EJ, you are correct that license fees paid for gamelands. Unfortunately, the money there is to spend on them isn't enough to do all that could be done to enhance habitat. A lot of our gamelands is stuff they got cheap because it wasn't that good for much to begin with and making it good for wlidlife while trying to make it pay for itself isn't always the easiest task. I'm not saying that it couldn't be done better. I beleive it could in many places. I'm just saying that it can be a big job taking a chunk of ground that no one wants and turning it into a game paradise which is what we'd all like to see.

Iwould support for a user fee for gamelands that would be set aside strictly for maintenance and improvement of those gamelands. I'd supprt a user fee for anyone using them but we also need a higher fee for non hunters who wish to use them. even If we never have a user fee for hunters, we still should still charge non hunters who hike, bicycle, fish, birdwatch, horseback ride etc on gamelands. I pay taxes but I still have to pay launch fees tolaunch a canoe or camp or use a pavillionin a state park, why shouldnt the PGC charge non hunters to use what hunters have paid for?


I don't remember the exact percentage but I did see it just a short time ago and the PGC only holds the mineral rights for a small portion of the states gamelands.

bob, i was in a meeting with sen wojesnack and DCNR.

dont think for minute that is not being looked at.

you will see user fees at parks soon.

maryland is doing it now.

i fish B.A.S.S tournaments in maryland.

they charge 20 dollars for season to fish in there local lake or 6 dollars daily.

you cant fish after dark, that was strange to me but they caught mexicans dumping chemicals from boats after dark.[:@]

All of those possibilities and pretty much every other likely avenue of combining the various duties and even the management of a combined Fish and Game Agency were evaluated by the Legislative Budget and Finance Committee. They couldn’t come up with any significant cost saves or even a reduction in management personnel even while exploring it for a cost savings. They did identify many areas where there would be some huge expenses in just merging the two agencies though.

All of that was in what one would have to view as a near perfect transition as well. History has also shown that the larger bureaucracy, and that is what it would be, are nearly always less efficient and even stacked higher on the management end of the scale then on the field level end of the scale. That would just mean more money spent with less public return.
It most certainly could be done but I seriously doubt if combining the two agencies would result in any cost saving. But, perhaps the even bigger question is who pays for the initial costs of merging the two already financially strapped agencies.


I suspect you were talking about Big Joe over in Forest County as being your friend. I used to bump into him often. The Game and Fish Officers have always worked close in their duties and most likely always will even without any official merging of the agencies. I help with fish law enforcement and fish stocking every year the same as the Fish WCO helps with game law enforcement. I have even handled first on scene pollution investigations though I really don’t carry the necessary equipment (there wouldn’t even be room for that in my vehicle with all of the wildlife handling equipment I carry with me) or have the required training to collect the water samples so they would be admissible in court. There really is a lot more to the cross training issues then most people realize.



It isn’t that I specifically want to say out of the crossbow discussions it is just that I have no strong feelings on the issue one way or the other. I have been a bow hunter for over forty years and still use a compound bow, or at least would if I had time to hunt during that busy time of the year. I very well might buy a crossbow though now that they are legal, if I can somehow save up that much money.

The real reason I am neutral on the subject has more to do with the rate at which I have already watched the number of crossbows taking over in the hunting field and that rapid increase isn’t something the Game Commission can even control. That control of crossbow inclusion was lost, to the Game Commission, with the legislature changing just one word in the law that allowed disabled hunters to use a crossbow during the archery season.


That law used to say that the Game Commission “MAY” issue a permit to anyone with a Doctor’s report explaining why they couldn’t draw a conventional bow. When someone made application WCOs investigated that person to make a determination if the person truly did qualify. If not, and many didn’t based on the ones that saw still able to play various sports and do arm and upper body physical work on their regular jobs everyday, so we sent in a report that required them to show further cause before being granted the permit. That resulted in the WCO being the bad guy, as usual it seems, the Legislature getting complaints from people that didn’t get their way and finally the Legislature changed the law to read, “The Game Commission “SHALL” issue a permit upon receiving the Doctor’s report. Who couldn’t get a doctor to sign a report saying they can’t draw a bow simply based on what ever the person told them regardless of what a physical exam indicated?


