Safari Club International Champions Access for Hunting Before Congress

On behalf of millions of American sportsmen and women, Safari Club International’s (SCI) Director of Hunter Advocacy, Melissa Simpson, testified yesterday before the House Committee on Natural Resource’s subcommittee on National Parks, Forests, and Public Lands. Simpson provided testimony on H.R. 1581, the “Wilderness and Roadless Area Release Act of 2011” on behalf of a sportsmen’s coalition that included the National Rifle Association and the U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance. “H.R. 1581 would help hunters who are being denied or limited access to public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service,” Simpson says. “Currently, the Bureau and Forest Service are managing nearly 43 million acres of public land under the prohibitions of wilderness area study area policy, even though the agencies have recommended to Congress that these areas are not suitable for wilderness designation.” The protectionist management by the two agencies severely restricts hunter access to these lands by 1) failing to authorize roads and trails that would help disabled and elderly hunters’ access hunting areas; 2) prohibiting or limiting hunters from using carts for game retrieval and; 3) reducing hunters’ ability to access lands inaccessible by existing roads and trails. Studies have shown that one of the biggest reasons for the decline in hunting participation in recent years has been the lack of access to hunting lands...more