46th legislature - STATE OF NEW MEXICO - first session, 2003

RELATING TO GAME CONTROL; CREATING GAME AND FISH DEPARTMENT LIABILITY FOR PROPERTY DAMAGE CAUSED BY GAME ANIMALS.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO:

Section 1. A new section of Chapter 17, Article 2 NMSA 1978 is enacted to read:

"[NEW MATERIAL] GAME ANIMALS--PROPERTY DAMAGE--DEPARTMENT LIABILITY.--If the department of game and fish does not intervene in an animal depredation within ninety days after a landowner or a lessee or employee of the landowner files a complaint of depredation with the department or if the game animal, including a game mammal or quadruped and a game bird or fowl, causes property damage within ninety days after a landowner or a lessee or employee of the landowner files a complaint of depredation with the department, the department shall be liable for the property damage described in the complaint and all other property damage caused by the game animal within ninety days of the date that the complaint was filed. For the purposes of this section, "intervene" means a solution proposed by the department to eliminate depredation."