Time for more letters

Time to remind Oberle we aren't happy!

peace.river@assembly.ab.ca
Rob.Corrigan@gov.ab.ca
james.allen@gov.ab.ca
ron.bjorge@gov.ab.ca

Dear Honourable Frank Oberle:
I had the opportunity to sit in on your address to the delegates at the AFGA convention last week and I must say that what you had to say gave me hope that SRD is on the right track once again. I wish you luck with what you are trying to achieve with the department, especially given the budget constraints you are under.

I especially took notice of your comments about not allowing things to get bogged down in bureaucracy as a means of not dealing with them. This has often been a favoured tact of SRD when they didn’t want to deal with something. So, it came as somewhat of surprise to me when I was informed by your staff that they had not had time to look at the AFGA resolution put forth last year regarding the use of pack dogs by hunters in the 400WMUs. The sceptical side of me says that this is just a means of bogging the resolution down in bureaucracy, especially when your same staff was able to deal with the handgun resolution in a scant three days. It seems when your staff takes a personal interest in something it happens fast and when they don’t, it gets placed on the proverbial back burner.

There was some indication from your staff at the last AGMAG meeting that the practice of using pack dogs may be legal under current legislation so I asked Pat Dunford for clarification on this which he promptly supplied me with. After reading his interpretation of the law, it left no doubt in my mind that the practice of big game hunters being accompanied by pack dogs is definitely illegal and that the Wildlife Act needs to be changed to permit it as was put forth in the AFGA resolution in 2011.

It was interesting to see that two of the main reasons cited for the new handgun law in Alberta were that it brought us in line with other jurisdictions and that the current wording was never the intent. Both of these arguments are easily applied to the use of pack dogs as well, but in this case to allow their use. I must admit that to those looking from the outside in, there appears to be a double standard to the expediency with which the Wildlife Act can be changed. If it’s something your staff has a personal interest in and it creates no opportunity, it can happen very fast. If not, it gets bogged down in bureaucracy.

I have supplied considerable information to your department regarding how other jurisdictions deal with the use of pack dogs and I’ve supplied considerable anecdotal evidence as to their benefits to hunters yet it all seems to have fallen on deaf ears. While I was disappointed not to see this in the 2012 regulation changes, your speech at the AFGA convention gave me hope that it may indeed find its way into the 2013 changes and not a victim of bureaucracy.

Thank you for your consideration and attention to this matter.
T.J. Schwanky