Don't know a thing about Wisconson but PA isn't quite the picture that a few folks like to paint. We have had a reduction in the herd but that has been the stated goal for many years and has just now appears to have been accomplished in a meaningful way. Pa had vast tracts of timber in our "big woods" where precious little forage was to be found below the browse line.
It hasn't come without a price. Casual one day a year hunters can no longer just go out and sit on a favored stump and see 20-50 deer in a half days hunt and that has caused some limited but very vocal protests and as someone said here even a lawsuit filed by a tiny splinter group of misguided individuals from the fringes of PA's hunters. This group has railed about a percieved overharvest of does since the mid 80's. The wording of suit itself is frivilous enough that it's alteady been thrown out once and had to be reflied. The new suit will undoubtedly have similar results.
At the same time the herd reduction began, so did an antler restriction designed to let some of our bucks get past a year and a half in age. (we were killing 80+% of our yearlings every single year)
The photos in the local papers and the remarkable volume of trophy racks in the local taxidermy shops are testament to the success of our new average antler size.
Pa's changes have pleased most but the few disgruntled hunters have been vocal, passionate and persistent. Hunters have always been notoriously quiet when satisfied as most seem to be. The vocal few have succeeded temporarily in placing a financial chokehold on our State Game Commission. An independent audit of our commisions management plan by an outside firm is due soon though and should debunk some of the fiction being placed out there by the few.
Positive findings from the audit seem imminent simply because the vocal splinter groups began crying foul the moment it was undertaken. It seems they know that their position is based on a sentimental clinging to traditions more than good sound science and popular results.
PA's deer management is on the right track and most PA hunters agree.