New and Improved "Open Fields" Bill In Congress
Press Room
Press Release
For Immediate Release
March 8, 2005
For more information contact:
George Cooper, (202) 508-3421
New and Improved "Open Fields" Bill In Congress
WASHINGTON, DC - Today on Capitol Hill Senators Kent Conrad of North Dakota and Pat Roberts of Kansas officially introduced a new version of the "Open Fields" bill in the U.S. Senate. A companion version was introduced in the House of Representatives by Congressmen Tom Osborne of Nebraska and Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota. By funding grants to state and tribal access programs, the bipartisan legislation, officially titled the "Voluntary Public Access and Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program Act of 2005":
- opens millions of acres of private land and water to sportsmen and women;
- offers farmers, ranchers and foresters voluntary opportunities to bring new income into their operations;
- encourages expansion and improvement of fish and wildlife habitat.
The first version of "Open Fields" introduced in November 2003 picked up 40 Republican and Democratic co-sponsors and the support of the country’s leading hunting, fishing and conservation groups. This improved version of the bill expands funding availability to tribal access programs and forest properties. Responding to budgetary constraints, "Open Fields" now calls for $20 million in annual federal funding from the Department of Agriculture to be made available between 2005 and 2009. That would equate to roughly four million acres of new land opened per year.
There are currently 17 states with access programs that would qualify for "Open Fields" grants. States with particularly strong access programs include North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Montana and Kansas. In Montana’s access program alone, for the 2004 hunting season, approximately 1,250 landowners opened nearly 8.8 million acres to the public. These states have waiting lists of landowners they can’t get to without additional funding. Just since the introduction of the first version of "Open Fields" a little over a year ago, four states have created new access programs. Several states have not started access programs because of funding shortages, but would likely start them if "Open Fields" grants became available.
As a coalition of hunting, fishing and conservation groups focused on guaranteeing Americans a place to hunt and fish, The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership and its partner organizations have sought to spread the word about "Open Fields" to the nation’s hunters and anglers. The feedback has been resoundingly positive with sportsmen expressing hope that Congress will seize this opportunity to directly address two of their biggest problems: loss of access and loss of quality fish and game habitat.
Dr. Terry Riley, TRCP’s Director of Policy, who is credited with helping several states start access programs says "This relatively new policy area offers huge potential because we are creating and refining access programs that have the unique ability to simultaneously invest in the agricultural, sportsmen’s and conservation communities."
For sportsmen, loss of access is a growing problem that is cited as a major contributing factor in the decline in the number of people hunting in particular. Urban sprawl, concerns over liability, and other factors are making it more difficult for the sportsman of average means to get on to land reasonably close to his or her home that still has good fish and game habitat and isn’t overcrowded.
TRCP Chairman Jim Range expressed confidence that "Open Fields" can pass this year saying "People in Washington are figuring out they need to listen to nation’s sportsmen. If sportsmen speak up loud and clear, and let their members of Congress know that they want them on this bill as co-sponsors, then this bill will move." David Nomsen, Vice President of Pheasants Forever, and one of the leaders of TRCP’s "Open Fields" access policy initiative says "states can use grant money from "Open Fields" to offer rural landowners incentives to voluntarily open their acreage, improve habitat and expand huntable land. This bill packs a big load of meaningful benefits that would be tangible to sportsmen."
TRCP partner organizations, led by Pheasants Forever, the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, Whitetails Unlimited and the Izaak Walton League of America, will continue to work together, as they have for the past year, to educate sportsmen, policymakers, and legislators about "Open Fields."
The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership is a coalition of leading conservation organizations and individual grassroots partners, working together to preserve the traditions of hunting and fishing by conserving fish and wildlife and the habitats necessary to sustain them, increasing funding for conservation and management, and expanding access to places to hunt and fish.
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