Starting Sept. 1, Texas hunters and most fishers will have to renew their annual licenses to legally game in the state for the upcoming year. A commonly-held myth is that the approximately $90 million in the funds that are collected from these licenses goes to fund departments other than Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TWPD).

However, the truth is that the money is kept in the department's coffers but not touched in order to help balance the state's budget, as required by a constitutional amendment. Even though the state does not use these funds for other departments, all of the "unappropriated balances" are left idle in accounts as a way to offset negative balances in other state programs. This budgeting gimmick has long been a tool for lawmakers to make their state budgets appear balanced.  Texas is not the only state relying on this gimmick to make its balance sheet look better.  In Minnesota, lawmakers have consistently relied on withholding state funds from school districts  to boost the balance sheet.

In Texas, federal excise taxes are also allocated to states to help fund wildlife and fisheries programs and research projects. Texas gets about $40 million a year from these federal fisheries and wildlife programs. For a state to receive these funds, it must prohibit using hunting and fishing license revenue for anything other than wildlife and fisheries programs, hence, why Texas cannot transfer the funds to other departments. The entire amount collected goes directly into the Game, Fish and Water Safety Fund (Fund 9). The fund will contain $31 million by the end of this month, and it is projected to increase to an estimated $48 in Aug. 2012 and as much as $64 million by Aug. 31, 2013.

As a result of the budget shortfall this year, lawmakers proposed holding up to $65 million in Fund 9 balances was proposed. In the end, budget writers cut the TPWD budget by 21 percent, which will result in the elimination of169 positions. TPWD laid off 115 employees over the past month. Those layoffs included 9 percent of the staff in the agency's wildlife division, 8 percent of the inland fisheries division and just under 3 percent of the coastal fisheries division.

Despite the public's faith in their state government to appropriately spend these funds when they purchase licenses from the state, they would be shocked to discover that these funds are merely left stagnant as part of a budget gimmick crafted by lawmakers.