Two Pennsylvania agencies are shutting down their volunteer deputy programs on 1 September, stripping 176 part-time officers out of the field — and one of them chairs the Fish and Boat Commission's board.
The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission and the Pennsylvania Game Commission both confirmed the closures on 13 August. The PGC loses 140 deputy game wardens. The PFBC loses 36 deputy waterways conservation officers, who were notified the previous day.
The waterways figure is the one anglers should read closely. Those 36 deputies covered 29 of the PFBC's 76 patrol districts, working alongside about 100 full-time officers: twelve in the southeast, seven in the northeast, six in the northwest, four apiece in the southwest and northcentral, three in the southcentral. They were paid $100 for an eight-hour day with equipment supplied, and their work went beyond patrols — trout stocking among it.
Don Anderson has held a PFBC deputy commission since 1978, and he also presides over the agency's board. At 72, he is the state's oldest serving deputy. Add the Game Commission deputy years he began in 1976 and he is approaching fifty years of service.
The numbers, he concedes, had been going the wrong way for some time.
"Our deputy forces decreased greatly over the last couple of years," Anderson told the Pocono Record. "We're down to a low number. Like in our southwest region of the state, there's only four of us, counting myself. We've all been getting older and we haven't had the interest with any younger people coming on as deputy officers."
Filling shifts has been the sticking point at every level. "They have to give up weekends and holidays to work. Of course, that's when we need people on the enforcement end," he said.
He is unsentimental about his own position, too. "Sometimes you just have to sort of stop and look at things and say, should I be doing this at age 72? And maybe it's time that I should give it up for my safety and maybe the safety of other officers I'm working with," Anderson said. "I have mixed emotions over it, to be quite honest."
A court decision hangs over the timing. On 31 July the Pennsylvania Supreme Court sided with two hunting clubs that had contested the Game Commission's authority to enter posted private land without a warrant, rejecting the agency's open fields doctrine argument. Wardens will now need warrants in most cases to pursue suspected violations on posted ground.
"That left a lot of things up in the air that need to be determined in the future as to what conservation officers can legally do and not do," Anderson said. Deputies are trained, but by his account "it's not at the level of a full-time officer. Does that create some liability for the agency, that's a question there, too."
The decision came from PFBC executive director Tim Schaeffer and his PGC counterpart Steve Smith, Anderson said, with the PFBC board briefed weeks earlier under personnel matters.
"As part of our ongoing mission to protect Pennsylvania's wildlife resources, the Pennsylvania Game Commission has made the difficult decision to end the Deputy Game Warden Program within law enforcement," PGC press secretary John Buffone said. "This decision reflects our focus on having the most efficient and effective full-time, professional workforce."
That language has landed badly with the people it was sent to.
"It's sad, angry, frustrating, spending 10 years for the agency doing this job," deputy game warden Kale Geiswite said. "And to just be treated that way at the end is unfathomable."
Gary Fisher, 18 years in the role, counted the personal outlay. "It kind of hurts," he told WGAL. "We devoted all this time, and we've spent our own money to buy the stuff that the agency would not provide us at the time."
Others are focused on what happens to coverage in the districts now going unstaffed. "I think the impact is going to be huge. I think you're going to see the wardens having longer response times now," deputy Jake Clevenger said. "So, when somebody does call the game commission for a nuisance animal or some type of a violation, they're going to have to prioritize. And it's not going to be a quick response."
Geiswite says the grievance is about process rather than the policy itself. "I think as deputies, I think we just deserve answers. And if the program is not going to come back, that's fine. But I think that those people who are currently serving were treated poorly. And we deserve better than that."
