I found this on Facebook this morning:
CWD UPDATE
:
MDC WANTS A "COMMUNITY CONVERSATION" —
SO WHY DOESN'T THE COMMUNITY KNOW ABOUT IT?
Let's talk about what a "community conversation" actually means.
According to the Missouri Department of Conservation, they are holding eight "Deer Management Community Conversations" across Missouri this month. Eight meetings. Eight regions. Two hours each. Small group format. Designed — according to MDC — to "listen to feedback, answer questions, and work together to begin creating a shared path forward for managing a healthy and sustainable deer herd in Missouri."
Sounds great. There's just one problem.
NOBODY KNOWS ABOUT THEM.
Here's how Big Country 99 found out about these meetings — and pay close attention to how this unfolded.
We contacted Jason Isabelle — MDC's Cervid Program Supervisor and the man who oversees CWD management statewide — about a CWD meeting that had been rumored in Cape Girardeau. What followed was a carefully choreographed series of narrow, precise answers:
We asked: Is MDC HOSTING a CWD meeting in Cape Girardeau? Answer: No.
We asked: Is MDC SPEAKING AT or PRESENTING at any CWD event in Cape Girardeau? Answer: No.
We asked: Are there ANY meetings in Cape Girardeau in May where CWD is on the agenda? Answer: No — but here are two meetings you might want to attend.
Notice what happened there. Isabelle never once volunteered that MDC was holding eight regional community conversations across Missouri this month. Every piece of information had to be pulled out through increasingly specific questions. Only when we asked directly for all eight meeting locations did a flyer suddenly appear — sent privately as an email attachment to our station.
THE ONLY RADIO STATION IN TEXAS COUNTY FOUND OUT ABOUT THE OZARK REGION MEETING BY ACCIDENT — THROUGH A PERSONAL EMAIL CHAIN WITH THE HEAD CWD OFFICIAL AT MDC.
Here is what makes this even more pointed:
That flyer has no publication date on it. None. A legitimate public outreach document — one genuinely designed to inform the community — carries a date showing when it was created and distributed. This one doesn't. Which raises a question MDC needs to answer directly:
WAS THAT FLYER ALREADY BUILT AND SITTING IN A FOLDER GOING NOWHERE? OR WAS IT BUILT AFTER WE STARTED ASKING QUESTIONS?
Because if it already existed — why wasn't it distributed to every rural radio station, every county farm bureau, every sportsmen's club and hunting organization in Missouri? The first meeting is THIS MONDAY. Three days away. We received this flyer yesterday. By asking for it.
And if it was built AFTER we started asking questions — then MDC's "community conversation" outreach document was created reactively in response to a journalist pressing for answers. Not proactively to actually inform the public.
Either way the conclusion is the same:
The community conversation existed on paper before it existed in the community.
There was no press release sent to rural radio stations.
No announcement to county farm bureaus.
No outreach to sportsmen's clubs or landowner organizations.
No social media campaign targeting Missouri hunters and landowners.
Nothing.
And yet MDC will walk away from these eight meetings and tell the Conservation Commission, tell the legislature, and tell the public: "We held community conversations across all eight regions of Missouri. We listened. We engaged. We partnered with the public."
That is not community partnership. That is the APPEARANCE of community partnership.
Here's what real community outreach looks like: You contact every rural radio station in Missouri. You send press releases to every county farm bureau. You notify every sportsmen's club and hunting organization in the state. You post it on social media WEEKS in advance. You make it impossible for a hunter or landowner NOT to know the meeting is happening.
Instead, MDC held meetings that — by design or by incompetence — only people already connected to MDC would know about. Small groups. Controlled rooms. Controlled narrative. And when it's over, they get to say the community was heard.
This is the same agency that spent 15 years telling you their CWD sharpshooter program was working while the disease spread from 1 county to 70. The same agency that paused that program in December only after hunters threatened to vote against the Parks tax. The same agency that has $212 million a year in constitutionally protected funding and answers to exactly four appointed commissioners.