Since that time about 63,000 people have received the crossbow permit and there simply isn’t anyway the Game Commission can slow that ever increasing trend. If you take all of the archery licenses sold during the 2007/2008 license year that would mean that about 24% of our archery hunters can already use a crossbow statewide. Then factor in that anyone in one of the Special Regulations units has been allowed to use a crossbow in their hunting area for years and it becomes obvious that the number of crossbows being used for hunting was a run away number that the Game Commission, or the UBP allies, really had no control over anyway. One word being changed by the State Legislature changed the abilty of the Game Commission to prevent an ever increasing number of crossbow huntersin the archery season, so perhaps the problem really started with waht some peopleare saying they want even more of.

Another factor that I think the Commissioners had to look at was that even though some of the best allies the Commission has ever had didn’t want the crossbow included there were still many others that were equally animate that they did want crossbows included in the archery season. That alone might not be a good reason for the Commission vote going the direction it did but when you combine that with real mission of the Commission being to provide as many hunting opportunities as possible without adversely affecting the resource I do believe they had to look at the possibility that the use of crossbows might allow more people an opportunity to spend more time hunting then they presently are. Isn’t that a good thing? Perhaps not if you are only looking at from the perspective of putting more hunters into a state of completion for the deer, but should that be something that the Commissioners even think about or should they be more focused on the long term future of hunting in general? That is a difficult question to answer though isn’t it? So, when I sit down and think about I really don’t see it as a slap in the face as much as I see it as trying to weight out both the short term and long affects of the decision and then making a judgment call with their vote. It is one of those dammed if you do and dammed if you don’t decisions that frequently challenge major controversial issues, you just can’t win and have to do what seems best based on all of the facts you have. If then it might have been just as easy, and maybe as wise, to just flip a coin and go with what it suggested.


As for the crossbow vote being a conflict of interest for the Commissioner with the sporting good business; it would perhaps seem that way but I don’t think I see the conflict though when I look at more of the facts of his situation. His business is deep in the heart of one of the areas where anyone has been able to use a crossbow during the archery season for a number of years. I doubt he is going to see much of an increase in his business due to his statewide inclusion of crossbows. In fact it may actually boost the business of his completion and hurt him in the really big picture.

I can say that I have some questions of the logic of not allowing the magnification of scopes though in view of the fact that so many people (about 63,000 hunters) already have the scopes and used them without incident for all these years. That was probably more of a compromise gift to the UBP allies that just kind of didn’t result in enough comprise to have any value for the cost of it. I suspect it one of those “paying too much for your whistle” decisions.


Could the need for adjustments be needed in the future for management reason? I suspect that is a possibility depending on how many new hunters, people that weren’t archery hunters before, now join the ranks. No one knows the answer to that question, but we will find out now that they are legal. If there are biological or wildlife management problems that arise they can be most likely be solved, though I am sure many will argue that point too. Time will tell.



I agree that it would be preferable to have hunters paying the full wildlife management bill and I argued for that very thign for a long time. But, the really is that it either already has, oris very rapidly approaching the point when hunters alone simply can’t afford to pay all of the costs of a quality wildlife management program. It costs more money all the times just to maintain the same programs even without new programs and research. At what point do we end up pricing hunters out of hunting.

Yet, it would be irresponsible of both the hunters and wildlife management professionals to allow our resources to become degraded out of either pride of the fear of new and more effective funding methods. At least in my opinion itwould be.

As for the voice of PETA or other non-hunting and anti-hunting groups I will say that they already have a strong voice in wildlife management. If nothing else they get a voice within the Legislature and anyone that studies the situation can surely see how much influence the State Legislature already has in the direction of wildlife management, sad as it is. That is only getting worse and to be honest with you I think working from a portion of a dedicated percentage of the sales tax (the direction I presently would prefer)would result in less outside influence then we have today instead of the more many hunters fear.

As for the PETA types looking for and even demanding a position on the BOC that is already occurring because of the division of the hunters ranks and the USP law suit. I will start a new topic to show what they are presently up to. Please, all hunters that really care, go read it.

R.S. Bodenhorn

Since that time about 63,000 people have received the crossbow permit and there simply isn’t anyway the Game Commission can slow that ever increasing trend.

So that number would exceed the number of votes saying yes to Xbows over those that voted no? So it was the majority who wanted to use Xbows in the state of PA. 24% of bow hunters use Xbows. And how many rifle hunters would of said yes to Xbows.

