Permit Price Adjustments 2025

KEY POINTS

• The cost of conservation business (habitat work, cost share, fuel, equipment, contract work and construction work) continues to increase.
• Missouri nonresident and resident permit prices remain a good bargain when compared to surrounding states.
• Other states continue to increase nonresident permit prices and have started to restrict hunting opportunities for some nonresident hunting seasons.
• If approved by the Commission at the September 2025 meeting:
  • Permit prices would go into effect Jan. 1, 2025.
  • Migratory bird, trout and daily fishing permit would increase for residents and nonresidents (daily small game hunting permit only applies to nonresident hunters).

PUBLIC COMMENT AND COMMISSION ACTION

The Missouri Conservation Commission gave initial approval to the proposed permit changes at its May 24 open meeting in Jefferson City

MDC will seek public comments about its proposed permit price adjustments from July 2 to Aug. 1. Get more information and submit comments at mdc.mo.gov/contact-engage/public-commenting-opportunities

MDC will then compile comments received and share them with the Commission prior to the Sept. 6 Commission open meeting when it will give final consideration to the proposed permit price adjustments. If approved, the changes would become effective Jan. 1, 2025.

PERMIT SALES AND MDC FUNDING

Permit sales account for about 16 percent of MDC annual revenue. Other significant revenue sources for MDC include the Conservation Sales Tax at about 61 percent and federal reimbursements at about 17 percent of total MDC revenue. Sales and rentals, interest, and other sources make up the remaining 6 percent of MDC revenue. Missourians on average pay $26 annually for conservation efforts through the Conservation Sales Tax.

MDC receives no funds through fines from tickets or citations and no funding from the state’s general revenue budget. For more information on MDC revenues and expenses and how those monies are used to help MDC take care of nature, connect people with nature, and maintain the public trust, read the MDC Annual Review for Fiscal Year 2023 in the January 2024 issue of the Missouri Conservationist online at mdc.mo.gov/magazines/missouri-conservationist/2024-01/annual-review-fiscal-year-2023

WHAT PERMIT SALES SUPPORT

Additional revenue from permit sales will help MDC maintain and improve its nationally recognized programs and services for hunters, anglers, wildlife watchers, and others. Conservation efforts supported by revenue from permit sales include: 

• Maintaining and improving nine fish hatcheries around the state that raise and stock more than 7 million fish annually for public fishing, including about 1.3 million trout at five hatcheries.
• Maintaining and improving more than 70 public shooting ranges around the state.
• Ongoing habitat work on nearly 1,000 conservation areas, including 14 intensively managed wetlands for public hunting and wildlife watching.
• Expansion of popular youth offerings such as the Missouri Archery in the Schools Program, which has reached more than 200,000 young archers at nearly 700 Missouri schools, and the Discover Nature Schools Program, which helps more than 87,000 Missouri students each year at more than 700 schools around the state learn about and connect with Missouri outdoors.
• Helping more than 24,000 landowners create and maintain habitat for wildlife. 
• Research on health and sustainability of deer, turkey, quail, waterfowl, songbirds, fish, bears, elk, and other species.
• Evaluation of the effectiveness of harvest regulations for fish and wildlife game species and understanding resource-user preferences.
• Restoration, monitoring, and protection of imperiled and endangered species and habitats.
• Reduction and removal of invasive species that threaten the health of native species and habitats.
• Maintaining and improving 15 nature and education centers around the state.

Additional revenue from permit prices will help MDC with the rising costs of improving buildings and other infrastructure at conservation areas, fish hatcheries, shooting ranges, and nature centers that are many decades old and in need of significant repair or replacement.

• MDC will need to invest more than $150 million over the next decade to repair and improve aging infrastructure at its fish hatcheries so the state’s more than one million anglers can continue to catch the more than 7 million sport fish raised and released from the hatcheries each year.
• MDC is investing more than $7 million in a new and much larger Shepherd of the Hills Conservation Center near Branson to better accommodate the estimated 250,000 people who visit the conservation center and adjacent fish hatchery each year. The former facility was built in the 1970s.
• MDC is facing ever-increasing costs to manage more than 42,000 acres of core wetlands around the state plus an additional 100,000 acres of flooded bottomland that also contributes to the state’s wetland habitats. Costs are increasing to fix or replace aging equipment and infrastructure needed to manage these areas such as pumps and water control structures, levees, and other things. These wetlands draw more than 40,000 waterfowl hunting trips each year and are among the top 50 birding hotspots in the state for Missouri’s more than 1.1 million birders.
• Additional revenue from permits will help MDC maintain and improve its five staffed shooting ranges and 70 unstaffed archery and firearm shooting ranges around the state.
• Additional revenue will help MDC support CWD monitoring and testing. A CWD test costs about $22 while a resident firearms any-deer permit costs $18.

Costs of doing business have also increased significantly.

• Printing and production costs have increased by about 17% over the past year for the nature-based curriculum MDC offers schools through its Discover Nature Schools Program, which helps more than 87,000 Missouri students each year at more than 700 schools around the state learn about and connect with Missouri outdoors.
• The cost of clay targets provided at MDC shotgun ranges has doubled from an annual budget of $100,000 for the four staffed ranges to $200,000.
• Costs of construction materials and labor are up 52% since 1999.
• The cost of a gallon of unleaded fuel was $1.42 in early 2003 compared to around $3.40 in April 2024. MDC purchased nearly 908,000 gallons of fuel last year to run vehicles and equipment.
• The costs of dove field management for sunflower plantings (seed, fertilizer, herbicide, lime, and pesticide) were $53 per acre in 1999 compared to $250 per acre in 2022. MDC manages more than 3,188 acres for doves.
• The costs to control woody cover and heavy brush on conservation areas have increased from $133 per acre in 1999 to $319 per acre in 2023. MDC worked on controlling more than 2,116 acres in 2022.
• The costs of using prescribed burns on woodlands have gone from about $13 per acre in 1999 to more than $117 per acre in 2023. MDC conducted prescribed burns on more than 9,970 acres in 2022

More frequent annual floods and drought are requiring more monies from MDC to maintain its more than 1,000 conservation areas and repair related damages to infrastructure on the areas. These weather events will continue, and the related costs will continue to increase.

• MDC has spent more than $11 million over the past decade on repairs and improvements to fish hatcheries damaged by extreme flooding.
• MDC manages more than 140,000 acres of wetland areas that serve as flood-water storage areas to help reduce or prevent flood damages elsewhere while improving water quality. The increasing frequency and intensity of extreme rain and flood events, along with general wear and tear over time, requires additional monies to maintain, repair, and replace aging infrastructure to continue to provide quality habitat and recreational-use opportunities.