I am posting this because it deals with a group of people looking to ban a legal recreational, conservation based activity. If an activity like hunting on a river can be banned because people simply don't agree with the practice can jet skiing, yachting, or fishing be next? (Please note that all noise levels, safety issues are within state imposed limits.)
Food for thought.
Ant
http://tworivertimes.com./current/news3.php
Opponents Seek Ban On Local Waterfowl Hunting
By John Burton
A number of area residents are urging state officials to take action to halt waterfowl hunting along the Navesink and Shrewsbury rivers.
While hunters counter that they are doing what people have been doing here for years and that they obey all laws and state regulations doing it, those opposed to the sport recently ratcheted up their campaign by compiling a petition seeking an out-and-out ban on local hunting.
"The discharge of firearms has no place in this densely populated area, and should have been discontinued years ago," states the letter accompanying the petition sent to Gov. Jon S. Corzine.
The petition, complied by a group calling themselves Residents for a Peaceful River, contains more than 400 signatures from those who live in the area, but also from people not in the immediate vicinity. While the majority of signatures are from those living in Monmouth Beach, Rumson and Fair Haven, communities located directly on the waterways, there are also signatures from people in Hazlet and the Port Monmouth section of Middletown, in the county's Bayshore area, from West Long Branch and Eatontown, and one signature from as far away as Short Hills.
Those opposed to the shooting and hunting cite two major concerns: safety and the infringement on homeowners' quality of life.
During the 60-day season, between November and January, homeowners are often subjected to "An unceasing loud report of gunfire," alleged Fair Haven resident Susan Russell with the Residents for a Peaceful River.
"It's bothersome, it's noisy, it disturbs a homeowner's peace," she said.
"Even on Christmas morning, you wake at 5:30-6 o'clock to gunshots," said fellow Fair Haven resident Dr. Eugene Cantor.
For residents, they said, over the approximately last two decades the area has gotten increasingly developed, with evermore homes popping up along the riverbanks, with the neighborhoods no longer the sparsely populated wooded areas they once were.
"These hunters are so close to these homes," especially in his hometown, Monmouth Beach, said Jim Sickels, "and all along the river that it's just unbelievable to all of us how this is able to go on."
To hunt waterfowl along the rivers requires hunters to obtain permits from both the federal and state government entities, according to the state's Division of Fish and Wildlife, and Karl Buch a Rumson resident who is an avid hunter and spokesman for the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance, an outdoor organization that advocates for hunters, anglers and trappers for sporting and conservation means. Along with the permits, or stamps as it's called, hunters must have firearms licenses and separate firearms hunting licenses, that require training and certification.
Along with the 60-day season length, there are other restrictions placed upon the hunters, including allowing it from 30 minutes before sunrise to sunset, a prohibition on Sunday hunting and from shooting any closer than 450 feet from any occupied or unoccupied structure, according the division and the alliance.
According to the petition and the comments of some residents, there were instances of damage from shotgun blasts - Cantor said his window was broken by a gunshot, though he acknowledged that was quite a few years ago - and reports of shots on Sundays.
"If you work at home or are home with a child you get this gunfire all day," Russell said. "When you record it, it sounds no different than Iraq."
Those arguments, alleged Buch and Anthony Mauro, a Colts Neck resident, hunter and chairman of the outdoor alliance, are, as Mauro put it, a "red herring."
"There has not been, to my knowledge, one reported accident [from] hunting on the Navesink or Shrewsbury river," areas where government regulated hunting has been permitted for more than 100 years, Mauro said.
Mauro and Buch said there have been no police reports to substantiate the objectors' claims of damage or especially Sunday hunting.
And if it were true, Buch noted, it would be easy to prove. "It's so visible. If you're hunting on Sunday everybody can see you," Buch said. "It's pretty hard to conceal yourself in a boat."
A local country club has a skeet shooting range and there is a privately owned skeet range on one of the river islands, which could explain reports of the gunshots, Mauro and Buch said, as did some of the area mayors, who briefly discussed this matter at last week's monthly meeting of the Two River Council of Mayors.
In addition, deer hunting is permissible at Hartshorne Woods, a county park in the Locust section of Middletown. So, "duck hunting is a fraction of the noise that you hear," Buch said.
According to Rumson Police Chief Richard Tobias, borough police have received a total of six complaints concerning possible hunting violations since 2000. Of those six, only one summons was issued, in 2006 for hunting animals out of season, he said. For two of the complaints police could not locate any hunters, one involved hunters who appeared to have wandered into a prohibited area, by Riverside Park, and one where the hunters weren't violating any laws, the chief said.
