Missouri has a new leader of its programs to protect our outdoors and its fish and game. For 25 years, John Hoskins has worked his way up through the ranks, starting as a conservation agent in Poplar Bluff. He joined the Department a month after the Design for Conservation, the plan for development of conservation areas and services, went into effect. But Hoskins steps up to the Department directorship worried about what he calls the isolation of the Department’s mission from conservation. Hoskins says the Department has gotten requests to use its lands forauto shows, model rocketry exhibitions, alternative lifestyle gatherings, weddings, concerts, paint-ball battles, balloon races, and more. Nice, but they aren’t the Department’s mission, which he says responsible management and maintenance of public properties and the species that live in them.
