With the budget shortfalls facing the city of San Diego, Mayor Kevin Falkner proposed cuts to the city’s Public Utilities Department of $700,000. In those cuts were the only two hunting programs conducted at two of the many City Lakes Properties. The city has eight reservoirs for fresh water located within San Diego County. Many of the lakes have been closed or have had their hours of operation reduced due to the Covid-19 Pandemic.

Lake Sutherland, located a few miles north of the town of Ramona, allowed spring wild turkey hunting. This program was run by volunteers of the San Diego Chapter of the National Wild Turkey Federation. The program brought in thousands of dollars to the city in access fees and boat rentals from 14 youth hunts and 35 adult hunts throughout the season. The Chapter members would open the gate in the morning to allow the scheduled hunters to enter. They checked permits and licensing, collect fees for blinds and boat rentals, issue the boats and motors if the hunters need them and monitor the hunt with no one from the city lake staff on hand. Lake Sutherland was also the location of the NWTF Chapter’s annual Turkey Tune-up, the chapter’s largest fund-raising event.

The other city lakes hunting opportunity on the chopping block was the winter waterfowl season hunts conducted at Barrett Lake in San Diego south county area. This hunt has historically been run by city parks personnel during a time of the year when the lake is closed to other activities. The waterfowl hunts fiscal impact to the city amounted to $950/day times two days per week, times a 15-week season is right around $27,105 of city income if all blind areas are used for each hunt during the season.

When the proposed cuts to the hunting program were announced, the San Diego County Wildlife Federation, a coalition of 18 outdoors hunting and fishing groups representing thousands of sportsmen and women in San Diego County, went to work on a campaign to keep the hunting programs. The Federation’s president, Gary Brennan, started a letter writing campaign to inform the members of the City Council what was at stake. Hunting programs within city lakes properties were going to be cancelled for the year and possibly forever but of greater concern was the loss of revenue during a time when the city is struggling with income due to the loss of revenue from the Covid-19 pandemic. Brennan, along with many other members of the Federation provided testimony during the City Council Budget Meetings. He also requested intervention by State Senator Brian Jones and Assemblymember Randy Vopel. The Senator and Assemblyman wrote a joint letter to the council asking them to keep the hunting programs and described what the programs meant to the citizens of the county. Prior state senator, Joel Anderson, who is currently running for a sat on the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, also got involved asking the county to assist the city in running the two lakes as well as several other city lakes located within San Diego County.

On June 5th, the City Council voted to keep the lakes open and to retain the hunting programs at Lake Barrett and Lake Sutherland. Brennan stated, “It was a team effort to retain these historical hunting programs and it couldn’t have been accomplished without the support of the member organizations of the San Diego County Wildlife Federation and other state NGO’s such as California Waterfowl Association.” Brennan also said, “We look forward to working with the City Council, the City’s Public Utilities Department and San Diego County to retain these hunting programs and assist in the operation of the waterfowl hunting program at Barrett Lake and the continued volunteer-run spring wild turkey hunts at Sutherland.”