Virginia: Sunday Hunting Legislation to be Considered Tomorrow!

Please Contact Subcommittee Members TODAY!

Tomorrow morning, after the full House Agriculture, Chesapeake and Natural Resources Committee, the House Natural Resources Subcommittee will consider legislation to allow hunting on private land and public waterways on Sundays.  Senate Bill 464, sponsored by state Senator Ralph Northam (D-6), previously passed in the state Senate by a bipartisan 29 to 11 vote on January 26.

Please contact members of the House Natural Resources Subcommittee TODAY and urge them to pass this critical hunting reform. Subcommittee members and contact information can be found here.

Currently, Virginia is one of only six states in the country that strictly bans hunting on Sunday. This prohibition threatens the very future of our hunting heritage by discouraging hunter recruitment and retention.  In addition, this antiquated ban harms Virginia’s economy.

Due to increasingly demanding work, family and extracurricular schedules, older and younger hunters alike often have only Sundays available to hunt.  The ban keeps them from remaining or becoming hooked on hunting.  There is a reason that the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), a radical group whose ultimate goal is to end all hunting in America, is one of the most active advocates of maintaining the ban.  Hunting license sales in Virginia have decreased from 500,000 to 300,000 in little more than two decades, while the Commonwealth’s population has increased by millions.  Our opponents know that the future of hunting is at stake and you should too.

At a time when the economy is struggling and too many Virginians are out of work, legislators must not continue to refuse the enormous economic benefits associated with allowing hunting on Sundays. Comprehensive research from the National Shooting Sports Foundation shows that allowing hunting on Sundays would generate a total annual economic impact estimated at $296 million and create 3,927 jobs. All of this would be spurred by simply eliminating words from state statute books (the current prohibition), not spending taxpayer dollars on some pie-in-the-sky scheme.