Take Back The MDC
A Gathering Point for True Sportsmen
MDC Abandons Hunter Education
by Linda M. Everhart
In February 2007 the Missouri Department of Conservation celebrated the 50th anniversary of Missouri’s hunter education program by canceling their support of the annual conference of the Missouri Hunter Education Instructor’s Association (MHEIA).
Unpaid, volunteer instructors teach most of the hunter education classes across the state, and the MHEIA is comprised of these volunteers. Once a year, they get together to visit, accept awards for any milestones they may have reached, and learn the details of recent hunting accidents that could help with their teaching.
The MDC has co-sponsored these meetings since 1992, as a way of keeping in touch and thanking the dedicated volunteers who have helped make hunting safe and the job of the MDC easier.
Under the current leadership of Director John Hoskins and Outreach and Education Division Administrator Lorna Domke, the MDC no longer supports the volunteers or hunter education. "It’s not their concern."
In “The Next Generation of Conservation”, a slick, politically correct publication, that details the plans, goals and direction of this new MDC, there is no mention of hunter education. Not even a word of remembrance can be found, of a program that’s been around since 1957, and was responsible for the reduction of hunting accidents in Missouri by 70 percent, and prevention of untold numbers of home firearm accidents.
Hunters are being disenfranchised from the very department they created.
If the leadership at the MDC honestly believes hunter education is no longer important, then Missouri hunters should not be required to take the classes.
Governor Blunt will be appointing two new commissioners this June, and Bob Staton, the man who wrote the very first hunter education manual for Missouri, has offered himself for one of these unpaid positions.
Bob cannot buy his way in, as many have done in the past. His is a grassroots campaign to literally take back the MDC for the people who founded it.
If you care about the future of hunting, fishing and trapping, please share your desires with Governor Matt Blunt, Room 216, State Capitol Building, Jefferson City MO 65101.
Or call the governor at: (573)751-2019
Sen. Dan Clemens Remarks
Just last month State Senator Dan Clemens made remarks on the Missouri Senate Floor expressing his concerns with the current leadership at the MDC. Please read his remarks and forward them on to others who may wish to read them. Click Here
Report to Elected Officials
Please download and pass on the Take Back The MDC report to elected officials concerning the current state of the Missouri Department of Conservation. Please call your state elected representatives and senators and tell them that you are concerned with the Leadership at the MDC. Tell them you want change!
Download HERE
