I thought that some might find this response with one of the members of the sub-committee that is studying HSB 610 of interest, it was received today.
Purchase of land by animal rights people, there's probably some of that going on, but is it as prevalent as is suggested (sincere question)?
How can our DNR officers possibly have the time to enforce such a complex measure?
We just heard about this proposal at the tail end of last week, and it was discussed today, seems to be a fast tracked effort to sneak this in.
After reading the response several times it sounds like this proposal is being justified by an urgent panic, I don't know about you, but my warning antennae goes up every time I hear a government official in a panic.
Please consider reaching out to your legislators ASAP.
Additional Information:
HSB 610, nonresident landowners deer hunting licenses. This is a long bill full of requirements for a NRLO to qualify for yearly deer tags for use only on their land. There are minimum acre requirements, length of ownership requirements and several stipulations they would need to follow. The proposed bill would not alter that fact that soon Iowans would have no place to hunt. Link to HSB 610: Iowa Legislature - BillBook A subcommittee has been appointed:
Terry Baxter, House District 8, Hancock, Wright and parts of Kossuth counties. Legislative web page: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative Email: [email protected]
Steven Bradley, House District 58, Jackson and parts of Jones and Dubuque counties. Legislative website: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative Email: [email protected]
Ras Tafari Smith, House District 62, parts of Waterloo and Black Hawk county. Legislative webpage: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative email:
[email protected]
A meeting of the subcommittee has been scheduled for Monday 1/31 at 3pm. Please contact your Representative and the members of the subcommittee and urge them not to move this legislation.
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Thank you for your email. Let me set the record straight. I am an avid sportsman and committed to preserve the tradition of hunting for the next generation in Iowa. I
I am also committed to the health and preservation of the Whitetail herd in Iowa.
I worked hard for seven years to come up with common sense laws in Iowa to slow the spread of Chronic Wasting Disease. My efforts were blocked and now CWD is on the move into new counties. Tragically, Fremont and Greene counties have now had positive tests. That makes 12 counties in Iowa. When I started my efforts it was restricted to three counties.
HS 610 is an attempt calm an even greater storm brewing on the horizon. The bill is an effort to listen to both sides. On the one hand, we want to discourage nonresident hunters from buying up Iowa hunting land and closing it off to resident hunters. On the other hand, we want a way for long term mom resident land owners to enjoy sportsmen pursuits on their own land and give incentives for them to grant hunting access to resident hunters. Later I will make a case that nonresident land owners who are sportsman will help our overall hunting cause in Iowa and help deter a storm that is brewing in our state.
First, let’s look briefly at this bill. HS 610 puts a decade wait before nonresident land openers could qualify to get an annual land owner license to hunt their own land at full non-resident price. Furthermore, in the bill, they need to allow access to some resident hunters, participate is some form of conservation or water quality program and give preferred rent to new farmers on pastures or tillable acres. They are prevented from using their land for guide services and are encouraged to participate in a herd management program on their property if they are in a high density area and a late season hunt is set for their region. This answers the majority of complaints against tax paying nonresident landowners having a pathway to hunt their own land put forward in the past several years.
In talking to the DNR, the greatest problem currently with nonresident owned land is lack of access for herd management of high antler-less populations. This bill seeks to address that issue by encouraging non-resident land owners to open their land to resident hunters and participate in special herd management seasons if applicable in their area.
Keep in mind, some nonresidents have owned land for thirty or more years. Many have lived and farmed in Iowa on multi-generation family owned farms. Now they just want to come back and hunt with their grandchildren on their own land. Many come back to plant and harvest every year. I think they are making a reasonable request.
Now let me address the storm clouds on the horizon in Iowa. I am concerned about the rapidly growing number of anti-hunting or extreme environmentalist investors buying land in Iowa and totally closing lands off to all hunting. This is a growing trend.
Nonresident land owners who are sportsman share our voice and value system. Our current system of restricting hunting by nonresident landowners is coming back fast too haunt us. Many sportsmen are skipping Iowa and going instead to other states. But guess where the liberal anti-hunters are flocking to buy investment land?
I had a conversation recently with my county recorder. She shared that there is a huge and alarming up spike of nonresidents buying up land in Iowa as more farmers are aging out and younger farmers are priced out. But there is a hidden problem.
Because of our restrictions on nonresident hunters, guess which crowd is buying up the land? More and more land is quickly being closed off to resident hunters by the new anti-hunting nonresident land owners. We are quickly creating the very problem many sportsman groups are trying to prevent.
If current trends continue, in the next fifteen years as more farmers retire or pass away, millions of acres will forever be closed to resident hunters as we turn sportsman away from Iowa. I am very concerned about this rapidly growing trend.
For the past seven years, I have been part of the Legislative Sportsman’s Caucus across the country. High on the list of concerns is the absence of new hunters coming into the sport and the increase of the radical anti-hunter voice. They want to stop all hunting and their numbers are growing fast.
In my thinking, it makes more sense to create a win-win situation in Iowa between resident sportsman and nonresident land owners who are sportsman than turn our lands over to nonresident land owners who are anti-hunters. This trend is accelerating quickly in Iowa because of our current policies.
I have also worked to encourage the purchase of more public hunting and good habitat ground in Iowa. We are second only to Rhode Island for the amount of public hunting ground per capita compared to our population. Many of those efforts have been blocked by agriculture groups.
HS 610 is an effort to create a win-win situation and open more nonresident owned lands to resident hunters. It is not an anti-whitetail bill. If this bill is stopped, it will be a major setback for sportsmen and future hunting access in Iowa.
