Will County to Forest Preserve to Consider deer hunting

[Tvandermyde]

Illinois: Will County Considering Opening New Hunting Lands

on Thursday, June 10^th!

 

On Wednesday, June 2, the Forest Preserve District of the Will County Board of Commissioners voted to consider opening forest preserve land within the county to certain public hunting opportunities. The deer population in the forest preserve needs to be managed to maintain balance, sustainability and enhance biodiversity. One option under consideration is public hunting. The Board of Commissioners will meet for a full vote on Thursday, June 10 and the option to allow public hunting as part of the deer management program and to enhance hunting opportunities will be under consideration.

 

The meeting will begin at 9:30 am and will be held on the second floor of the Will County Office Building, 302 North Chicago Street, in Joliet. Please make plans to attend this meeting.

 

If you cannot attend this meeting, please take a moment to contact members of the Will County Board of Commissioners and urge them to support public hunting in the forest preserves in Will County as a means to manage the deer population. To find contact information for County Board Members, please go to http://www.willcountyboard.com/yourcountyboard.htm, and then click on the link for the Board Member you wish to contact.

 

 

Guys with the legislature out, I could use some help with calls and emails. The subject matter should be simple:

1. Hunting is safe and responisble means of managing the deer heard.

2. Other activities are more likely to cause injury than hunting

3. McHenry County which does this has not had a single accident or injury since it started allowing hunting in 2001.<BR style="mso-special-character: line-break">

[Sigma]

I emailed John Anderson and Jim Bilotta

[pyre400]

Dear <board member>

 

 

 

The state of Illinois' Deer population is approaching 800,000, and with this number growing, if left unchecked, stands to cost Will County Citizens life, injury, and property.

 

 

 

An effective and responsible means of controlling deer population is through a controlled hunting program. In observation of this fact, the Illinois DNR has adjusted Hunting Regulations in order to improve upon the management of deer population in Illinois. Please see this "facts an analysis" page from the IDNR web site for more depth:

 

IDNR_deer_fact_sheet.pdf

 

 

 

Will County stands to benefit from the extensive research done by the IDNR - For some more details, please reference the "Joint Deer Population Task Force's" recommendation page: http://dnr.state.il....uary/joint.html

 

 

 

As with any outdoor activity, there are often safety concerns. Hunting is a safe hobby enjoyed by many here in Illinois and abroad. In 2006 the IDNR issue 300,000 hunting licenses, while only having an injury rate of 1/10 of 1%. That equated to 30 injuries, with only 14 of those injuries being the result of an injury sustained from a "hunting device" – i.e. firearm. Please compare that with the 25,000+ Deer/Auto accidents, with numerous injuries, and fatalities that occur each year in the state of Illinois. Granted, these statistics are state wide, but one would expect these statistics to have a relative relationship to the amount of deer habitat present in the county.

 

 

 

McHenry County permitted hunting on Forest Preserve land within their county in 2001. Since then there has not been a single incident of injury or death. So hunting should not pose any significant impact to public safety in Will County, but I refer to the IDNR and the "National Highway Traffic Safety Administration" should you wish to get more information on the impact of allowing, or not allowing hunting within Will County Forest Preserve land.

 

 

 

Having said all this, I respectfully urge the Commissioners of Will County to take public hunting into serious consideration. Allowing public hunting on Forest Preserve land within Will County makes good sense, and would be a win for all the people of Will County.

 

 

Thank you for your time

 

 

 

-----

Emailing all of them

 

EDIT: I actually stopped after 5 or so, once I got this email "County Board [CountyBoard atsign willcountyillinois.com]

[eric2281]

Did & done!

[RacerDave6]

I emailed John Anderson and Jim Bilotta

I know a number of the board members

The ones we have to hit hard (they would tend to vote against this) will be

Anderson

Konicki

Brooks

Stewart

Winfrey

Adamic

Babich

Wilhelmi

 

I will try to get a solid count and find out who is on the fence.

 

Dave

[pyre400]

I know a number of the board members

The ones we have to hit hard (they would tend to vote against this) will be

Anderson

Konicki

Brooks

Stewart

Winfrey

Adamic

Babich

Wilhelmi

 

I will try to get a solid count and find out who is on the fence.

 

Dave

 

I emailed:

CountyBoard (generic addy)

Ann Dralle

Tom Weigel

Singer

Deutsch

Amy Jensen

 

I have yet to get any replies back, other than the automated one from the general email addy.

[RacerDave6]

 

I emailed:

CountyBoard (generic addy)

Ann Dralle

Tom Weigel

Singer

Deutsch

Amy Jensen

 

I have yet to get any replies back, other than the automated one from the general email addy.

Singer is solid, but doesn't get to vote except to break a tie

 

Jensen?? Don't remember her on the county board. What district?

 

Dave

[pyre400]

Singer is solid, but doesn't get to vote except to break a tie

 

Jensen?? Don't remember her on the county board. What district?

 

Dave

 

You are the real deal sir - good catch. Jensen did not get an email regarding hunting.

 

I sent out unique emails to each of the other addresses - Jensen happened to be someone else I was emailing on a different gun topic - please disregard that name as I was just rolling through my "sent items" in my email box and did not pay attention to the "subject".

 

Sorry for the confusion sir