Who is Behind Proposal 3?

As of October 31, the two state ballot committees supporting the “Yes on Proposal 3” campaign—the “Citizens for Wildlife Conservation Committee” and the “MUCC Stop the Anti’s Committee”—had collectively raised a reported $583,361.99.  Of that total, approximately 68% of the money, or $395,600, came from five national, out-of-state, hunting organizations:

• U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance , headquartered in Ohio , gave $135,000
• Safari Club International, headquartered in Arizona , and its chapters gave $104,200
• National Wild Turkey Federation, headquartered in South Carolina , and its chapters gave $26,400
• National Rifle Association, headquartered in Virginia , gave $15,000
• Ballot Issues Coalition, an NRA offshoot in Virginia , gave $115,000

In addition, the committees received support from several organizations based in Michigan , including:

• “Citizens for Wildlife Conservation,” the group that held an illegally lottery which was shut down by Attorney General Mike Cox, gave $114,808.07 to the similarly named “Citizens for Wildlife Conservation Committee”
• Michigan Bear Hunters Association gave $15,000
• Michigan Hunting Dog Federation gave $3,000
• Michigan Wild Turkey Hunters Association gave $1,050
• Hunting Heritage Defense Committee gave $1,000
• Michigan Trappers Association gave $500
• Michigan State United Coon Hunters Association gave $500
• Millbrook Coon Hunters Association gave $500

With all the organizations funneling money to support the “Yes on Proposal 3” campaign, making up more than 90% of the group’s funding, one must wonder where the support is from individual citizens. There are very few, especially when compared to the nearly 7,000 individual Michigan residents who have donated to the “No on Proposal 3” campaign.

In fact, the three top individual donors to the “Yes on Proposal 3” campaign have given $10,000 each:

• Michael Ferrantino, CEO of EQ Industrial Services, who has been in the news this month when his hazardous materials plant exploded in Apex, North Carolina, causing thousands of people to evacuate and more than 100 to be hospitalized (wouldn’t his money be better spent helping the victims of that tragedy, rather than trying to open a target shooting season on mourning doves?)
• James C. Shaeffer, CEO of JCS & Associates, Inc., and Treasurer of the aforementioned “Citizens for Wildlife Conservation” which had conducted the illegal lottery
• Michael J. Leonard, owner of Dollar Bill Copying, based in Ann Arbor

It’s no wonder that poll after poll indicates that Proposal 3 is expected to go down in flames, based on the lack of support from individual Michigan voters, including individual sportsmen. In an eleventh hour attempt to hold on for dear life, backers of Proposal 3 have started spreading rumors that the “No on Proposal 3” campaign is connected to extremists. But let’s look at who the real extremists are. Three of the main spokespersons for the “Yes on Proposal 3” campaign have been:

• Kirk Gibson, former Detroit Tigers player, who appears in the “Yes on Proposal 3” radio ads
• Marc Somers, president of the Flint chapter of Safari Club International
• David Farbman, president of the World Hunters Association

Kirk Gibson operates a “canned hunt” called Buckfalls Ranch in Millersburg , Michigan .  Captive animals are trapped behind fences on the 1,300-acre ranch, and have no chance of escape. At canned hunts, the animals are so tame that they don’t even flee from hunters. Gibson’s web site lists prices of up to $7,500 for trophy hunters to get a guaranteed kill based on the size of the buck, and says you can get so close to the animals that you can shoot them from 25 yards or less. Ethical hunters are repulsed by this type of drive-thru killing, which has no element of sportsmanship or fair chase.

Safari Club International is a group of wealthy, elite, trophy hunters, which fights in Congress to open our national parks to sport hunting, weaken protections for endangered species, and also defend drive-thru killing of captive animals at canned hunts. Safari Club members annually kill thousands of the world’s most beautiful creatures merely to stuff and display them, or to compete in trophy competitions where awards are given for shooting one-of-each on various target lists. These include the “African Big Five” (lion, leopard, elephant, rhino, Cape buffalo), “Bears of the World,” and “Wild Sheep of the World.” To win all 35 categories of Safari Club trophy competitions, a trophy hunter must kill 499 separate species and subspecies. Some members spend hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime shooting animals in the wild, or killing captive wildlife in canned hunts. The Safari Club might not have a trophy category for mourning doves, but this extreme group has never met a species it didn’t want to shoot.
 

Safari Club members have even been implicated in a taxidermy tax scam, which had allowed them to shoot rare animals overseas, donate the trophy mounts to phony museums, and write off the entire cost of their hunting trips as charitable donations. A two-year undercover investigation exposed the scam, and revealed that 800 “donated” trophy mounts were stacked up in an old railroad car in rural Nebraska . Congress passed legislation this year that closed a loophole in the federal tax code, shutting down this safari swindle.

The World Hunting Association is perhaps an even more extreme organization, which has proposed crazy schemes that true Michigan sportsmen have shot down. This year, David Farbman and his WHA had planned a televised competition which included shooting deer with tranquilizer darts for prize money. Hunters and outdoor writers across Michigan condemned the WHA’s outrageous proposal. 

• Rick Story of the U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance said, “The whole notion of a hunting competition turns most hunters off.  Is that what hunting’s become - a body count contest?”
• M.R. James, President of the Pope & Young Club, added, “Hunting is not a ‘catch and release’ proposition. Nor is it intended to be an entertaining public spectacle.”
• Even Safari Club International expressed “serious concerns with attempts to ‘professionalize’ the tradition of the hunt, particularly with cash rewards.”
• And the Quality Deer Management Association said, “WHA’s program violates many elements of QDMA’s mission of ethical hunting, sound deer management and preservation of the deer-hunting heritage – values shared by the vast majority of deer hunters in North America .”  

Farbman and his WHA don’t represent the values of true hunters, and it’s no surprise that they are the face of the “Yes on Proposal 3” campaign. Michigan sportsmen didn’t listen to them when it came to darting deer in a televised contest, and shouldn’t listen to this extreme group when it comes to shooting doves for target practice either.