The permitted ammunition for duck hunting is non-toxic steel birdshot. That type of ammunition has a maximum effect range of approximately 75 yards, according to James Harris, manager for The Sportsman Shop, a sporting goods store in Neptune. At 225 feet that should be well out of the 450-foot range of buildings, as required by law.
The real agenda here, Mauro argued, "is simply an effort to ban hunting on the Shrewsbury [River]," he said.
"This whole thing is that people are angry because people are allowed to hunt," he argued.
This is true for Sickels, who, while he is a gun collector and target shooter, said, "I'm totally against hunting. I'm an animal rights activist."
That being said, Sickels still insisted there is a safety consideration, given the growing population of the area.
"There are so many homes along the river and everything is just so close," he said. "It baffles me that this is allowed to go on."
The state's Department of Environmental Protection does not allow hunting on the Shark River or other waterways. "And we're entitled to the same consideration," Russell said.
Ultimately, "It boils down to consideration," Russell said. "Hunters can go somewhere else; we can't."
Mauro and Buch said they would be willing to meet with members of Residents for a Peaceful River. "We don't mind policing our own," Mauro said.
In sending the petition to the Governor's Office, Russell hoped to spur action on the state level. Terry West, a spokesman for the Governor's Office recently attended a meeting of the Two River Council of Mayors, to hear the views of town leaders on the issue. West said that the DEP had received six complaints about hunting in the Shrewsbury and Navesink rivers.
The consensus of the council was that the matter is under state jurisdiction and the mayors appeared more than willing to defer to the Governor or DEP.
"We don't have control over this," said Little Silver Mayor Suzanne Castleman.
"I've had a number of complaints," she added, noting that this is the first year she has received complaints. She believes the complaints are coming from one caller, who refuses to give her name.
"We may be opening a can of worms here," added Eatontown Mayor Gerald J. Tarantolo, "if we try to control how the river is utilized."
"There's been duck hunting around here forever and a day," Castleman noted.
Russell said she would continue to pursue the issue on the state level. And Sickels indicated he would continue his fight, despite what elected officials had to say.
"Nobody on the official level seems to care," he said. "But it's our right as homeowners along this river to stop this madness.
Food for thought.
Ant
http://tworivertimes.com./current/news3.php
Opponents Seek Ban On Local Waterfowl Hunting
By John Burton
A number of area residents are urging state officials to take action to halt waterfowl hunting along the Navesink and Shrewsbury rivers.
While hunters counter that they are doing what people have been doing here for years and that they obey all laws and state regulations doing it, those opposed to the sport recently ratcheted up their campaign by compiling a petition seeking an out-and-out ban on local hunting.
"The discharge of firearms has no place in this densely populated area, and should have been discontinued years ago," states the letter accompanying the petition sent to Gov. Jon S. Corzine.
The petition, complied by a group calling themselves Residents for a Peaceful River, contains more than 400 signatures from those who live in the area, but also from people not in the immediate vicinity. While the majority of signatures are from those living in Monmouth Beach, Rumson and Fair Haven, communities located directly on the waterways, there are also signatures from people in Hazlet and the Port Monmouth section of Middletown, in the county's Bayshore area, from West Long Branch and Eatontown, and one signature from as far away as Short Hills.
Those opposed to the shooting and hunting cite two major concerns: safety and the infringement on homeowners' quality of life.
During the 60-day season, between November and January, homeowners are often subjected to "An unceasing loud report of gunfire," alleged Fair Haven resident Susan Russell with the Residents for a Peaceful River.
"It's bothersome, it's noisy, it disturbs a homeowner's peace," she said.
"Even on Christmas morning, you wake at 5:30-6 o'clock to gunshots," said fellow Fair Haven resident Dr. Eugene Cantor.
For residents, they said, over the approximately last two decades the area has gotten increasingly developed, with evermore homes popping up along the riverbanks, with the neighborhoods no longer the sparsely populated wooded areas they once were.
"These hunters are so close to these homes," especially in his hometown, Monmouth Beach, said Jim Sickels, "and all along the river that it's just unbelievable to all of us how this is able to go on."
