DENVER–An association representing nearly a quarter of Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s workforce has endorsed Amendment 83, the November election ballot measure adding a right to hunt and fish to the Colorado Constitution.
The Colorado Wildlife Employees Protective Association (CWEPA) recently issued a position statement formally supporting the amendment. According to reporting by Ali Longwell for the Aspen Times and other mountain newspapers, the endorsement followed a vote of the group’s membership, which includes about 230 of the agency’s roughly 1,000 employees, among them wildlife officers, biologists, technicians, aquatics staff and administrators.
CWEPA is a private, nonprofit labor organization founded in 1947. The endorsement marks only the second time in the association’s 79-year history that it has taken a formal position on an election issue.
“Well-regulated hunting and fishing form the foundation of wildlife management and conservation in Colorado,” the statement reads. “Amendment 83 would protect the state’s wildlife resource, ensure management decisions remain guided by science and continue to perpetuate the wildlife resource of this State for current and future generations.”
As previously reported by Complete Colorado, the measure would establish hunting, fishing and the harvest of fish and wildlife as a right for every Coloradan. It covers all state-managed species except those that are endangered, federally prohibited or classified as non-game. The amendment still lets state agencies and the legislature restrict hunting and fishing when necessary for science-based conservation, public safety or preserving future opportunities, and it specifically says the right does not include trespassing on private property.
The association’s statement points to existing state law, which already identifies hunting and fishing as the primary methods of wildlife management. The statement also says the endorsement aligns with a 2024 membership resolution adopted as voters weighed Proposition 127, the failed mountain lion and bobcat hunting ban.
State law bars Colorado Parks and Wildlife from taking positions on ballot measures. CWEPA’s statement makes clear the endorsement does not reflect the position of any government agency or employee acting in an official capacity, and that no public funds or resources were used.
Opponents argue the amendment’s language could lock in one approach to wildlife management, but the association’s board told the Aspen Times it does not believe the amendment will stop wildlife management from adapting as conditions and science change.
The timing of the amendment follows a string of fights over hunting policy in Colorado. Complete Colorado has previously reported that out-of-state groups, including the Tucson-based Center for Biological Diversity, pushed the 2024 mountain lion ban effort and a fur sales ban that recently failed before the state wildlife commission. The Boulder-based Prairie Dog Coalition has also pressed the commission for a prairie dog shooting ban, and a beaver hunting ban bill died in the legislature earlier this year.
Because Amendment 83 would change the state Constitution, it needs 55 percent voter approval to pass. Colorado’s general election is Nov. 3.
Disclosure: Complete Colorado is a project of the Denver-based Independence Institute, which has endorsed Amendment 83.
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