Craig Daily Press

Rep. Al White, R-Hayden, said he wants his constituency to get the answers they’re looking for.

With that purpose, White will sponsor an open meeting in Craig between local residents and Colorado Division of Wildlife officials.

The meeting is planned for 1 p.m. July 26 at the American Legion Post 62 at 1055 County Road 7.

DOW Director Tom Reming­ton and other regional officials are expected to attend.

“The Division of Wildlife is important in Northwest Colorado, and this is an opportunity for the citizens there to meet face-to-face with the Division and get answers to any of the questions they may have,” White said.

In his two-term tenure with the Colorado House of Representatives, White has played the role of middleman for many residents’ questions.

“As a legislator, citizens come to me with questions or complaints, and I turn around and take them to the DOW and then respond back to the citizen,” White said. “Oftentimes, you end up in these kind of frustrating three-way conversations.”

Sometimes, it becomes a “circular conversation that just falls flat,” he said.

There were enough questions and concerns recently that White said it might be more beneficial to everyone if they had a forum to meet with each other.

“I’ve received questions from a number of citizens — or complaints — about game damage issues,” White said. “There were enough of them to make that a relatively big issue.”

Craig resident Cris Criswell, 71, a fifth-generation Moffat County native, said he is most concerned with the DOW’s winter feeding plans, which some ranchers have pointed to as a chief reason that there was so much property damage reported on private lands this year.

“My main concern is the feeding for animals so they don’t have to come into town and eat the trees and the shrubbery everywhere,” Criswell said. “I’m not a rancher or anything like that. I’m just a concerned citizen.”

Criswell said he would advocate a section of state land to be set aside for wildlife grazing in the winter.

Criswell said he has tried to contact the DOW before with minimal success.

“I didn’t have good luck in the past, but that was a while ago and it might have changed now,” he said.

White said winter feeding and property damage is only one aspect of the collective conversation he hopes residents will have with DOW officials.

He wanted to call the meeting because of the DOW’s history of involvement in the Moffat County area, he said, which is a principal component of the area’s economy and lifestyle.

White added people may not get the answers they are looking for, but “at least they’ll have the answer.”

From there, he said, he would be willing to look at addressing any continuing problems through the legislative process if that were needed.

This won’t be the first such event White has had a hand in initiating.

A few years ago, he and departing senator Jack Taylor, R-Steamboat Springs, who cannot run for re-election because of term limits, hosted a similar meeting regarding to hunting license changes.

About 100 people attended that event, White said.

“I think it’s time we had another one,” he said. “I’m hopeful we’ll get the same kind of interest and attendance as the last one.”