Last week DEC announced that it had adopted a five-year deer management plan, containing revisions based upon public comments made after the release of a previously drafted version.

I’m still not certain what this all means, primarily because so much of it appears nebulous but here it is. In any event, here’s what the five-year management plan involves:

The plan describes six primary goals encompassing the current priorities for deer management.

1. Manage deer populations at levels appropriate for human and ecological concerns.

2. Promote and enhance deer hunting as an important recreational activity, tradition and population management tool.

3. Reduce negative impacts caused by deer.

4. Foster public understanding about deer ecology, management, economic aspects and recreational opportunities.

5. Manage deer to promote healthy and sustainable forests and enhance habitat conservation efforts.

6. Ensure that necessary resources are available to support sound management of whitetail deer.

Public comments on the draft plan were reviewed by the department and several notable changes were made in the adopted plan, including:

Changing to a five-year cycle for evaluating deer population objectives;

DEC removed the proposal to completely discontinue either sex and antlerless-only tags;

DEC remains committed to implementing a youth deer hunting opportunity but details relating to the timing and structure of this youth hunt have been removed from the plan to allow continued discussions to identify the most appropriate option;

DEC clarified that a special antlerless-only season for muzzleloader hunters will only occur as the third phase of a multi-phase process and only in WMU’s where additional doe harvest is needed.

While many strategies will take several years to develop, DEC expects to begin rulemaking to implement a number of hunting-related aspects of this plan prior to the 2012-2013 hunting seasons., including:

• Establishment of a youth deer hunt;

• Starting the Southern Zone bow season on October 1;

• Allowing deer management permits to be used during the bow and early muzzleloader season in the northern zone, and;

• Expanding mandatory antler restrictions into seven Wildlife Management Units in southeastern New York State.If you’d like to peruse the entire plan you can do so at: www.dec.ny.gov/docs/wildlife but if that doesn’t take you directly to it, try typing “deer plan” in the subject index. That should do it.

MORE ON MICROSTAMPING

For the uninitiated, microstamping is a process that micro-laser engraves a firearm’s make, model and serial number on the tip of a gun’s firing pin so that, at least in theory, it imprints the information on discharged cartridges so that if they’re found at a crime scene the shooter can ostensibly be tracked.

However, there are a lot of problems with that technology - as a matter of fact there are so many problems that it doesn’t work. In effect it would only work with semi-automatic handguns that discard the spent cartridge case after every shot. What happens with wheelguns, i.e. revolvers, wherein the cartridge case is retained within the cylinder until the shooter manually removes them, probably some distance from the crime scene.

Then there’s the technology itself. It can be circumvented by anyone with a knowledge of basic household tools such as nailfiles, or the firing pin can easily be replaced by one with no engraving. Then too, what would happen in the event of a stolen firearm, the theft of which had already been reported to proper authorities? If this technology was in place, all it would do is bring police agencies not to the miscreant but back to the person from whom the weapon was first stolen.

Add to that list the extra costs involved in implementing this unproven and unreliable technology - costs which will ultimately be foisted upon gun owners.

The reason I mention all this is because microstamping failed to pass muster during the last legislative session but there are strong indications it may be brought up again. It was a bad idea the first time around and it’s still a bad idea now.

In March we “celebrated” the 10th anniversary of the state’s Combined Ballistic Identification System program.

Under this program, all new handguns sold in the state had to be test-fired and the shell casings imaged and entered into a databank for possible use in crime scene investigations. Since its inception in March of 2001, more than 350,000 shell casings have been cataloged at an estimated cost of $4 million per year, for a total of $40 million over the past decade.

Now, you might ask yourself “what has that investment brought the taxpayer”? The answer is zip, nada, nothing -not a single crime had been solved because of this program. Now, the same people who swore COBIS would work may be back pushing for mandatory microstamping, which is essentially just another ballistic imaging scheme based upon unproven and flawed technology.

Another $40 million boondoggle in the works? Probably, if not considerably more, and can we afford that now?