Melissa Ross
The League of Women Voters of Florida has sent out an e-blast calling for a stop to Florida’s scheduled bear hunt– a message that includes a plug for the organization’s First Vice President, Chuck O’Neal.
The missive, “Stop the Hunt! Vote for Chuck!” asks readers to click on a link that takes you to the “Cox Conserves Heroes” contest. O’Neal is a finalist to be chosen as a “hero” who has worked to “create, preserve or enhance the shared outdoor places in our communities.” The awards program was created by Cox Enterprises and the Trust for Public Land.
Should O’Neal win, the LWVF Education Fund receives $10,000, according to the email.
As to the controversial hunt, O’Neal, an environmental activist and real estate investor in Longwood, says he’s filed a lawsuit against the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to stop it from taking place next month. He is joined in the legal action by Speak Up Wekiva, a nonprofit group based in Lake Mary.
“The League has a position that says the hunt should not occur until all the data has been scientifically gathered and analyzed,” O’Neal told FloridaPolitics. “At this point, two of the four bear management units where the hunt will occur don’t have any data back. In the other ones, the data is very sparse and we question the analysis of that data.”
The bear hunt season will start in Florida Oct. 24. State officials will allow the killing of as many as 320 bears. This hunt is Florida’s first in more than two decades, and is sanctioned by the state as a way to control increasing bear populations and human-to-bear conflict. More than 1,200 permits were sold as soon as the state made them available last month, including one snapped up by Motor City Madman Ted Nugent.
However, activists like O’Neal argue FWC should resort to non-lethal means, such as bear-proofing trash containers, prohibiting people from feeding wild bears and cracking down on the illegal harvesting of saw palmetto berries, which is a staple of a bear’s diet.
O’Neal also says he believes it’s appropriate for the LWVF, which bills itself as a nonpartisan organization, to take a position on the hunt.
“There are two parts to the league, advocacy and education,” he said. “We do advocate on issues, such as for the passage of Amendment 1, and advocating against the campus carry bill. I don’t really see this as a partisan issue, actually. This is more of a conservation issue.”
As this site’s Jim Rosica has reported before, the League has taken heat in recent years for tackling a suite of politically charged issues, from the normalization of relations with Cuba to Medicaid expansion.
