HENRICO COUNTY, Va. — The Virginia Department of Wildlife Resources rejected two proposals that prompted hunters and property owners to pack a Thursday morning meeting.
The proposals were part of a series of seven total proposals designed to improve regulations regarding hounding hunting in the Commonwealth. While the first five proposals primarily served as updates to funding, training, and education efforts on how Conservation Police Officer (CPO) would enforce laws on the books, proposals six and seven would change how a decades-old law right to retrieval law would be interpreted.
Board Proposal Six would require that any dog cast to hunt bears or deer have a GPS tracking device affixed.
It would also require hunters to track dog(s) from the time of casting until recovery unless a signal is lost.
Board Proposal Seven required hunters and landowners to demonstrate reasonable efforts to keep hunting dogs from entering private property where they have been notified that their dogs are not wanted.
The proposal says that notification of a hunter may also be made by a landowner, their agent, or a CPO.
However, the law says that the type of reasonable effort is to be determined by the hunter to include the way hunts are planned and conducted, the use of technology; landowner communications, etc.
Finally, the proposal states that if a hunter's dogs enter a property for which notification was received within 12 months, the hunter would have the burden of proving that reasonable efforts have been undertaken.
Proponents of the proposals believe that additional measures are necessary because currently, the law allows any hunter to enter private property under the guise of retrieving a hound at any time without identifying themselves which is inherently endangering the landowners
"The so-called right to retreat law has given a legal loophole to trespassers to violate personal property rights under the guise of retrieving their dogs," one landowner argued during public comment. "An uninvited, unannounced man has been given authority to trespass on my private property without my permission at any time of day for any length of time. That is highly unconstitutional."
"Why are you using my private property for your hobby against my will, keeping me from doing mine," said Glenda Grubbs "The doggers have been allowed to self-police since 2008 using their code of ethics, and unenforceable voluntary adherence dogger code."
"We don't care if others want to hunt with dogs, we don't want to stop that," said another landowner. "We want to stop the constant intrusion onto our properties."
But hunters against the regulations say that the proposals are not only vague in their summaries, but that it complicates laws already on the books in addition to stifling the tradition of hound hunting.
"Hunting numbers are down in Virginia, that's without a doubt and we're addressed it previously, this is just a bad idea," an opponent of the proposal said.
"If laws and regulations that are in place are not being enforced by CPOs, what good is it going to do that these regulations?" James Hudson, a hunter from Appomattox, Virginia, said.
"It is my sincere hope that this board and agency can move beyond the recent atmosphere of conflict surrounding dog hunting and establish a policy of support for it," another hunter said.
DWR brought up Proposals Six and Seven back in March. During that meeting, the board voted to advance those seven proposals designed to reduce conflicts between hunters and landowners.
Between May 22 and July 5, the board recorded 1,209 comments for Proposal Six and 2,262 comments for Proposal Seven.
Both public comment surveys skewed heavily against the proposal.
Sixty-one percent of comments against Proposal Six compared to 23.3% in favor and 79.8% opposed to Proposal Seven with only 11.8% in support.
Following 37 public comments Thursday, the board had the power to pass both proposals, reject them, or table the proposals indefinitely until another meeting.
However, after a lengthy discussion, the board instead voted 6-3 to reject the proposals which would leave Virginia's 1936 Right to Retrieval law unaffected.
Though it was a decision that many opponents of the new regulation were happy with, hunters like Hudson believe there were still no victors following the public meeting.
"It’s never going to be a win unless we can get land owners and dog hunters can hunt in harmony and find a way to do it," Hudson said.
Mathews County landowner and hunter Amanda Savignano also had mixed reactions following the board's vote.
She said she was largely in favor of Proposal Six, but expressed that Proposal Seven was vague and needed to be reworked.
Proposal Six was kind of a no-brainer because everyone people already use tracking collars anyway. I think it's a shame it didn't pass," Savignano said. "Number Seven I think as it was worded was the issue; It was muddy, and gray and leaves a lot of room towards interpretation. I think if it was reworked it could have been effective, but as it was worded it would have furthered the divide."
Savignano also believes that the Right to Retrieval law needs to be reconsidered to address women who may live alone and who have to deal with hunters who enter their property when retrieving their dogs.
"Not everyone is an upstanding citizen and as a woman, we should be able to say no you're not coming into my farm when I'm alone. I should be able to say I'm not comfortable with this," Savignano said. "The right to retrieve is always going to be a contentious issue. It's a constitutional issue."
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