Environment Minister Elaine Taylor has responded to recommendations from the Yukon Fish and Wildlife Management Board, though the process remains under the veil of confidentiality.

Board chair Don Hutton confirmed to the Star that last Monday, Taylor forwarded her response to several recommendations for changes in wildlife management and to hunting and fishing regulations.

Hutton, however, said he could not say more because of the confidentiality provisions set out in the Umbrella Final Agreement, the blueprint for negotiating aboriginal land claims in the territory under which the management board was created.

Issues being considered by the board late last year included everything from banning the use of ATVs for hunting above treeline on Pilot Mountain and throughout the Miners Range, to permitting youth to have their own big game tags.

The Teslin Renewable Resource Council is seeking a realignment of the Game Management Zones along the Yukon River to increase the effectiveness of managing the annual moose harvest.

And the Yukon Fish and Game Association is seeking a regulation change that would enable special guiding permits for Yukoners who want to take friends from around Canada on sheep hunts.

All in all, there were 14 proposals before the board. As is the annual practice, the board invited public input into the proposals late last year, and held a public meeting to discuss them in December.

The board forwarded its recommendations to Taylor on Jan. 9.

Under the umbrella agreement, the minister has 60 days to accept, reject or alter the recommendations. The board then has 30 days to reply back, and the minister has another 30 days - or she can take more - to respond a second time. Ultimately, the minister has the last say.

From the day the recommendations are forwarded by the board in late December or early January, the process is confidential until a final decision is made, unless the minister exercises her right to waive the provisions of confidentiality.

The board asked Taylor to waive the confidentiality provisions in December, but she declined. She did indicate she would consider waiving the provision on a recommedation-by-recommendation basis.

In her reply, Taylor wrote: "A waiver will be considered on a recommendation-specific basis to support the interest in any additional information exchange as may be required from time to time for purposes of clarification or where business information, traditional knowledge or third party information is of a private or confidential nature that may preclude public release."

In the board's request to waive confidentiality for the current set of recommendations, Hutton told Taylor that local renewable resource councils and the 750-member fish and game assocation are expressing "dissatisfaction with the timing and the transparency of the process."

In an interview back then, the chair of the management board explained that interested parties submit their proposal for consideration by the June deadline. The board sifts through which proposals qualify for further consideration, then publishes the proposals for public review and input.

But it can be months - until a final decision is made - before renewable resource councils or the fish and game association even learn what the board recommended with regard to its proposals.

Allan Koprowsky, assistant deputy minister of Environment, said last Thursday a final determination on the current set of 14 recommendations has not been made, and it would be premature to release the details at this time.

"It may be a little too early to get them out and have sort of a public response or reaction to that when there has not been a final determination," he said.

There is the potential, said Koprowsky, for some of those decisions to affect the livelihoods of outfitters and trappers.