Spring bear hunt will not be reinstated in Ontario (12/31/2003)

The Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) has refused to reinstate the province's spring bear hunt. Instead, a plan will be implemented to help people deal with nuisance bears. The decision ignores citizens' pleas and committee recommendations to allow the hunt.

Citizens from northern Ontario had urged the government to reinstate the hunt to ease financial hardships they suffered as a result of its cancellation in 1999. The Nuisance Bear Review Committee, established by the Minister of Natural Resources to review the biology, geographic and socio-economic factors relating to nuisance bear problems in Ontario, recommended that a limited spring bear hunt be reinstated for socio-economic reasons. The requests were denied.

The MNR will instead institute a nuisance bear strategy plan, which includes the establishment of a 1-800 nuisance bear hotline and the expansion of education efforts. It also promises to support efforts by municipalities to avoid nuisance bear problems and work with the Ministry of Municipal Affairs to develop a bylaw to prevent bear incidents.

The MNR has suggested alternative solutions to the nuisance bear problem but offered little to lessen the economic impact of the cancelled hunt.

"I'm hopeful they will fund and adequately deal with the situation for municipalities," said Fort Frances Coun. Tannis Drysdale. "But in the past, the programs that previous governments put in place to assist the industry in transition from the hunt to other revenue-generating mechanisms were actually far more work than they were actually worth."

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