A Message from Chief Warden Randy Stark

Welcome to the Department of Natural Resources Bureau of Law Enforcement website.

The goal of our website is to keep you informed. You'll find access to new items under our "Headlines" section, emerging issues, regulations, Mentored Hunting, and the Learn to Hunt Program, recruitment and hiring, our annual report along with other official reports, and more. You'll find text, audio and video content.

Whether you buy a license, enroll in a safety course, or register a boat, snowmobile, or ATV, you are making an investment in conservation and recreation. You are investing and enhancing safety and enjoyment of outdoor recreation, and protecting our natural resources for everyone's future use.

You are the key to our success, and the success of conservation efforts in Wisconsin. With your support, we can accomplish our strategic goals. On behalf of the Bureau of Law Enforcement, I'd like to take this opportunity to personally thank you for investing your time and money to help us get the job done. Whether it's by being vigilant and reporting violators, partnering with us in educational endeavors, working together to solve problems or supporting us through your license dollars, your individual investment is vital in leaving our natural resource legacy intact for future generations.

In the Warden Service we work to enhance public safety and protect our natural resources through enforcement, education, and community involvement. We patrol Wisconsin's lands and waters enforcing laws designed to promote public safety and protect our natural resources. We educate outdoor users in the safe and wise use of our resources. We work together with people and organizations in our communities to promote conservation.

We want you to view us as the investment of choice. When we developed our strategic plan, you told us what was important. We want to show you we listened, and give you confidence your investment is working on the things you told us are important now, and into the future.

As the title of our strategic plan suggests - "Same Mission: New Challenges, Strategies, and Opportunities" - our mission is the same, but we are facing many new challenges in accomplishing it: fish and wildlife diseases, invasive species, threats to the quality of our air, land, and water, societal changes, new technologies, threats to our Homeland Security, and a rapidly changing economy.

Our strategic plan focuses on six goals to address these new realities, challenges and opportunities:

1. Maintaining healthy and diverse wildlife populations and habitats.
2. Enhancing oppotunity, safety, and enjoyment of outdoor recreational experiences in Wisconsin.
3. Enhancing public safety by being ready to respond to emergencies, natural disasters, and acts of terrorism.
4. Leading by example in conservation and passing on the conservation ethic to future generations.
5. Protecting health and the environment through clean air, land, and water.
6. Leading, adapting, and managing the Warden Service to achieve our mission while providing our people with fulfilling careers.

We believe in being accountable to the public we serve. We want to let you know how we are translating your investment into strategic action on behalf of conservation. We believe it's important to report back to you and be accountable for how your investment in conservation is spent, and what it is accomplishing. We hope you'll find the information and reports on our website meet this goal.

In 2008, we strategically took on these new challenges and realities by hiring our Water Guards to combat invasive species; initiating the Harmony in the Woods porgram to help facilitate relations between the Hmong and Conservation communities; responding to emergencies that threaten public safety; enforcing pollution control laws; and efficiently managing our budget in the wake of an economic downturn. These are just a few examples of how we are adapting to meet these challenges.

THANK YOU again for your support

Randy J. Stark

Chief Warden

Bureau of Law Enforcement

"The conservation of natural resources is the fundamental problem. Unless we solve that problem it will avail us little to solve all others."

-Theodore Roosevelt, U.S. President, Memphis, TN, October 12, 1907