Sincerely,
Terry Baxter
Iowa State Representative
Purchase of land by animal rights people, there's probably some of that going on, but is it as prevalent as is suggested (sincere question)?
How can our DNR officers possibly have the time to enforce such a complex measure?
We just heard about this proposal at the tail end of last week, and it was discussed today, seems to be a fast tracked effort to sneak this in.
After reading the response several times it sounds like this proposal is being justified by an urgent panic, I don't know about you, but my warning antennae goes up every time I hear a government official in a panic.
Please consider reaching out to your legislators ASAP.
Additional Information:
HSB 610, nonresident landowners deer hunting licenses. This is a long bill full of requirements for a NRLO to qualify for yearly deer tags for use only on their land. There are minimum acre requirements, length of ownership requirements and several stipulations they would need to follow. The proposed bill would not alter that fact that soon Iowans would have no place to hunt. Link to HSB 610: Iowa Legislature - BillBook A subcommittee has been appointed:
Terry Baxter, House District 8, Hancock, Wright and parts of Kossuth counties. Legislative web page: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative Email: [email protected]
Steven Bradley, House District 58, Jackson and parts of Jones and Dubuque counties. Legislative website: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative Email: [email protected]
Ras Tafari Smith, House District 62, parts of Waterloo and Black Hawk county. Legislative webpage: State Representative (iowa.gov) Legislative email:
[email protected]
A meeting of the subcommittee has been scheduled for Monday 1/31 at 3pm. Please contact your Representative and the members of the subcommittee and urge them not to move this legislation.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you for your email. Let me set the record straight. I am an avid sportsman and committed to preserve the tradition of hunting for the next generation in Iowa. I
I am also committed to the health and preservation of the Whitetail herd in Iowa.
I worked hard for seven years to come up with common sense laws in Iowa to slow the spread of Chronic Wasting Disease. My efforts were blocked and now CWD is on the move into new counties. Tragically, Fremont and Greene counties have now had positive tests. That makes 12 counties in Iowa. When I started my efforts it was restricted to three counties.
HS 610 is an attempt calm an even greater storm brewing on the horizon. The bill is an effort to listen to both sides. On the one hand, we want to discourage nonresident hunters from buying up Iowa hunting land and closing it off to resident hunters. On the other hand, we want a way for long term mom resident land owners to enjoy sportsmen pursuits on their own land and give incentives for them to grant hunting access to resident hunters. Later I will make a case that nonresident land owners who are sportsman will help our overall hunting cause in Iowa and help deter a storm that is brewing in our state.
First, let’s look briefly at this bill. HS 610 puts a decade wait before nonresident land openers could qualify to get an annual land owner license to hunt their own land at full non-resident price. Furthermore, in the bill, they need to allow access to some resident hunters, participate is some form of conservation or water quality program and give preferred rent to new farmers on pastures or tillable acres. They are prevented from using their land for guide services and are encouraged to participate in a herd management program on their property if they are in a high density area and a late season hunt is set for their region. This answers the majority of complaints against tax paying nonresident landowners having a pathway to hunt their own land put forward in the past several years.
In talking to the DNR, the greatest problem currently with nonresident owned land is lack of access for herd management of high antler-less populations. This bill seeks to address that issue by encouraging non-resident land owners to open their land to resident hunters and participate in special herd management seasons if applicable in their area.
Keep in mind, some nonresidents have owned land for thirty or more years. Many have lived and farmed in Iowa on multi-generation family owned farms. Now they just want to come back and hunt with their grandchildren on their own land. Many come back to plant and harvest every year. I think they are making a reasonable request.
Now let me address the storm clouds on the horizon in Iowa. I am concerned about the rapidly growing number of anti-hunting or extreme environmentalist investors buying land in Iowa and totally closing lands off to all hunting. This is a growing trend.
Nonresident land owners who are sportsman share our voice and value system. Our current system of restricting hunting by nonresident landowners is coming back fast too haunt us. Many sportsmen are skipping Iowa and going instead to other states. But guess where the liberal anti-hunters are flocking to buy investment land?
I had a conversation recently with my county recorder. She shared that there is a huge and alarming up spike of nonresidents buying up land in Iowa as more farmers are aging out and younger farmers are priced out. But there is a hidden problem.
Because of our restrictions on nonresident hunters, guess which crowd is buying up the land? More and more land is quickly being closed off to resident hunters by the new anti-hunting nonresident land owners. We are quickly creating the very problem many sportsman groups are trying to prevent.
If current trends continue, in the next fifteen years as more farmers retire or pass away, millions of acres will forever be closed to resident hunters as we turn sportsman away from Iowa. I am very concerned about this rapidly growing trend.
For the past seven years, I have been part of the Legislative Sportsman’s Caucus across the country. High on the list of concerns is the absence of new hunters coming into the sport and the increase of the radical anti-hunter voice. They want to stop all hunting and their numbers are growing fast.
In my thinking, it makes more sense to create a win-win situation in Iowa between resident sportsman and nonresident land owners who are sportsman than turn our lands over to nonresident land owners who are anti-hunters. This trend is accelerating quickly in Iowa because of our current policies.
I have also worked to encourage the purchase of more public hunting and good habitat ground in Iowa. We are second only to Rhode Island for the amount of public hunting ground per capita compared to our population. Many of those efforts have been blocked by agriculture groups.
HS 610 is an effort to create a win-win situation and open more nonresident owned lands to resident hunters. It is not an anti-whitetail bill. If this bill is stopped, it will be a major setback for sportsmen and future hunting access in Iowa.
Sincerely,
Terry Baxter
Iowa State Representative
