Field Trialers -- Consider This Our Wake-up Call!

	Without both public and private land, our sport would not exist. Photo by: Author

If you have not heard about the Pittman-Robertson Act, and the abuses taking place within the United States Fish and Wildlife Services (USFWS), pay attention, our sport is under attack and the “wolf is in sheep’s clothing”.

For those of you that are not familiar with the Pittman-Robertson Act, the act was established in 1937, to manage monies derived from federal excise taxes paid on the purchase of firearms, ammunition, fishing equipment, etc. By law, these funds are to be allocated to state wildlife agencies for the acquisition and maintenance of state land and wildlife restoration projects. Since its inception, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service has been responsible for managing more than $3.4 billion accumulated in the Pittman-Robertson Trust Fund. Sounds good, doesn’t it? In theory, the Act seems to benefit the sportsmen and preserve the future of our sport, much the way hunting license proceeds do.

Under this act, an event can be barred from these public use areas if it meets a simple “acid test”:

1. If an event destroys habitat or interferes with habitat restoration,
2. Disrupts or destroys wildlife on these areas,
3. Interferes with other public use on these areas,
4. Requires additional facilities or habitat changes

Recently, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service has cloaked the sheep’s garments and has attacked our sport undetected. A handful of regional USFWS bureaucrats have attempted to establish a ban on field trials held on land acquired and/or maintained by Pittman-Robertson funds, sighting that such activities meet the acid test above.

On July 19, 2000, in a written statement before the U.S. Senate, Environment & Public Works Committee, by Thomas Honecker and The Pittman-Robertson Working Group refuted this claim stating, “…trialing is intimately connected to hunting, that trialing supports the training of dogs in a manner that assures conservation of game while hunting. It shows that all of the funding to support P-R grounds comes from taxes and fees paid by hunters, and that trialers are these same people. It also shows that, despite being a traditional use, trialing takes place on only a very small part of the available P-R grounds. Lastly, it shows that while habitat damage has been alleged to arise from trialing, none has actually been demonstrated or documented. We thus believe that action to prohibit trialing on P-R grounds has no basis, that trialing is not at all an incompatible use.”

Since 1937, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into law the Act sponsored by Senator Key Pittman of Nevada and Representative A. Willis Robertson of Virginia, field trailing and dog tests have been an accepted use of land acquired and maintained with Pittman-Robertson funds. However, in December of 1999, the USFWS forced the cancellation of field trials and dog tests on four properties in Michigan by threatening to withhold $5.5 million (annually) in funds allocated to the state if the state did not go along with the ban on field trials. These actions border on EXTORTION!

	Even waterfowlers find the availablity of land to be an issue. Photo by: R. Michael DiLullo

Why are field trials the subject of such attacks? Well, the answer is not a pleasant one. In an article titled “If They Can’t Get Us One Way, They’ll Try Another”, written by Kenneth Marden, Delegate, German Shorthaired Pointer Club of America, Inc., summarized it best, “The USFWS has been infiltrated by animal rights humaniacs. When you find that a former vice president of the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) occupies a key position I the USFWS, and you know the HSUS is violently opposed to hunting in any form, everything becomes clear.” Simply put, many animal rights groups and environmental zealots have found their way into these government agencies. Most are in federal positions in Washington and given the opportunity and support by special interest groups have attacked our rights, much the way a sheep in wolf’s clothes would.

Fortunately, groups like the National Rifle Association, National Wildlife Institute, NAIA and sportsmen organization, and Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) stepped up to this attack and faced it head on. After indications that USFWS misused federally appropriated funds, Rep. Young requested an audit of the USFWS by the General Accounting Office. The findings from this audit uncovered astounding abuses. Millions of tax dollars, collected from the excise taxes on the purchase of firearms, ammunition, fishing equipment, etc., where suppose to go to federal conservation effort per the Pittman-Robertson Act, where instead spent to pay themselves huge bonuses and extravagant business trips around the world. In one case, an attempt was made to finance and unauthorized project to promote a program for an animal rights group.

After such findings Rep. Young introduced H.R. 3671, “The Fish and Wildlife Programs Improvement and National Wildlife Refuge System Centennial Act of 2000”, a bill to end abuses and ensure that the millions of dollars in excise taxes, paid by sportsman annually, went back to improve the conservation projects that will benefit our sport. On November 1, 2000, this bill was signed into law. Unfortunately, the law was passed contained no statutory language regarding field trialing or the animal rights anti-hunting attacks on our sport.
However, the HR4690 amendment amended the Pittman-Robertson Program to include a modified form of the term "wildlife-associated recreation." Senators Mary Landrieu (D-Louisiana) and Chuck Robb (D-Virginia), together with Chairman Don Young (R- Alaska) were instrumental in including the term "field trialing" in this definition.

Sometimes it takes an attack like that waged by the USFWS (through the Pittman Robertson Act) to unite the strong personalities in our sport. Unfortunately, we let this one get a little too close for comfort. Be assured that we have not heard the last of the special interest groups. As my father and coach once counseled me after winning a big cross-country race in high school, “The minute you think you cannot be beat, you will be! Now you’re ripe for the picking, you know! This time you won. Hopefully, you have learned from winning just as much as they have learned from losing. Undoubtedly, they will come back even stronger, in ways you may not be ready for.” Lastly, as he walked out of my bedroom he stated, “I don’t mean to take anything away from your win, it was BIG, but don’t rest on your laurels. Instead, consider this your wake-up call.”