Has there ever been any effort to overturn WY's unfair wilderness rule for non-residents ??? Last yr after rifle hunting reg national forest for 3 days and not seeing a single elk...I sat on a ridge looking across the valley and glassed 2 groups of elk containing 6 diff bulls in the wilderness area. I love hunting WY... but it doesn't seem fair since non-residents fund the majority of the G & F. Hey Buzz...whats your thoughts? Thankfully my WY friend was able to join me the last day of rifle season & I shot a cow in the wilderness.
Here is what I have been consistent about regarding this law.
I think its perhaps the second most discriminatory law regarding access to public wildlife...with the most being the AK guide requirements for species. I also don't like that the law was put in place by WOGA as essentially a welfare/subsidy for them. For those reasons, I do not like the law at all, and don't agree with it.
The funding argument is a non-starter for me. To simply look at a GF budget and try to argue that its unfair from that angle, is pretty lame. The reason I say that, is what is never considered, is the amount of money that is funneled to the GF from Wyoming based NGO's, WWNRT, etc. etc. The other thing that is never considered is how much time and effort is spent by resident volunteers regarding improving things for hunting, wildlife, conservation, etc.
So, when those are considered regarding the funding disparity, the gap starts to really narrow and not hold much water as a reasonable argument to me. But, that's just my opinion, and I have no problem if others don't agree. Its just that I'm in the position to see how many hours, so many give, without anything for reimbursement...and rarely even a "thank you".
The only way to over-turn this would be to somehow gather enough Resident support to reverse it. I think that's going to be very tough sledding. There are guys like me that think the law is total crap and if the decision were up to me, I would repeal it today. However, because the average Resident probably only hunts one state, and the fact that the law gives Residents some relief from NR hunters, its highly unlikely they would want to repeal the law.
Finally, the amount of political capital that would be required for Residents to actually get something like this passed would probably not be worth it. In particular at this time, where there is still those within the legislature that are so blatantly outfitter sympathetic.
IMO, any law can be over-turned, but timing is critical and perhaps down the road it can be revisited.
But, I fundamentally disagree with the law, who passed it, and why and most certainly see why NR are upset about it.
