New legislation in Kentucky purports to create an independent Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources and Commission. Instead, House Bill 395 (HB 395) would give the Department of Agriculture the authority to appoint nearly half of the Fish and Wildlife Commission. Under the bill, Kentucky’s governor would make five appointments to the commission, and the Commissioner of Agriculture would make four.
Act Today! Kentucky sportsmen need to contact their state representatives and urge them to oppose House Bill 395, which will dilute the voice of the hunters, anglers and trappers who pay for conservation in the state. Sportsmen can find their legislators by using the Sportsmen’s Alliance Legislative Action Center.
While agriculture is important to the Commonwealth of Kentucky, agricultural interests don’t always align with what is best for fish and wildlife management, nor what is best for sportsmen. Kentucky hunters, anglers and trappers who pays for licenses, permits and who are responsible for federal Pittman-Robertson funding for the state, deserve a Fish and Wildlife Commission devoted to the best interest of the resource, and the sportsmen who are the backbone of wildlife management.
“While the language in HB 395 sounds like it would create an independent fish and wildlife agency, in truth, it would more likely result in a department largely controlled by agricultural interests, and no longer responsive to its paying customers, the sportsmen of Kentucky,” said Dillon Barto, manager of state services at the Sportsmen’s Alliance.
The North American Model of Wildlife Conservation was created to ensure that wildlife is managed scientifically to serve the public and, specifically, the hunters, anglers and trappers who buy licenses. This system, which has been implemented in all 50 states for decades, is meant to keep politics out of wildlife management, and to ensure the license dollars spent by sportsmen are allocated for the benefit of wildlife and license buyers. Turning control of wildlife management over to agricultural interests breaks this successful model and introduces risk, uncertainty and the possibility of long-term damage to the ongoing management of fish and wildlife resources across the Commonwealth.
About the Sportsmen’s Alliance: The Sportsmen’s Alliance protects and defends America’s wildlife conservation programs and the pursuits – hunting, fishing and trapping – that generate the money to pay for them. Sportsmen’s Alliance Foundation is responsible for public education, legal defense and research. Its mission is accomplished through several distinct programs coordinated to provide the most complete defense capability possible. Stay connected to Sportsmen’s Alliance: Online, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.