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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Vollmer" data-source="post: 151712" data-attributes="member: 8014">The 2017 Legislative session is here and YOU need to get involved!  The legislature is being hit with bills that will impact ALL of us as resident hunters and we need to do something about it NOW.  If you care about your hunting and fishing, get involved!1.      subscribe to ND Game and Fish Dept. legislative update and stay informed about bills that will impact your hunting & fishing.  <a href="http://gf.nd.gov/legislation" target="_blank">http://gf.nd.gov/legislation</a>2.      contact the members of any legislative committees and express your opinion about pending legislation.  Tell them how it will affect YOU and tell them how you’d like them to vote.3.      contact your legislators and express your opinion.  Tell them how you’d like them to vote.  Right now there almost 20 proposed bills that will affect YOUR hunting and fishing and more will be coming. Legislative contact information is here:  <a href="https://www.legis.nd.gov/lcn/assembly/constituentViews/public/findmylegislator.htm" target="_blank">https://www.legis.nd.gov/lcn/assembly/constituentViews/public/findmylegislator.htm</a>4.      spread the word!  Talk to other outdoorsmen and tell them to get active.  Forward the emails.  Ask questions.  DON’T JUST SIT THERE AND DO NOTHING!Of all the pending bills, there are four that seem to me, have more significant flaws than others:  NOTE- “HB” are House bills.  “SB” are Senate bills.**NOTE:  SB2227 and 2259 are being heard in committee on Thursday, January 26, 2017.  Please contact your legislators before the hearing!HB 1413  Would develop a system for hunting license lotteries which gives additional preference to applicants 70 years of age or older.1.      Bad bill because it discriminates against younger and new hunters who are the future of hunting in ND.  Hunters 70+ have enjoyed a lifetime of good deer hunting in ND.2.      Creates potential for dramatic increase in length of time it takes for hunters under 70 to draw a license.3.      Creates an expensive problem for NDGF is recreating a new lottery system.4.      Next session, will the age be lowered to 65 or 60?SB2225   Would require an individual to receive permission from the landowner to hunt, trap or pursue game on private land. Currently permission must be received only if the land is posted.1.      One of the biggest problems the public will have if this passes, other than the obvious more limited hunting access, is the ability to even contact the landowner for permission.  Without no hunting signs hunters will have trouble determining who to ask for permission or where one person’s land ends and another begins.2.      Then there is the problem of trying to find someone to ask.  Farms are getting very large and may live many miles from the tract you want to obtain permission to hunt on. How do you find them? How do you get their number to call?3.      Some will argue that hunters should use a county atlas or plat book.  Even that doesn’t solve the problem with trying to get permission.  Look at any page in almost any county plat book and you will find absentee landowners, estates, LLCs, etc.  Then consider that many of these tracts are leased by other people or relatives – information which is not in the plat book.  So how do you determine who owns the land and get the proper permission to hunt the flock of mallards you find at sundown?  You can’t.4.      Also without no hunting signs even if you did get permission it will be difficult to stay on the property with no way to determine property boundaries.5.      Ironically, the people that will be hurt the most by this are the nonresidents who have limited number of days to hunt and will spend much if not all of their time trying figure out who owns what and who to ask permission.6.      Trespass complaints will go up dramatically simply because people will be confused.  Landowners and other rural residents will be constantly bothered by people seeking permission to hunt, many times on land they don’t even own or lease.7.      Resident and nonresident hunter numbers will decline and so will their economic impact on small communities.8.      Landowners currently experiencing depredation issues with deer, coyotes, Canada geese, elk, moose, etc. would be required to post land open to hunting to help reduce depredation issues.9.      And finally and most importantly, a no trespass law would punish those good hunters who would like to ask permission by determining who owns the land and those people are ignoring no trespass signs now would keep doing what they are doing. So the “problems” this bill is trying to solve will not be fixed.SB2227  A nonresident age 65 or older would be entitled to purchase up to two nonresident waterfowl hunting licenses per year, with $100 of the fee for the nonresident's second license must be used for the private land open to sportsmen program. The second license would cost $150.1.      