Submitted by Randy Stevens
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Had a great couple of days hunting with the kids, Derrick Stevens Lyndsey Marie, and Brett Rote. It's been 20 years since Derrick, Lyndsey, and I spent time together hunting in Penns Woods. Thanks for rekindling memories of the past and look forward to more time with you hunting in Penns Woods. Thank you to the legislature for the passage of Senate Bill 147 but now it is time to pass Senate Bill 607. It just so happened that one of my kids, my son, only has off two weekends a month and if the opening weekend for whitetail here in Pennsylvania would not have opened when it did and he would've had to work, the opportunity for me to hunt with my son would've never happened. I do not want to have to wait another 20 years of my life to have the ability to hunt with my kids and extended family members. It is time to get rid of this archaic blue law that prohibits hunting on Sunday with just a few exemptions in Pennsylvania. It’s time to stop placating to the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau and start listening to hunters on this issue. It is time for the legislature to pass Senate Bill 607 and let the Pennsylvania Game Commission manage all of the 480 wildlife species here in Pennsylvania seven days a week every week of the year. The opening weekend of whitetail deer rifle season was the best weekend for me in the last 20 years. Without the season opener on a Saturday and the ability to hunt on Sunday, I would not have been able to hunt with two of my kids. One is a schoolteacher and the other one only has off work two weekends a month. The corporate and labor workplace schedules are not commonplace Monday through Friday schedules in today's world. If the opener for whitetail still would've been on Monday two of my kids and my son-in-law would not have had the opportunity to hunt together. It just so happened that the opening day and the one Sunday of rifle season fell on my son’s scheduled weekend off. I also had the ability to hunt with my son-in-law who is an electrician and very rarely does he have the ability to get off work because of his company's scheduled jobs. Needless to say, I myself am self-employed and am an Allied health provider so it is very difficult for me to get off work. I used to have to take off work to hunt on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, which would mean three days of not seeing patients and creating more of a backlog where my patients would have to wait. But this year because of me being able to go back to work on Tuesday I only had to take off one day of not scheduling patients. It is difficult for guys like me to understand what the problem is with passing a simple law like SB607. We live in a society that operates 24 hours a day, 7 days a week conducting and participating in everything from politics to mail service. But for some reason having the ability and opportunity to hunt on Sunday is something that you as the legislature believe you must control. I and many others just don’t get it. It is time to move SB607 and get it passed into law for guys like me and the many others out there. Randy Stevens |