And now they want a "community conversation."
HERE ARE THE MEETINGS THEY DIDN'T TELL YOU ABOUT:
KANSAS CITY REGION — Monday May 11, 6-8 PM — Humansville Senior Center, 102 W Tilden St, Humansville MO 65674
NORTHEAST REGION — Tuesday May 12, 6-8 PM — Northeast Regional Office, 3500 S. Baltimore, Kirksville MO 63501
CENTRAL REGION — Wednesday May 13, 6-8 PM — Central Regional Office, 3500 E. Gans Rd, Columbia MO 65201
NORTHWEST REGION — Thursday May 14, 6-8 PM — Mildred Litton 4-H/FFA Community Center, 10780 Liv 235, Chillicothe MO 64601
SOUTHWEST REGION — Friday May 15, 6-8 PM — Southwest Regional Office, 2630 N. Mayfair Ave, Springfield MO 65803
SOUTHEAST REGION — Monday May 18, 6-8 PM — Progress Sports Complex, 1300 Progress Parkway, Ste. Genevieve MO 63670
ST. LOUIS REGION — Thursday May 21, 6-8 PM — East Central College, 350 Audrey Lane, Union MO 63084
OZARK REGION — Tuesday May 26, 6-8 PM — Ozark Regional Office, 551 Joe Jones Blvd, West Plains MO 65775
YOU ARE WELCOME AT EVERY ONE OF THESE MEETINGS. They are open to the public.
If MDC won't tell the community about community conversations — we will.
Show up. Speak up. Make sure the room isn't just filled with people MDC already knows.
If you want to contact Jason Isabelle — MDC's Cervid Program Supervisor — directly, his email is [email protected] and his office number is 573-815-7901 ext. 2902.
If you want to contact MDC's Public Involvement Coordinator for these meetings directly, reach out to Jennifer Hoggatt at [email protected].
The community conversation starts when the COMMUNITY shows up.
Conservatives For Rural Missouri
stSopndero5u182fuu4mc5uc316521m21a1ll6cg0lt8g1f66i6h124g10a6 ·CWD UPDATE
:
MDC WANTS A "COMMUNITY CONVERSATION" —
SO WHY DOESN'T THE COMMUNITY KNOW ABOUT IT?
Let's talk about what a "community conversation" actually means.
According to the Missouri Department of Conservation, they are holding eight "Deer Management Community Conversations" across Missouri this month. Eight meetings. Eight regions. Two hours each. Small group format. Designed — according to MDC — to "listen to feedback, answer questions, and work together to begin creating a shared path forward for managing a healthy and sustainable deer herd in Missouri."
Sounds great. There's just one problem.
NOBODY KNOWS ABOUT THEM.
Here's how Big Country 99 found out about these meetings — and pay close attention to how this unfolded.
We contacted Jason Isabelle — MDC's Cervid Program Supervisor and the man who oversees CWD management statewide — about a CWD meeting that had been rumored in Cape Girardeau. What followed was a carefully choreographed series of narrow, precise answers:
We asked: Is MDC HOSTING a CWD meeting in Cape Girardeau? Answer: No.
We asked: Is MDC SPEAKING AT or PRESENTING at any CWD event in Cape Girardeau? Answer: No.
We asked: Are there ANY meetings in Cape Girardeau in May where CWD is on the agenda? Answer: No — but here are two meetings you might want to attend.
Notice what happened there. Isabelle never once volunteered that MDC was holding eight regional community conversations across Missouri this month. Every piece of information had to be pulled out through increasingly specific questions. Only when we asked directly for all eight meeting locations did a flyer suddenly appear — sent privately as an email attachment to our station.
THE ONLY RADIO STATION IN TEXAS COUNTY FOUND OUT ABOUT THE OZARK REGION MEETING BY ACCIDENT — THROUGH A PERSONAL EMAIL CHAIN WITH THE HEAD CWD OFFICIAL AT MDC.
