One Step Closer to Sunday Hunting In Virginia

Yesterday Senate Bill 464 came before the Virginia State Senate where it passed with a vote of 29 for and 11 against repealing the ban on Sunday hunting in Virginia. This puts us one step closer to joining almost the entire rest of the country in allowing hunting on Sunday. There was one provision added that will prevent people from hunting on Sunday within 250 yards of a place of worship. It also only allows for Sunday hunting on private land.


I was actually able to watch the session stream live on the senate website and I can say while I liked what most had to say but there were several members of the senate that were against the repeal of the ban, called themselves hunters and then spoke of how dangerous hunters were. Granted anyone with a gun can be dangerous if you are a hunter calling hunters in general dangerous then you are just fueling the argument to get rid of hunting altogether, while in reality hunters as a whole are very safe group. I wish I had caught the names of the few 'hunters' that were against it but as it was streaming my kids were running around crazy and I couldn't take notes as I would have liked. 


While we've gotten one step closer we still have a ways to go. I'm continually baffled by our convoluted legislative process but I do know that it goes to the house of delegates next where they may have to form a committee after that I'm still figuring it all out and won't pretend to know exactly the many ways it can go next. The bottom line is if you live or hunt in Virginia PLEASE contact your legislators and let them know you want them to vote in favor of repealing the ban on Sunday hunting. The best way to do this that I have found is to visit the Virginia Sunday Hunting Coalition website at VirginiaSundayHunting.org. You can also join their Facebook Group for updates and discussion around the issue.


Lastly, while we go after the delegates to make sure they know our stance please also take the time to thank the senators that voted it through. Also feel free to contact the 11 that voted against it and respectfully let them know that you are disappointed. Here is how the voting in the senate went:


YEAS-Barker, Black, Blevins, Carrico, Ebbin, Edwards, Favola, Garrett, Herring, Howell, Lucas, Marsden, Marsh, McEachin, McWaters, Miller, J.C., Miller, Y.B., Norment, Northam, Petersen, Puckett, Puller, Reeves, Saslaw, Stanley, Stosch, Vogel, Wagner, Watkins-29.
NAYS-Colgan, Deeds, Hanger, Locke, Martin, McDougle, Newman, Obenshain, Ruff, Smith, Stuart-11.