Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., have introduced legislation that guarantees funding for improving hunter access to existing public lands, according to a release by the Boone and Crockett Club.
“Sportsmen and women want better access to their national forests and BLM lands for hunting and fishing. Sen. Harry Reid and Sen. Max Baucus are tackling this problem, head on, with this bill,” said Lowell Baier, President of the Boone and Crockett Club.
Additionally, Baier praised Reid and Baucus for “their deep commitment to enhancing outdoor recreation opportunities on our public lands.”
For the 32 million American hunters, anglers and recreational shooters, federal public lands are an increasingly vital to their participation in outdoor sports. Nearly half of all hunters, for example, conduct a portion of their hunting activity on these lands. In addition, lack of access is cited as a primary reason that hunters, anglers and target shooters stop participating in these traditional sports. However, numerous reports verify that access to federal lands is problematic in many places. In fact, a 2004 report to the U.S. House Committee On Appropriations concluded that more than 35 million acres of U.S. Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service land have inadequate access. Specifically, nearly 2 million acres (or 10 percent) of USFS lands in Montana and 8.4 million acres (or 29 percent) of BLM lands in the Montana/Dakota's region were identified as having inadequate access.
Sportsmen and women make important contributions to both wildlife conservation and the nation's economy. The hunting and shooting sports industries create over 160,000 full-time jobs nationwide, generating an economic benefit of over $20 billion annually.
