AUGUSTA – Bear hunting in Maine will not likely change this year. Citing voters’ rejection of a referendum to ban bear hunting with bait dogs and traps last November, lawmakers on the Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Committee voted unanimously Tuesday to kill eight bills seeking reforms of the hunt.

The bills, debated during a well-attended public hearing last week, ranged from allowing hunters to carry guns into the woods on Sundays while tracking wounded bear to the very bans proposed by the failed referendum.

Lawmakers instead voted a joint “ought not to pass” on the bills with the understanding that a letter would be sent to Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife Commissioner Roland “Danny” Martin asking his staff to take a broad look at bear hunting in Maine, with the involvement of a stakeholder group, then return with any suggested reforms in time for the 2006 session.

Several people had suggested last week that trapping, the least-popular and most-controversial hunting method, could be banned as a compromise. But Sen. Chandler Woodcock, R-Farmington, expressed the prevailing view on the committee when he said that he believes state biologists are best-suited to make such decisions.

“They’re not guessing; they’re managing,” he said.