Like the traveler in Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken,” visitors to the Dairy Fork Wildlife Management Area near Spanish Fork face a decision. About three miles into the Dairy Fork trail, mountain bikers, OHV riders, equestrians and the like can continue along the main trail, which veers to the left another five miles. Or they can go right onto the Sky High trail.
Similarly, Utah lawmakers may come to a fork in the road next legislative session regarding some of the state’s most popular Wildlife Management Agencies, like Dairy Fork. For anyone who isn’t a hunter or fisher, the path they take may make all the difference.
Two separate interim legislative committees have begun discussing what tweaks should be made to a controversial new law requiring a fishing or hunting license to access Wildlife (or Waterfowl) Management Areas in Utah’s four most populous counties. And, at least initially, the committees have two very divergent approaches.
One solution expected to be presented to a committee this week keeps the license requirement intact. However it creates paths for free or discounted access, mostly via community service projects and education. The other solution, which has passed in committee, recommends getting rid of the license requirement altogether and returning to the way things were.
Rep. Nelson Abbott, R-Orem, brought the latter proposal to the Judiciary Interim Committee in September.
“We’ve had a really strong tradition in the United States of allowing hikers to access public lands,” Abbott told The Salt Lake Tribune, “and we shouldn’t be changing that.”
How the new law could change
The law, which went into effect in May, requires all adults — regardless of their recreational intent — to carry a hunting or fishing license when on a Wildlife Management Area in Davis, Salt Lake, Utah and Weber counties, with a few exceptions. The licenses range from $40 to $144 (nonresident hunting) and are good for one year. To actually hunt on the land, license holders also must have a valid, state-issued permit.
(Chris Samuels | The Salt Lake Tribune) A sign along the Bonneville Shoreline Trail in Orem, Friday, July 25, 2025. Hunting or fishing licenses are now required for any access to the Wildlife Management Areas in the four most populous Utah counties: Salt Lake, Utah, Davis and Weber.
Tucked inside a larger package of hunting-related provisions, the license requirement gained little notice when Rep. Casey Snider, R-Paradise, introduced HB309 in January. Not until this summer — when wildlife rangers began issuing warnings to hikers, mountain bikers, bird watchers and other recreationalists for treading on WMA land that many had been frequenting for years — did state leaders begin hearing complaints.
“The impact on the public was more than I certainly expected when we passed the legislation,” Sen. Mike McKell, the bill’s floor sponsor, said in July.
Abbott, whose district cuts through Utah County, said he was contacted by numerous constituents who were upset about the change. He saw the same consternation reflected in the comment section of articles in The Tribune and other publications.
So last month he presented his revisions to the Judiciary Interim Committee.
“They don’t want to pay to hike on public lands,” he told The Tribune. “It’s not fair to make them do it, and they’ve always been able to do it and it’s never been an issue until now,”
Abbott’s motion passed 9-3. Among those who voted “No” was Rep. Stephanie Gricius, R-Eagle Mountain. She objected, at least in part, because another committee was also reviewing the law. Rep. David Shallenberger, R-Orem, spoke during public comment and urged the Judiciary Interim Committee to reject Abbott’s proposal in favor of the one Shallenberger will present Wednesday to the Natural Resources, Agriculture, and Environment Interim Committee.
Yet the action Shallenberger plans to propose is quite different.
(Christopher Cherrington | The Salt Lake Tribune)
Shallenberger said he believes the top priority of the original bill sponsors was to educate people about how Wildlife Management Areas differ from other public lands. Under his plan, licenses would still be required in designated Wildlife Management Areas. However, in addition to paying with money, people could pay with their time. That might include participating in organized trail work or watching a short informational video before entering a restricted property.
“It’s finding this balance between recreation and wildlife management,” said Shallenberger, who coaches a youth mountain biking team that often uses trails in Wildlife Management Areas. “But also, if we can collect money, let’s find a way to do it.”
And money, of course, is what’s really at the root of the issue.
Paying for upkeep
Wildlife Management Areas are lands set aside to preserve wildlife habitat. Yet they differ from other public lands in one key way: They are almost entirely purchased, maintained and operated with funds generated by the sale of hunting and fishing licenses.
Because they hold a bounty of wildlife, though, many bird watchers, hikers and other recreationalists enjoy those areas as well. Around the state’s urban areas, those users often far outnumber hunters and fishers, Riley Peck, director of the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, told the Natural Resources interim committee in June. They can make significant impacts, he said, yet they don’t contribute financially to the land’s upkeep.
The new law impacts 30 WMAs, Peck said. Within a month of its enactment, he estimated wildlife rangers had issued 100 verbal warnings and six written warnings. He said he expects 300 people to purchase a license solely because of the new law.
Until the legislature agrees on a solution, though, Abbott said it is his understanding that DWR officers will continue to give warnings more often than tickets.
Snider told the Natural Resources interim committee that he introduced the license requirement last session to create some balance on the more popular Wildlife Managment Agencies. He said he worked for several years with stakeholders to narrow the scope of the provision.
It’s designed, Snider said, “so that those individuals recreating in whatever capacity they choose are contributing to the establishment or the maintenance of these properties.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) A pair of red-tailed hawks at the Farmington Bay Waterfowl Management Area on Friday, Feb. 7, 2020.
Birders and bikers don’t necessarily want to support hunting and fishing, though. Across multiple online forums focused on outdoor recreation in Utah, members suggested the creation of a separate recreation license. Peck, the DWR director, told the Natural Resources committee it was possible. However, he cautioned that the state would then miss out on federal matching funds of about $16 per fishing license and $80 per hunting license.
Shallenberger said his proposal will allow the state to keep capitalizing on those federal funds, but not at the expense of all users.
“People are looking at it like a binary approach,” Shallenberger said. “It either has to be $40 and people are going to be mad, or it’s going to be zero and it’s a missed opportunity.
“What we’re talking about is maybe a scaled approach, where people can donate less than $40 — $5, $10, $20, whatever they want. But if they donate $40 or more, they get their fishing license, and we get matching funds also.”
That’s not a good enough reason to charge people to use public lands, Abbott said.
“Extra money is always good,” he said, “but, to me, that’s just not a compelling issue.”
Another snag that will need to be addressed if the state keeps the license requirement is the confusion around where and when licenses will be required. Trails often weave between Wildlife Management Area parcels, where licenses are required, and other public lands, where they are not, with little signage to mark the transition. Plus, within the same Wildlife Management Area, some trails may have easements, eliminating the need for a license, while others do not. Such an easement was granted in July to a part of the Timpanogos WMA that encompasses part of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail and has long been popular with trail runners and mountain bikers.
Peck said his department is working on marking the trails with signs that include QR codes that will direct visitors to a website where they can learn more about the new law and purchase licenses online. Shallenberger said the same technology could link to quick, online courses that visitors could watch on their phones to earn free access to Wilderness Management Areas.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Columns of courting midges fly amongst shore birds and waterfowl including a yellow-headed blackbird in the Ogden Bay Waterfowl Management area on Wednesday, April 12, 2023.
Abbott had not seen a copy of Shallenberger’s proposal as of last week. So, he said, he’s having “a hard time, in my brain, imagining” how Shallenberger’s plan would work or be enforced. Still, Abbott said he’s open to compromise so long as low-impact users aren’t saddled with high costs.
If Shallenberger’s bill is approved by the Natural Resources interim committee, and he and Abbott can’t come to a compromise, then it will be up to the legislator’s powerful House Rules Committee to decide which one to put up for a vote during the next full legislative session. It could also decide to let both move forward.
“I think the more pressure legislators feel from the public,” Abbott said, “then the more likely mine is to come out.”