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Outdoor advocate Schneider dead at 84 By MARK FREEMAN One of Oregon's most distinguished members of the outdoor community has died. Phil Schneider, a former director of the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife and lifetime member of the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission, died Monday in Portland after a long battle with cancer. He was 84. His fish-and-wildlife career spanned more than half a century, helping carry Oregon's conservation attitudes from infancy to priority among the many management duties for fish and wildlife here. "He was a torch-bearer lighting the way for conservation in Oregon," ODFW Director Jim Greer said. "He was one of the great ones." Schneider began his career working full-time in 1939 for what was then known as the Oregon Game Commission. He became the agency's director in 1950, and stayed at the helm until his retirement in 1969. After retiring, he worked for the National Wildlife Federation, the National Academy of Science Committee on Oil Development on Public Land, and on the federal committee overseeing development of the Alaskan oil pipeline. In 1983, Gov. Vic Atiyeh appointed Schneider to the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission, the seven-member public body that oversees the ODFW and sets conservation, harvest and management policy for the state. He served three four-year terms until 1995, when Gov. John Kitzhaber appointed Schneider the unique title of Commissioner Emeritus, which made Schneider a lifelong, nonvoting member of the commission. "He gave us the benefit of his years of experience and wisdom regarding natural-resource issues," Greer said. Before his death, the commission had begun preparing to create an Oregon State University scholarship in Schneider's name, as well as renaming the Murderer's Creek Wildlife Area after him. Copyright � interRogue & The Mail Tribune 1998, Medford, Oregon USA