Discriminates against young hunters.  Next session will the age be lowered to 60?  Maybe 55?  Why should age be a factor?2.      Essentially allows nonresident to hunt the entire season.  This will increase leasing and purchase of ND land by nonresidents, thereby creating additional competition for land and driving up land prices.  This is not something our farmers and ranchers need during a very difficult/delicate time for agriculture.3.      The additional money dedicated to PLOTS is almost irrelevant because ND currently lacks quality acres to enroll in the PLOTS program.  Funding is not the main obstacle to increasing PLOTS acres.4.      Available habitat for hunting has decreased substantially in the last decade creating more competition for what’s left and putting additional pressure on a delicate resource. This bill would further exacerbate those problems by putting more people in the field.SB2259  Would allow a nonresident to buy a waterfowl license that is valid for three periods of four consecutive days. The fee for this license would be $200, and $50 must be used for the private land open to sportsmen program.1.      This is essentially the same proposal that was defeated in previous legislative sessions. It further expands nonresident hunting in a time of decreasing resources/habitat.2.      As with 2227, the additional money offered to PLOTS is almost irrelevant because ND lacks the quality habitat for the program, not the money to pay for it. The revenue from one additional license would barely cover one acre of PLOTS.3.      Nonresidents would have the ability to hunt most of the waterfowl season, leading to increased leasing and purchase of land by nonresidents and increased land prices for our farmers and ranchers.None of these bills will do anything to help ND resident sportsmen.  Their only benefit will be felt by nonresident hunters and commercial hunting operations.  As ND residents, the Legislature is supposed to work for us- not some guys from Minneapolis or Milwaukee!!Three of these bills are simply attempts to expand non-resident and/or commercial hunting at the expense of resident hunters by creating more competition for limited resources on decreasing habitat.   You will also need to contact your own legislators to ask them to vote NO when/if this bill comes to the floor for a full vote.  The process is basically the same for every bill so you’ll need to do this repeatedly throughout the legislative session.  If you don’t – no one will and the resident sportsmen will lose out!House Energy & Natural Resources Committee members:Todd Porter, Chair  <a href="mailto:tkporter@nd.gov">tkporter@nd.gov</a>Chuck Damschen, Vice Chair  <a href="mailto:cdamschen@nd.gov">cdamschen@nd.gov</a>Dick Anderson, <a href="mailto:dickanderson@nd.gov">dickanderson@nd.gov</a>Glenn Bosch, <a href="mailto:gdbosch@nd.gov">gdbosch@nd.gov</a>Bill Devlin, <a href="mailto:bdevlin@nd.gov">bdevlin@nd.gov</a>Pat Heinert, <a href="mailto:pdheinert@nd.gov">pdheinert@nd.gov</a>George Keiser, <a href="mailto:gkeiser@nd.gov">gkeiser@nd.gov</a>Mike Lefor, <a href="mailto:mlefor@nd.gov">mlefor@nd.gov</a>Andrew Marschall, <a href="mailto:amarschall@nd.gov">amarschall@nd.gov</a>Alisa Mitskog, <a href="mailto:amitskog@nd.gov">amitskog@nd.gov</a>Corey Mock, <a href="mailto:crmock@nd.gov">crmock@nd.gov</a>Shannon Roers Jones, <a href="mailto:sroersjones@nd.gov">sroersjones@nd.gov</a>Matthew Ruby, <a href="mailto:mruby@nd.gov">mruby@nd.gov</a>Jay Seibel, <a href="mailto:jayseibel@nd.gov">jayseibel@nd.gov</a>Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee members:Unruh, Jessica K. Chairperson, <<a href="mailto:jkunruh@nd.gov">jkunruh@nd.gov</a>>Kreun, Curt E. <<a href="mailto:ckreun@nd.gov">ckreun@nd.gov</a>>Armstrong, Kelly <<a href="mailto:karmstrong@nd.gov">karmstrong@nd.gov</a>>Cook, Dwight C. <<a href="mailto:dcook@nd.gov">dcook@nd.gov</a>>Oban, Erin <<a href="mailto:eoban@nd.gov">eoban@nd.gov</a>>Roers, Jim <<a href="mailto:jroers@nd.gov">jroers@nd.gov</a>>Schaible, Donald G. <<a href="mailto:dgschaible@nd.gov">dgschaible@nd.gov</a>>We don’t get a second chance to save our proud heritage of hunting & fishing.  We need YOU to be involved.   This message has been sent to approximately 300 ND resident sportsmen and you can make a difference.  Contact the committee members or contact your own legislators TODAY!Your time and consideration are appreciated.(by Mark A. Mazaheri)</blockquote>

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