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Outdoor Wisconsin host Dan Small welcomes you to his special on-line sanctuary. This week, Dan looks at a group that plans protests against Wisconsin's DNR.  Awards Highlights
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WCSFO taking a shot in the dark?by Dan Small The leadership of a major sportsmen's coalition is asking its members (and anyone else who agrees with this position) to consider forgoing this year's gun deer season as a way of protesting certain recent policies of the Department of Natural Resources (DNR).
Druckenmiller asserts that all the money the WCSFO release is concerned about has been spent to improve or maintain a quality fishery. "We are not 'diverting' funds, he says. "We are using them in a way that some folks would rather not see us use them." The bottom line, he says, is better fishing.
September 16,
'97: More Online
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While stopping short of
calling for an out-and-out boycott, a press release from
Wisconsin Council of Sportfishing Organizations (WCSFO)
membership director Bob Chojnowski says "WCSFO is taking a
stand and asking its members and other hunters to consider
not participating in the annual gun deer season hunt."
Speaking for WCSFO's
seven-member board of directors, but admittedly not yet for
its membership, Chojnowski objects to recent decisions to
"divert" sportsmen's dollars to what he calls
"special-interest groups." In particular, the $1.5-million
buyout of Lake Superior commercial fishing licenses and the
decision to pay $100,000 this year to the Lac Du Flambeau
tribe and allow the tribe to keep the money from
on-reservation fishing license sales in the future, in
return for a larger walleye bag limit on Vilas and Oneida
county lakes.
Chojnowski tosses in a couple
more recent beefs for good measure: the loss of the public
intervenor (although not a DNR decision), and DNR
reorganization. He dredges up two older issues as well: the
state's allegedly poor defense of the lawsuit that resulted
in federal recognition of Chippewa treaty rights a decade
ago, and the ongoing contention that the DNR is not doing
enough to provide access to our lakes. "We're not a radical
group, we've been around for 15 years," Chojnowski says.
"We're just so frustrated that we felt we had to
do something."
Chojnowski and his cohorts
aren't the only ones who are frustrated. Stan Druck
enmiller, executive assistant to DNR secretary George Meyer,
says that focusing on these issues continues to undercut the
DNR's ability to work on more positive aspects of resource
management, especially in fisheries. "Habitat work is far
more important than whether or not we bought out commercial
fishing on Lake Superior," he says. Druckenmiller and his
boss, George Meyer, contend that the majority of state
sportsmen are pleased with the improved hunting and fishing
that result from DNR management decisions, and that it is
only a small, albeit vocal, minority that keeps opposing
policies once they are in place, often for philosophical
reasons. Druckenmiller is right. Whether or not one group
agrees with a few DNR decisions, sportsmen are better served
by supporting the work of the department. Wisconsin offers
its citizens some of the best hunting, fishing and other
outdoor recreational opportunities available anywhere. Most
of us would admit that, and plenty of non-residents come
here every year to enjoy our natural resources, too.
Chojnowski got the DNR's
attention. Whether he'll get more than a yawn from sportsmen
is another matter. If WCSFO delegates ratify the stand taken
by their board when they meet in Stevens Point on Oct. 18,
they'll only add to the image of the state's sportsmen as
foot-draggers who don't know when they've got it good and
don't know where best to direct their considerable clout:
toward the continued fight to improve habitat, reduce water
pollution and sustain our fishery.