Sunday hunting makes sense

Maine’s Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife has never attracted public tax dollars sufficient to pay for the services the department provides to the public. No matter what the mechanism, or how hard sportsmen lobby for public dollars, it simply does not happen. We can’t compete for funding with the real human needs, including health and education.

Three years ago a study demonstrated that DIF&W provides $4 million of direct services to the public each year. Gov. Angus King and the Legislature responded to that study by enacting a law that requires the governor to provide General Fund tax money to pay for 18 percent of DIF&W’s budget. It has not happened.

For the second biennium since that law was enacted, public money is unavailable to provide the $4 million to $5 million in tax money to DIF&W that the law requires.

In the last biennium, sportsmen stepped up to fill the gap, supporting a move to increase every single license, permit and registration sold by DIF&W by $3. That $3 across-the-board increase was temporary and expires at the end of 2005.

This year, sportsmen were united in opposition to re-enactment of that $3 increase, and lobbied strongly for the $4 million that would fulfill the legal requirement for 18 percent public funding for DIF&W.

When Gov. Baldacci was unable to provide this level of public funding in his proposed state budget, sportsmen stepped up again to fill the funding gap, agreeing to make the $3 across-the-board increase permanent, in return for Sunday hunting opportunities and a commitment from the governor to work together for a long-term funding solution for DIF&W.

The governor’s proposed budget for DIF&W specifically includes:

. $700,000 of General Fund tax money in each year of the two-year biennium;

. Sunday hunting for all species and seasons except the November gun season on deer. No Sunday hunting will be allowed during the firearms season on deer except for duck hunters;

. repeal of the law that prohibits nonresidents from hunting on the first day of the firearms season on deer;

. extension of the $3 increase in all permits, licenses and fees;

. a higher boat registration fee.

The department’s budget is essentially flat-funded, allowing for a slight increase in spending so that no positions or staff will be cut, but providing for no increases in services and programs.

The governor has also pledged to work with sportsmen and DIF&W leaders to find streams of income from the public that would resolve this long-standing funding problem permanently, without tapping into tax money. We anticipate that the governor will offer a long-term funding solution for DIF&W in his Part II budget that will be submitted later in this legislative session.

The governor has put his Sunday hunting proposal in economic terms. At SAM’s Sportsman’s Congress last week, he said, “Maine is one of only nine states in the country that does not allow hunting on Sunday. We attract over 40,000 nonresident hunters a year, but lose many to neighboring states like Vermont, New Hampshire and Canadian provinces where hunting is allowed on Sunday. Hunting has an economic value of more than $450 million, and allowing bird, moose or bear hunters to hunt the entire weekend will make Maine a more appealing destination for hunters, and it will increase that revenue.”

We must emphasize that this Sunday hunting proposal does not include the November gun season on deer. That’s when hunters are out in big numbers and suffer conflicts and problems with landowners and the public. All other hunting seasons involve much smaller numbers of hunters and few landowner problems.

We doubt that anyone feels unsafe or any landowner feels besieged in May during the turkey hunting season, or in September and October when hunters pursue a range of game including ducks, geese and grouse with guns and deer with bows.

For the sportsmen of Maine, and the state’s outdoor economy, we hope the Legislature and people of Maine will support the governor’s proposed DIF&W budget, including the opportunities it offers to hunt on Sundays.

George Smith is executive director of the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine. His e-mail address is george@samcef.org