Poll: Support for bear baiting referendum declining

BANGOR – A new poll released Thursday indicates that Question 2 – the referendum to ban bear trapping and hunting with bait and dogs – is behind, with just a small portion of the electorate undecided.

Of voters who said they were certain about their decision, 54 percent said they intended to vote no and 44 percent said they will vote in favor of the ban.

The poll was conducted through telephone interviews earlier this week with 642 randomly selected voters statewide, for the Bangor Daily News and NBC affiliate stations WCSH 6 Portland and WLBZ 2 Bangor. It is considered statistically significant to a 3.9 percent margin of error.

The totals verified two other unbiased polls that had indicated that supporters of bear baiting have pulled ahead in recent weeks.

There’s disagreement as to the exact percentages, but all the polls indicate a declining number of undecided voters as both groups have put hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of advertising on television over the past month.

“We just haven’t been on their air as much as they have,” Bob Fisk, spokesman for Citizens for Fair Bear Hunting, said Thursday, explaining that the coalition had two weeks on TV before his group’s first ad, which describes bear hunting as cruel, aired.

“The final poll will be November 2, and that’s the one that really matters,” he said.

Edie Leary, spokeswoman for Maine’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Council – a coalition made up primarily of hunting groups that is leading opposition to the referendum – called the poll an indication that voters are responding to her group’s “educational” message of leaving wildlife issues to professional state biologists.

“My catchphrase is, I’m cautiously optimistic,” Leary said Thursday. “We have to keep pounding our message.”

“I don’t think it’s over by any means,” Hunters for Fair Bear Hunting spokesman Cecil Gray countered Thursday.

“I think people will make up their minds based on what they’ve seen in the woods over the years, rather than some so-called education campaign,” said Gray, whose small group of pro-ban hunters is working cooperatively with Fisk.

With a new ad that premiered Thursday, Maine Citizens for Fair Bear Hunting accused the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife of exaggerating the possibility that bear populations would grow out of control without baiting.

The new Citizens for Fair Bear Hunting advertisement specifically targets state bear biologist Jennifer Vashon, whose advocacy against the referendum in a coalition ad led off the campaign season.

Maine’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Council also started a new ad Thursday, focusing on the economic losses that the coalition predicts will result if Question 2 passes.

Gloria Curtis, a sporting camp owner in Portage Lake, is depicted speaking about the money she believes she would lose if her guides could not offer baited hunts.

Though the ads are running statewide, both campaigns said they are focusing their efforts in southern Maine, where the joint media poll indicated that the race is tied.

However, even in northern Maine – where some had predicted an easy victory for the coalition – 40 percent of voters said they intend to vote yes, as opposed to the 58 percent who said no.

The poll also was divided by urban, suburban and rural populations. Rural Maine, too, offered surprises, with 41 percent of the electorate in favor and 54 percent opposed, the poll said.

Though the poll considered such factors as income, age and educational level, one of the most striking differences that emerged was between male voters, who overwhelmingly opposed the referendum and their wives, mothers and daughters – 53 percent of whom support the ban, with 43 percent against.

It won’t likely be possible for either side to win over the hard-core baiting opponents and supporters, who tend to split along political lines, so both Fisk and Leary are targeting those who, perhaps consumed by the presidential election, have not yet made up their minds on bear baiting.

It’s all about educating the voters, both said, each adding that their side offers the truthful view of bear hunting in Maine.