NEWS

Indiana Senate president moves captive deer-hunting bill

Ryan Sabalow
ryan.sabalow@indystar.com

The state Senate's top Republican has relaxed his hold on a bill that would legalize hunting of farm-raised captive deer in Indiana.

The Senate Natural Resources Committee will hear House Bill 1453 at 10 a.m. on Monday.

Last year, the committee overwhelmingly passed a similar bill. If that happens again on Monday, it sets the stage for a definitive vote in 2015 on whether the controversial practice of high-fence hunting will become officially legal in Indiana.

Last year's bill failed to advance in the full Senate by just one vote.

After HB 1453 passed the Indiana House this year, Senate President Pro Tempore David Long stopped the bill from moving in his chamber. The bill that passed the House set licensing standards, hunting seasons and minimum acreage requirements for fenced hunting ranches. Only hunting preserves that operated prior to 2015 would be allowed.

There are currently four Indiana hunting preserves in Indiana, but around a dozen were in business prior to 2005.

Long said earlier this month that he wanted to make sure the bill was amended to include adequate protections against disease and ensure that preserves sold ethical hunts.

Amendments to the bill weren't available on Friday, but Long said in a statement that a group of senators worked with state wildlife and agricultural officials, deer farmers and opponents of high-fence hunting to find a "common ground" compromise.

"While I remain personally opposed to captive deer hunting, it is also clear that a solution is needed or there will be no regulation whatsoever of these hunting preserves," Long said.

A message left Friday morning for Sen. Susan Glick, the committee's Republican chairwoman and the bill's sponsor in the Senate, wasn't returned.

Long has likened high-fence deer hunting to dog fighting, and he's called hunting preserves akin to a "slaughterhouse without a roof."

He voted against last year's failed bill.

For nearly a decade, nearly annual legislation that would formally legalize captive deer hunting has failed to advance in the General Assembly.

There are around 400 deer farms in Indiana, many of which breed whitetail deer to be sold in the interstate trophy hunting trade. Deer breeders say hunting preserves provide a critical "terminal market" for the animals they sell.

But in 2005, the Indiana Department of Natural Resources tried to shut down the state's hunting preserves, saying they were unethical and posed a disease threat to the state's wild deer.

Owners of the preserves sued.

The matter was tied up in court, and the hunting ranches that stayed in business were allowed to sell hunts without oversight from the DNR, whose conservation officers enforce hunting laws.

The Indiana attorney general's office this month challenged an appellate court ruling that found the DNR had overstepped its authority .

The challenge before the Indiana Supreme Court is pending, but it could be withdrawn if the Senate passes HB 1453.

The Natural Resources Committee meets in Room 130 at the Statehouse, 200 W. Washington St.

Call Star reporter Ryan Sabalow at (317) 444-6179. Follow him on Twitter: @RyanSabalow.