Letter to the Editor: publisher Friday, April 19, 2024

I feel the need to respond to two comments that was made at last weeks City Council meeting regarding the deer.

One statement was, The Community doesn’t believe the Catalina Island Conservancy’s science. My question is, why would the Community believe the the Conservancy’s science?

At a Avalon City Council meeting Tony Budrovich, President and CEO of the Catalina Island Conservancy from 2016-2022, stated “We’ve worked with a variety of people in the scientific community and they have established that the island would probably very easily carry 500 deer. That seems like the right number for 48,000 acres”. So, the “variety of people in the scientific community” that Tony Budrovich worked with were wrong, and the current Conservancy’s scientist are right? My question is, why would the Community believe the the Conservancy’s science?

In a 2007 California Department of Fish and Wildlife internal memo, written by Kimberly McGee Lewis, their Senior Enviromental Scientist, stated the following after a Conservancy led tour: “There are some major flaws regarding how they are presenting the problem (regarding the deer)”. She said, “We were not shown sufficient evidence that deer grazing was creating an emergency situation”.

She recalled that observations of exclosures related to a failed bid to obtain a Depredations Permit in 2002 lacked evidence of deer browse and showed possible damage caused by bison observed just 50 feet away”.

Of the exclosures, Ms. Lewis stated, “Re-growth inside the exclosure was exactly the same as outside”.

Ms. Lewis described Catalina’s environmental challenges as “a result of centuries of livestock damage to soil and vegetation, NOT deer browsing.” She disavowed the Conservancy’s justifications for deer eradication as “not demonstrated”, and a “false pretense”.

So, Ms. Lewis who was the Senior Enviromental Scientist at CDFW for 26 years was wrong, and the Conservancy’s scientists are right? My question is, why would the Community believe the the Conservancy’s science?

The Catalina Island Conservancy is falsely claiming today in 2023, what they falsely claimed in 2007.

The Conservancy has previously made at least THREE failed attempts for a Depredation Permit from CDFW to eradicate the island’s deer, in 2002, 2012 AND 2016. ALL were rejected for lack of scientific evidence to support it’s ecological impact claims, as well as a lack of the required public transparency and input.

The Conservancy’s new request, for a “Scientific Collection Permit”, is inappropriate for eradicating a species, and it aims to circumvent the rigorous process required by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to obtain a Depredation Permit.

AND here we are again, another application based on false claims. My question is, why would the Community believe the the Conservancy’s science?

The Conservancy insists that native plant survival depends on ALL Catalina Island deer be killed. The science clearly does not support that to meet recovery objectives for native plants, the number of deer must be zero. By the Conservancy’s own admission on their Instagram account, recovery is already occurring with plant species being observed that have not been seen in decades (with deer still present). So again, my question is, why would the Community believe the Conservancy’s science? The Conservancy offered the Community a compromise. One last hunt before the eradication of the deer started, and they would sterilize the deer within Avalon city limits letting them live out the rest of their life.

The second statement I had issue with was this, The Community stated that hunting was important to them. Clearly it isn’t, it doesn’t want another hunt.

It is not that the majority of the Community doesn’t want one last hunt, it is that they want to be able to hunt every year. AND sterilizing the deer within Avalon city limits is not saving the deer, when within 7 short years there would be no more deer on the island.

Debbie Wright

Avalon