Governor Names Agency Veteran to Head Fish and Game

Loris Ryan Broddrick, a San Joaquin Valley Democrat who rose from game warden to chief deputy director of the state Department of Fish and Game before leaving to work for Ducks Unlimited, was appointed Tuesday by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to be director of Fish and Game.

As director, Broddrick, 53, of Gold River, Calif., will oversee a department with more than 2,000 employees and a shrinking budget. “I’ve had to deal with budget cuts before,” said Broddrick, who was second in command of the department before leaving it three years ago. Still, he said, “if we are going to continue the social promise of good conservation, we have to make sure we have enough wardens and biologists to make that happen.”

In his meeting with Schwarzenegger last week, he said, the governor issued no specific marching orders.

“He recognized there are a lot of issues that Fish and Game wrestles with: mountain lions, invasive species,” Broddrick said. “But he was more interested in the real mechanics of what Fish and Game can do to provide a healthy environment and a robust economy. He made it clear he wants both.”

In announcing the appointment, Schwarzenegger cited Broddrick’s “extensive background in conservation” and management as key to what made him the governor’s pick for the job.

Besides regulating hunting and fishing, Broddrick will be in charge of a department that has broad authority to protect wildlife habitat, prosecute polluters, and coordinate the prevention and cleanup of oil spills.

A UC Davis graduate, Broddrick began working as a Fish and Game warden in 1981, gaining experience in cases involving the illicit trade of abalone, bear organs and venomous snakes. He worked his way through the ranks to become a regional patrol chief in the Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response. He later was appointed a deputy director and then chief deputy during the administrations of former Govs. Pete Wilson and Gray Davis.

Broddrick said he left the department in 2001 -- after 20 years -- to become conservation director in the western regional office of Ducks Unlimited, a nonprofit group founded by hunters who preserve wetlands for migrating waterfowl.

He has been on various state and federal committees that oversee how water in the Sacramento delta should be apportioned to cities, farms and wildlife.

Broddrick, who begins his $123,255 job Monday, must be confirmed by the state Senate.