State money is reimbursement for Deer & Tick spending
Deer & Tick Committee chairman Mike Scheibel acknowledges that a specific program needs to be outlined for deer management.
That $100,000 coming to Shelter Island to support its 4-poster program represents a reimbursement for money already spent by the Deer & Tick Committee this year, not an addition to the 2015 budget.
That word came from Supervisor Jim Dougherty at Wednesday morning’s Deer & Tick Committee meeting as members discussed the $112,850 proposed by Mr. Dougherty for the 2015 budget. That’s $13,600 more than what was in the current budget.
Mr. Dougherty acknowledged that he’s hearing noises about making the state money available for a number of hears, but said he’s not counting on that happening — at least not yet.
“This budget is not set in stone so come on in and make your pitch,” Mr. Dougherty told the committee. But whether members can make a strong call for more deer management money until a specific program is established is questionable.
There are number of questions that need to be answered if the committee is to make a case for raising the proposal for deer management from $4,000 in Mr. Dougherty’s draft:
• Is there an existing protocol for exactly tracking the number of deer a hunter takes?
• Can more recreational hunters be rewarded for butchering the deer they take?
• What are the rules the state Department of Environmental Conservation imposes affecting payment to hunters? Aside from professional sharpshooters, recreational hunters can’t be paid for the deer they cull. But they can be paid for butchering services. Are there other restrictions?
• How much incentive might it take to convince recreational hunters to take more deer? In the current year, Police Chief Jim Read started a raffle system that was legal, but can that be expanded?
In the 2014 budget, only $500 was allocated for deer management, but that’s partially because butchering costs came out of a miscellaneous fund and next year would come out of the Deer & Tick Committee money.
Hunter Beau Payne said hunters don’t think there’s an optimum number of deer on the Island because they aren’t seeing emaciated deer, so they don’t think further culling is needed.
What the committee wants is keep open the lines of communication with hunters to concerns about numbers of deer that are resulting in more people being treated for tick-borne diseases and traffic accidents that are deer-related.
Mr. Payne was instrumental in opening the door to a meeting in September between a number of hunters and the committee and said the feedback he has been getting from the hunting community has been generally positive.
They believe the committee is trying to work with them,” Mr. Payne said.
“We are not trying to jam anything down anyone’s throat,” committee member James Colligan said.
What concerns committee member Marc Wein in that a sufficient amount of money might be available to encourage hunters to take down more deer. It’s unfair to expect 20 or 30 guys to make the effort on behalf of the community without a sufficient incentive to do so, he said.
Mr. Colligan suggested that neighborhood associations might encourage their members to make contributions to a fund to support the deer management program.
Mr. Wein said he would be willing to try to encourage contributions for that purpose provided there is a specific program in place. He predicted, as he has in the past, that few of those who contributed to the 4-poster program in the past would be likely to support that effort since they’re not convinced it’s sufficiently effective.
The current proposal would raise the amount dedicated to educating the public from $500 to $2,500.
That’s in line with a plan committee member Jackie Black and artist Mike Zisser outlined for a series of “Did you know” ads they want to run in the Reporter. The two are doing their work pro bono, but Ms. Black said it would cost about $450 for a web redesign, $299 a year for a new domain name and an estimated $1,832 for the ads.