Here is what makes this even more pointed:
That flyer has no publication date on it. None. A legitimate public outreach document — one genuinely designed to inform the community — carries a date showing when it was created and distributed. This one doesn't. Which raises a question MDC needs to answer directly:
WAS THAT FLYER ALREADY BUILT AND SITTING IN A FOLDER GOING NOWHERE? OR WAS IT BUILT AFTER WE STARTED ASKING QUESTIONS?
Because if it already existed — why wasn't it distributed to every rural radio station, every county farm bureau, every sportsmen's club and hunting organization in Missouri? The first meeting is THIS MONDAY. Three days away. We received this flyer yesterday. By asking for it.
And if it was built AFTER we started asking questions — then MDC's "community conversation" outreach document was created reactively in response to a journalist pressing for answers. Not proactively to actually inform the public.
Either way the conclusion is the same:
The community conversation existed on paper before it existed in the community.
There was no press release sent to rural radio stations.
No announcement to county farm bureaus.
No outreach to sportsmen's clubs or landowner organizations.
No social media campaign targeting Missouri hunters and landowners.
Nothing.
And yet MDC will walk away from these eight meetings and tell the Conservation Commission, tell the legislature, and tell the public: "We held community conversations across all eight regions of Missouri. We listened. We engaged. We partnered with the public."
That is not community partnership. That is the APPEARANCE of community partnership.
Here's what real community outreach looks like: You contact every rural radio station in Missouri. You send press releases to every county farm bureau. You notify every sportsmen's club and hunting organization in the state. You post it on social media WEEKS in advance. You make it impossible for a hunter or landowner NOT to know the meeting is happening.
Instead, MDC held meetings that — by design or by incompetence — only people already connected to MDC would know about. Small groups. Controlled rooms. Controlled narrative. And when it's over, they get to say the community was heard.
This is the same agency that spent 15 years telling you their CWD sharpshooter program was working while the disease spread from 1 county to 70. The same agency that paused that program in December only after hunters threatened to vote against the Parks tax. The same agency that has $212 million a year in constitutionally protected funding and answers to exactly four appointed commissioners.
And now they want a "community conversation."
HERE ARE THE MEETINGS THEY DIDN'T TELL YOU ABOUT:
KANSAS CITY REGION — Monday May 11, 6-8 PM — Humansville Senior Center, 102 W Tilden St, Humansville MO 65674
NORTHEAST REGION — Tuesday May 12, 6-8 PM — Northeast Regional Office, 3500 S. Baltimore, Kirksville MO 63501
CENTRAL REGION — Wednesday May 13, 6-8 PM — Central Regional Office, 3500 E. Gans Rd, Columbia MO 65201
NORTHWEST REGION — Thursday May 14, 6-8 PM — Mildred Litton 4-H/FFA Community Center, 10780 Liv 235, Chillicothe MO 64601
SOUTHWEST REGION — Friday May 15, 6-8 PM — Southwest Regional Office, 2630 N. Mayfair Ave, Springfield MO 65803
SOUTHEAST REGION — Monday May 18, 6-8 PM — Progress Sports Complex, 1300 Progress Parkway, Ste. Genevieve MO 63670
ST. LOUIS REGION — Thursday May 21, 6-8 PM — East Central College, 350 Audrey Lane, Union MO 63084
OZARK REGION — Tuesday May 26, 6-8 PM — Ozark Regional Office, 551 Joe Jones Blvd, West Plains MO 65775
YOU ARE WELCOME AT EVERY ONE OF THESE MEETINGS. They are open to the public.
If MDC won't tell the community about community conversations — we will.
Show up. Speak up. Make sure the room isn't just filled with people MDC already knows.
If you want to contact Jason Isabelle — MDC's Cervid Program Supervisor — directly, his email is [email protected] and his office number is 573-815-7901 ext. 2902.
If you want to contact MDC's Public Involvement Coordinator for these meetings directly, reach out to Jennifer Hoggatt at [email protected].
The community conversation starts when the COMMUNITY shows up.
