. To help illustrate the scope of feasibility assessments as have been conducted for other species by wildlife agencies and partnering academic institutions, I have attached examples to my written testimony today, including feasibility assessments conducted for species such as elk and American Martin. What a feasibility study would entail under four seventy three? So H-four 73 reflects several important components that align with best practices and also respect the Department's role in a process like this, The first being no mandate to reintroduce. The bill only authorizes a study ideally led by Vermont Fish and Wildlife. It also prioritizes a science based analysis. It allows the department to review existing literature thoroughly and identify knowledge gaps that may need further study. It would allow for public and stakeholder engagement, which Peter spoke to the importance of, right, ensuring transparency in the process and opportunities for community input. And then we would suggest potentially a few changes to the bill, one that would potentially address the allowance for public and private partnership for this bill that could support research and analysis without relying on state funding while keeping the department in charge of the scope and direction of the feasibility assessment. And we would also suggest addressing regional consultation, recognizing that coordination with neighboring states here in the Northeast is an important element of any feasibility assessment for wide ranging species such as catamounts. So in closing, and then I'm happy to answer any questions if I have answers for you all. In closing, we view H-four 73 as a respectful and measured request for initiating the long term process of restoring catamounts back to Vermont. Supporting this bill would give Vermont Fish and Wildlife the authority to evaluate a complex conservation question using professional judgment, scientific rigor, and public input. My organization is committed to engaging constructively and collaboratively as this process moves forward, and for these reasons, we encourage the committee to support this bill and allow the feasibility study to move forward. So on that note, I am happy to answer any questions.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Thank you for your testimony.

[Representative Ela Chapin]: Oh, thank you.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: I guess I'm curious a little bit about your background. You said you've worked on other carnivore conservation projects.

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Yes. Yeah. So I was formerly carnivore conservation director at an organization that worked mostly in the Western United States on large carnivore species out there, albeit I've been based in the Northeast for quite some time, but working on helping communities coexist with gray wolves, grizzly bears, mountain lions, and coyotes in the Western United States.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: That's the work you were doing?

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: That I was formerly doing. Yes. Yes.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Can you flesh that out a little bit? What does that mean?

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Yes. Yeah. I guess my educational background, have a degree in wildlife ecology and as well as a law degree and have focused on helping advance policy addressing carnivore conservation and coexistence. So in the Western United States, I helped local communities and states develop policies to help address things like human carnivore conflict with domestic animals. I helped communities adopt community coexistence plans for living alongside species like coyotes and black bears, and did a lot of public education work kind of on a local and state level in the West. Yeah. And I can attach a I think I forgot to do that, but attach a resume or a CV to give a bit more of that background.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Well, that'd be great. Do members have questions? Representative Chapin, then I'll ask.

[Representative Ela Chapin]: I'd love to so you're working regionally now on this. Are you talking with folks in other states and at other universities? And can you share any sense you have about different stakeholders that pursuing this or interested?

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Yeah, definitely. So my work is actually mostly We are looking at this from a regional context, but I've been mostly working on the ground here in Vermont. I've been hosting a lot of public conversations, and I'm calling them catamount conversations because I like alliterations. Yeah, going across the state and introducing the conversation over the potential restoration of this species, inquiring about people's thoughts and concerns and trying to gauge stakeholder perspectives. I think some of the committee members have actually maybe attended a few of these. We've also brought in folks that have worked on coexistence with mountain lions in the Western United States. We brought in Beth Pratt, who leads Save LA Cougar's campaign in Los Angeles area to provide kind of insight on how urban communities in particular can coexist with large carnivores. I would say from a community perspective, we're hearing interest, some people bringing up concerns and thoughts around the potential for conflicts with domestic animals and how we could address those, what would be the impacts to our deer populations. And so some real actual questions over kind of like the nuts and bolts of what it would mean to bring the species back, but overall has been a fairly positive conversation. Yeah. Yeah.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Representative Austin.

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Everything I've read about the feasibility study and reintroducing, they kind of talk about there's a really trend or a theme that goes through everything I'm reading, which is community engagement, public engagement. And so can you help me understand how you frame that? I mean, in terms of, so you can get accurate data to kind of be the support or refute a position?

[Renee Secor, Northeast Rewilding Director, Mighty Earth]: Yeah, you mean to gauge the public's Yeah, so I think I touched on in my testimony some of that initial polling survey data, right? Which has looked positive toward restoration in that we're seeing kind of a 12 to one ratio, right? So for every 12 people strongly supportive of catamount restoration, there's only one strongly opposed. I think, from my understanding, researchers are currently in the process of doing more localized public survey data to better understand that at a county and local level across the Northeast. I'm not sure the status of that, but I think that was kind of a question before about how do you gain proper understanding of different stakeholder perspectives, right, and make sure you're properly reaching all the different demographic groups, stakeholder groups. I am not a social scientist, but I would welcome the committee to put you in contact with folks who have done some of that social science data to dive into how they actually scale that data based on the demographics of a specific state to ensure that they're properly representing each of those stakeholder groups. And I do think that the data that's currently published does break down by agricultural communities, hunter stakeholder groups. I think that data in in particular, can kind of look at the different levels of support and opposition broken out by different stakeholder groups. But I would want to bring in a social scientist to provide kind of like an in-depth answer of how they properly scale that data different stakeholders.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: All right. Thanks so much for your testimony. Members, we have our next witness at 02:30.

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Thank you. Thank you.

[Chair Amy Sheldon]: Is Rebecca Feifer joining us again, seeing you just shift gears and start thinking about More horses. Yeah.