You think if we tell the Dr.s we are to out of shape to walk more than 45yrds without gettinga blister on our feetwe could get a permit to shoot from a vehicle also? Just make everything legal in PA and get it over with.

Why would they want inclusion? They already have em.

The bottom line is that among those who hadenough interest to say something , the correspondence was 90/10 against.

Lets say they didn't have them allready? As RSB said,There was people that wasnothandi capped enoughto get them.

Yes, I do agree with the bottom line.

It is almost to that point with many people and that permit too. WCOs no longer investigate that permit either do to the changes in the Legislative statute. We do find our selves arresting more people that abuse what the law allows with that permit though in recent years.

The difference with that permit is that it really isn’t an advantage for those that don’t qualify provided they actually understand the limits of what their permit allows. In many cases a person with the permit is actually more restricted then a person without the permit when it comes to being permit to harvest wildlife they have seen while in a moving vehicle and traveling from home to hunt or back.

Most hunters, if they are able to stand up and still support a firearm don’t gain anything with a permit to use a motor vehicle as their seat. All that permit entitles a hunter to do is park their vehicle, shut the engine off and then load their gun and sit in the vehicle while they wait for game to arrive. Any able bodied hunter can do about the same thing by taking a chair and setting it up right beside their parked vehicle. The only thing they can’t do that the permit holder can is sit inside their vehicle with their gun loaded.

It is not a permit to road hunt like some people think it is. It is a very needed permit for those that can’t stand anymore though otherwise they couldn’t continue to be a hunter.

R.S. Bodenhorn

RSB

I have to admit that I had no idea that the disabled xbow permitregs had been changed from may to shall. That is huge! I cant help but recall the time when I was a county rep for UBP and was working with the Pa Sportsmen for the disabled putting on wheelchair accessable 3-D shoots when the first crossbow for disableds law was enacted. PFSTD was a primary mover and shaker in that efffort. I remember then having some lively exchanges with Harry Miller who was president of PFSTD at the time. I expressed my concerns that it would be abused and he said "better that the occasional jerk abuses the permit rather than a truly disabled guy be refused a chance to hunt archery season because he cant pull a bow any more. I eventually agreed and became a supporter for that original law. Originally the law as promoted by PFSTD and rep Godschall was intended for people who REALLY had no way to use a vertical bow. We certainly came a long way from there! It looks like my original fears have already come to pass! I knew I was seeing guys with xbows who looked perfectly healthy but as someonewho now hasa serious disability that is not always readily apparent to strangers, I've been ignoring it. I also had no idea that we had 63,000 permits already on the books. Thats a real eye opener!

As you said, add that to the SRA's where anyone can use one and maybe your point about the battle having been lost already holds at least some water. I still think it was handled very poorly. At the very least, the vote in the face of the opposition was still a display of apathy and arogancetowardinput from their funding constituents at a time when that ought to be something very important to the BOC members.


As for the studies examining the combining of the agencies not being cost effective, I'm still skeptical.Although your comment about any bureaucracy getting bigger is not lost on me

As for the commisioner who owns a sporting goods store and his vote, we're 100% apart on that one. IMHO,he should have abstained. I live in an SRA crossbow area and do much of my equipment business around here but I also hunt well outside of that area as well. I'd bet that at least some of his potential crossbow customers will be hunting outside of SRA's this year and I'd bet he WILL sell more crossbows now that full inclusion is a reality.

At the very least, a good conscientous public official should never take part in a decision where they stand to reap any possible financial reward as a result of that decision. I doubt this will ever come to pass, but hisneglecting to abstain and his vote in favor strikes me as possible reasonable cause for a court challenge to the decision. That certainly wouldn't be good for anyone except the lawyers now would it?

I certainly don’t disagree with some of your comments. The point I wanted to make though is that often things are not a cut and dry in the large arena of decision making as it first appears.

I assure you that there are a lot of behind the scenes facts that get presented before the Board of Commissioners that never reach the light of view to the public. Most people have no idea the amount of Legislative input that gets forced for consideration in some decisions. Even though the Commission was originally established to minimize politics and their influence I assure you politics in wildlife management and all that surrounds it is ever present and ever increasing. One only needs to read through the different topics of this Message Board to see just how that happens.

R.S. Bodenhorn