Warden bill in trouble> House and Senate at odds over details

AUGUSTA — A bill that would clarify the law enforcement powers of Maine’s game wardens was in danger of dying between the House and Senate Tuesday night after lawmakers failed to agree on the measure.

Usually supportive of their House counterparts, the Democratic majority in the Senate killed an amendment to the warden bill Monday that was backed by House Democrats and sponsored by Eagle Lake’s state representative and former House Speaker John L. Martin. Martin’s was supported in his amendment effort by Rep. Royce Perkins, R-Penobscot.

When the Senate’s version of the bill arrived at the House shortly after 10:30 p.m., the representatives were so miffed by the Senate’s rejection of the Martin amendment, they voted 120-24 to stand by their original version of the bill. Now the proposal is in non-concurrence and the House and the Senate will have to find a compromise version or the bill will die.

“What we have before us now is a very delicate posture,” Martin said of the bill, which is expected to be taken up by the Senate today.

Perkins and others worry the proposal goes too far in dictating how much power Maine wardens should have. Originally envisioned as a measure that would clear up conflicting wording in existing statutes, the bill was touted simply as legislation guaranteeing wardens the same law enforcement powers as county sheriffs.

But Perkins claims the wording of an amendment proposed by Sen. Marge Kilkelly, D-Wiscasset and Senate chairwoman of the Legislature’s Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Committee, leaves unanswered questions concerning a citizen’s right to privacy. He said it is not clear whether allowing the wardens to make regulatory stops would infringe on Mainers’ expectations of privacy.

“The Martin amendment gives the department exactly what it has said it wants to do, which is write the rules,” Perkins said. “It seems to me that there’s no good argument for not being in favor of his amendment.”

While the bill before lawmakers does not give wardens the right to make random vehicle stops, language addressing vehicle inspections is unsettling to some legislators, who worry the legislation strays from the department’s primary responsibilities of protecting fish and game resources. Still, wardens maintain they need the authority to stop motor vehicles where there is reasonable and “articulable” suspicion of violation of any state law.

A warden should have the right to stop a motor vehicle and question its occupants if the warden believes a violation of law has taken place, Perkins said. He suspects, however, the bill that will be argued today may have actually gone beyond the threshold of what police refer to as the “reasonable, articulable suspicion” required to make motor vehicle stops. He fears lawmakers may be creating a kind of gray area for those who hunt and fish that neither the public nor wardens may fully understand.

Martin attempted to address those concerns by crafting an amendment requiring the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife to develop major substantive rules for the vehicle stop policy and present it to the Legislature for approval. Although supported by Sen. Richard Ruhlin, D-Brewer, the Martin amendment was killed by Kilkelly on the basis that a state department’s internal procedures should not come back to the Legislature.

“Once we go down that path, are we then going to have the internal procedures for Department of Human Services case workers coming back to the Legislature?” she asked. “That’s a management function, not a lawmaking function. I believe it’s a separation of powers issue.”

Kikelly’s amendment would allow wardens to stop a person whether the person is in a motor vehicle or boat, on a snowmobile, or on foot if the warden has observed the person in the activity of hunting, fishing or trapping. The second part of her amendment would allow wardens to stop a vehicle if a person is known to be transporting game. Wardens could not search a vehicle until receiving the consent of the operator, or unless the warden already has probable cause that a crime has been committed. Failure to consent, she said, would not constitute grounds for probable cause.

“These are tied to current law, which states that when you are engaged in the activity you must carry your license with you and you must exhibit your license,” she said.

“There’s no `suspicion about activity,’ there’s none of that, they must observe them,” she added.

Under the amendment, the IF&W commissioner has to develop policies and training guidelines and advise the Legislature each year. He must also present the results of a customer survey to gauge public reaction to the policies.