Fish and Game tells Senate committee timelines must protect endangered species; department open to coordinated fixes

Sen. Tim Lang, sponsor of Senate Bill 109, told the committee the bill intends to set firm timelines for agency reviews of alteration of terrain (AOT) permits and to create a Threatened and Endangered Species Compensatory Mitigation Fund that would receive mitigation fees collected during permitting.

Why it matters: The bill links permitting timelines to development and housing goals while directing some mitigation fees into a fund to pay for compensatory work. It affects how Fish and Game consults on projects, how other agencies incorporate Fish and Game recommendations into permits, and whether Fish and Game can require species‑specific mitigation rules.

Stephanie Simic, executive director of New Hampshire Fish and Game, said the agency supports efforts to improve permitting efficiency but raised several drafting and operational concerns. "This bill does not just affect alteration of terrain permits, but it affects our whole environmental permitting and review process within our agency," she said, and asked the committee to review a letter the department filed with detailed concerns.

Dan Bergeron, Fish and Game wildlife division chief, testified the department’s longstanding authority to protect threatened and endangered species could be undermined by proposed language that allows other agencies to determine what is "reasonable and prudent." Bergeron warned: "Our concern is that what this does is it actually transfers, authority that the department holds to other state agencies and allows them to make the determination on whether or not there's impacts to threatened and endangered species."

Fish and Game also flagged timing and rule‑making concerns. The department’s rules already include review time frames; Fish and Game said its practice is to stop the clock when an applicant fails to provide required information so the agency can obtain complete data before making a determination. Under the bill’s strict 60‑day review requirement, Fish and Game said it might be forced to terminate consultations if information is missing, which could extend total project timelines when applicants must reapply.

The Department of Environmental Services (DES) said it supports the bill’s intent to improve permitting speed and identified recent coordination with Fish and Game. Adam Crapo, assistant commissioner at DES, said DES conducts about 230 AOT permits a year and that about 80 of those recent AOT cases required additional time beyond DES’s internal deadlines; many delays stem from applicants not providing information Fish and Game needs, or from capacity constraints. "We do feel like we do need to support this, at least a version of this bill or the attempt of this bill because it will help us ... to get to the governor's 60 day time frame," Crapo said.

Witnesses from conservation groups and naturalists urged caution. Meredith Hatfield of The Nature Conservancy and Eric Orff of New Hampshire Audubon said Fish and Game’s consultations have generally improved since 2022 and that rushing rule‑making or altering statutory authority could risk species and habitat protection. Orff said the state’s environmental review system is producing conservation gains and proposed careful coordination rather than abrupt statutory transfer of authority.

Fish and Game said the mitigation fund referenced in the bill already exists and that the bill would require the department to develop rulemaking establishing when mitigation payments are required and how they are calculated for species‑specific contexts. Bergeron said those calculations are complex, species specific and likely to require lengthy stakeholder work.

Committee members asked about specific implementation questions: whether staffing and funding would be needed if timelines are tightened, how the "clock stop" practice is logged, and whether the department would support memoranda of understanding or fee‑sharing arrangements with DES. Fish and Game said it is open to working on department-to-department MOUs and to exploring fee structures but noted many operational improvements require additional technology and staffing resources.

Ending note: The committee did not take final action. DES and Fish and Game asked to continue working with the committee and stakeholders to refine language that preserves scientific authority over threatened and endangered species while addressing permitting timelines and funding needs.