Pennsylvania Sportsmen Urge Gov. Corbett Not to Lease State Land

Mark Stahl / Getty Images

Gary Tierno fishes for trout with his daugh­ter Sarah on Pennsylvania’s open­ing day, April 17, 2004.

A coali­tion of hunters and anglers say no more state for­est lands should be leased to oil and gas devel­op­ers. The groups, pri­mar­ily con­sist­ing of the Penn­syl­va­nia Coun­cil of Trout Unlim­ited, sent a let­ter to Cor­bett on Thurs­day, telling him the 700,000 acres already under lease threat­ens the state’s “hunt­ing and fish­ing legacy.”

“Penn­syl­va­ni­ans have a rich her­itage of hunt­ing, fish­ing, trap­ping and other out­door tra­di­tions on state for­est lands. Passed down from gen­er­a­tion to gen­er­a­tion, these sport­ing tra­di­tions have become part of the commonwealth’s cul­tural and social fab­ric. Hunt­ing and fish­ing is not just a pas­time though—it is also big busi­ness. Accord­ing to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Ser­vice, more than $4.3 bil­lion in rev­enue is gen­er­ated in Penn­syl­va­nia each year from fish­ing, hunt­ing and wildlife-related recreation—and state forests serve as the cor­ner­stone for these activities.”

The groups’ let­ter points to a 2010 study by the Depart­ment of Con­ser­va­tion and Nat­ural Resources that con­cludes new gas drilling leases would “sig­nif­i­cantly alter the eco­log­i­cal integrity and wild char­ac­ter of our state for­est system.”

The sports­men tell Cor­bett they’re wor­ried about for­est “edge effects” asso­ci­ated with clear­ing land for drilling, espe­cially in the South­west­ern and North cen­tral parts of the state.

“North cen­tral Penn­syl­va­nia con­tains the bulk of the commonwealth’s Class A and wilder­ness trout water­sheds. This area also encom­passes Wildlife Man­age­ment Unit 2G—the area that had the high­est rates of grouse flush in the state in early 2011 and the high­est bear har­vest dur­ing the 2011 season.”

Among the groups that signed on to the let­ter are the National Wildlife Foun­da­tion, United Bowhunters of Penn­syl­va­nia, the Susque­hanna County Fed­er­a­tion of Sports­men Clubs, and the state’s local chap­ters of Trout Unlimited.

“Gov. Cor­bett is look­ing for a quick, easy way to fill the gaps in the state bud­get,” said Ken Under­cof­fer, pres­i­dent of the Penn­syl­va­nia Coun­cil of Trout Unlim­ited, “but we can’t sac­ri­fice our state for­est sys­tem, our nat­ural resources or our hunt­ing and fish­ing her­itage, for a short-term gain.”

Gov­er­nor Ed Ren­dell signed an exec­u­tive order for­bid­ding any more leas­ing of state forests just before he left office. But Cor­bett is expected to lift that ban, and some spec­u­late that announce­ment could be made in his upcom­ing state of the state.