To hunt waterfowl along the rivers requires hunters to obtain permits from both the federal and state government entities, according to the state's Division of Fish and Wildlife, and Karl Buch a Rumson resident who is an avid hunter and spokesman for the New Jersey Outdoor Alliance, an outdoor organization that advocates for hunters, anglers and trappers for sporting and conservation means. Along with the permits, or stamps as it's called, hunters must have firearms licenses and separate firearms hunting licenses, that require training and certification.
Along with the 60-day season length, there are other restrictions placed upon the hunters, including allowing it from 30 minutes before sunrise to sunset, a prohibition on Sunday hunting and from shooting any closer than 450 feet from any occupied or unoccupied structure, according the division and the alliance.
According to the petition and the comments of some residents, there were instances of damage from shotgun blasts - Cantor said his window was broken by a gunshot, though he acknowledged that was quite a few years ago - and reports of shots on Sundays.
"If you work at home or are home with a child you get this gunfire all day," Russell said. "When you record it, it sounds no different than Iraq."
Those arguments, alleged Buch and Anthony Mauro, a Colts Neck resident, hunter and chairman of the outdoor alliance, are, as Mauro put it, a "red herring."
"There has not been, to my knowledge, one reported accident [from] hunting on the Navesink or Shrewsbury river," areas where government regulated hunting has been permitted for more than 100 years, Mauro said.
Mauro and Buch said there have been no police reports to substantiate the objectors' claims of damage or especially Sunday hunting.
And if it were true, Buch noted, it would be easy to prove. "It's so visible. If you're hunting on Sunday everybody can see you," Buch said. "It's pretty hard to conceal yourself in a boat."
A local country club has a skeet shooting range and there is a privately owned skeet range on one of the river islands, which could explain reports of the gunshots, Mauro and Buch said, as did some of the area mayors, who briefly discussed this matter at last week's monthly meeting of the Two River Council of Mayors.
In addition, deer hunting is permissible at Hartshorne Woods, a county park in the Locust section of Middletown. So, "duck hunting is a fraction of the noise that you hear," Buch said.
According to Rumson Police Chief Richard Tobias, borough police have received a total of six complaints concerning possible hunting violations since 2000. Of those six, only one summons was issued, in 2006 for hunting animals out of season, he said. For two of the complaints police could not locate any hunters, one involved hunters who appeared to have wandered into a prohibited area, by Riverside Park, and one where the hunters weren't violating any laws, the chief said.
The permitted ammunition for duck hunting is non-toxic steel birdshot. That type of ammunition has a maximum effect range of approximately 75 yards, according to James Harris, manager for The Sportsman Shop, a sporting goods store in Neptune. At 225 feet that should be well out of the 450-foot range of buildings, as required by law.
The real agenda here, Mauro argued, "is simply an effort to ban hunting on the Shrewsbury [River]," he said.
"This whole thing is that people are angry because people are allowed to hunt," he argued.
This is true for Sickels, who, while he is a gun collector and target shooter, said, "I'm totally against hunting. I'm an animal rights activist."
That being said, Sickels still insisted there is a safety consideration, given the growing population of the area.
"There are so many homes along the river and everything is just so close," he said. "It baffles me that this is allowed to go on."
The state's Department of Environmental Protection does not allow hunting on the Shark River or other waterways. "And we're entitled to the same consideration," Russell said.
Ultimately, "It boils down to consideration," Russell said. "Hunters can go somewhere else; we can't."
Mauro and Buch said they would be willing to meet with members of Residents for a Peaceful River. "We don't mind policing our own," Mauro said.
In sending the petition to the Governor's Office, Russell hoped to spur action on the state level. Terry West, a spokesman for the Governor's Office recently attended a meeting of the Two River Council of Mayors, to hear the views of town leaders on the issue. West said that the DEP had received six complaints about hunting in the Shrewsbury and Navesink rivers.
The consensus of the council was that the matter is under state jurisdiction and the mayors appeared more than willing to defer to the Governor or DEP.
"We don't have control over this," said Little Silver Mayor Suzanne Castleman.
"I've had a number of complaints," she added, noting that this is the first year she has received complaints. She believes the complaints are coming from one caller, who refuses to give her name.
"We may be opening a can of worms here," added Eatontown Mayor Gerald J. Tarantolo, "if we try to control how the river is utilized."
"There's been duck hunting around here forever and a day," Castleman noted.
Russell said she would continue to pursue the issue on the state level. And Sickels indicated he would continue his fight, despite what elected officials had to say.
"Nobody on the official level seems to care," he said. "But it's our right as homeowners along this river to stop this madness.
There was no deer hunting on christmas day this year. However, small game and waterfowl were open.
