MEDFORD, Ore. (AP) Fred Craig, of Grants Pass, settled into his seat in the Salem office of Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Roy Elicker on Feb. 19 to hear a sales pitch Craig's ilk is not inclined to buy.
The Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission has asked Elicker's agency to draft some proposed rules that would require Craig and Oregon's other 298,561 hunters to wear bright orange in the field as a safety measure, just as it is required in 44 other states.
Elicker knows one way to get there is to gain the support of the 10,500-member Oregon Hunters Association, of which Craig is president.
Elicker pitched the safety angles. Craig riposted with his members' desire to make it a personal choice during his nearly two-hour audience in Salem with the head of a state agency in the midst of a legislative session.
"Truth is, he offered to drive down here for a one-hour audience with the president of the OHA," Craig says. "I'd say that's a pretty big deal compared to 20 years ago."
The OHA limped into the Rogue Valley in 1994 all but broke and with sagging membership. The Medford-based association has since become the largest sport-hunting group in Oregon, and it's done it by playing politics in ways other hunting organizations avoid.
With about $1.6 million in assets and a full-time lobbyist when the Oregon Legislature is in session, the OHA has eschewed the politically neutral mantra of other groups and created a visible presence on behalf of what its members call ``hunters' rights.''
From stumping for more public hunting opportunities on species such as elk and cougars to influencing what limitations hunters face in the woods, OHA's methods have impressed friends and foes alike.
"During the (legislative) session, they have a person in the building every day and you can't discount what that means," says Ron Anglin, the ODFW's Wildlife Division administrator. "Things change and they can jump right on it. They know how to build relationships with legislators, who to talk with about what. They know the process and how to make it work for them.
"From my perspective, I'm real pleased that there's a real strong voice out there speaking for hunters. I talk with (agency leaders) in other states and they're flat-out surprised we have a hunting group with a full-time lobbyist ready to tackle hunting issues."
That includes grappling with the likes of Sally Mackler, wildlife chairwoman of the 25,000-member Oregon Chapter of the Sierra Club.
Since she arrived in Jackson County in 1993, Mackler regularly has butted heads with the OHA over issues ranging from hound-hunting for cougars and bears to coyote-hunting bounties and trapping limitations.
"I think they've been aggressive, very aggressive, with their policies and their politics, which I consider extreme," says Mackler, of Ruch.
Still, Mackler remains impressed with the OHA's organizational skills as it helps forge pro-hunting wildlife policies in a state where about 8 percent of residents buy hunting licenses.
"The constituency they represent is considerably smaller than the constituency the Sierra Club represents, yet they always get someone to speak up for hunters," Mackler says. "There's never been a problem like that (marshaling the troops) in their camp.
"They've done a better job at that business, and it's a business," she says. "We need to do a better job at that."
Whether the OHA remained in business was far from a given in July 1994, when then-President Bill Kirk, of Medford, boxed up what was left of OHA furniture and records in Redmond for its move to Medford.
With about $10 left in the association coffers, the OHA moved into a Bennett Avenue garage of a member and tried to regroup amid financial shambles.
"When Bill said to stop writing checks, we were $67 short of paying the bills," says Duane Dungannon, the OHA's secretary.
The group mailed membership renewal notices to 1,200 people, and two came back the first week before more began to trickle in, Dungannon says.
"We've been OK since then," he says. "But that was a pretty scary time."
At the time, the OHA's membership equaled about 1 percent of licensed Oregon hunters.
Since then, the group has swelled to 27 local chapters with a total membership that covers about 3.5 percent of licensed hunters.
Of those chapters, the largest are in the Rogue Valley, Salem and Portland. Each carry about 1,000 members.
OHA's annual dues of $25 have not increased in 16 years. The association raises money primarily through chapter and statewide banquets that rely heavily on raffles and auctions of donated items ranging from guns and art to services such as laser eye surgery.
Federal tax forms show the chapters collectively had about $1.02 million worth of assets by the end of 2008. Much of the chapters' work is on wildlife habitat projects, and the association in 2008 paid $225,661 toward helping the ODFW feed and manage the state's wildlife.
"It's a largely volunteer organization that's not as polished on the local level," Dungannon says.
The OHA's parent organization ended 2008 with slightly more than $69,000 in net assets. The statewide OHA also publishes a monthly magazine and spent about $149,000 aiding the ODFW as well as funding the Turn In Poachers program that year, tax records show.
The main group has three full-time and one part-time employees. It pays longtime lobbyist Al Elkins $46,000 on a contract basis to lobby the Legislature when in session and lobby the commission, which meets monthly and sets fish and wildlife policies for Oregon.
Dungannon says the OHA began pushing hard for laws and policies favoring its membership in the 1990s, in part imitating how the National Rifle Association focuses on gun laws.
"I thought we needed the equivalent of the NRA to look after hunting rights," Dungannon says. "I think a lot of our people agree with that and a lot of our support comes from that."
However, the association is careful not to divide its own ranks.
"We don't pick up issues that pit one group of hunters over another," Dungannon says. "That's a powder keg."
While the OHA often butts heads with groups espousing animal-welfare interests, they have found themselves in the same bed at times.
For example, the OHA and the Humane Society of the United States both stumped for state rules severely limiting private game ranching, prohibiting "cyberhunting" over the Internet and banning the importation of certain animal parts to reduce the susceptibility of Oregon's native wildlife to chronic wasting disease found elsewhere in North America.
"For some issues, we can check our differences at the door and come work together on a shared mutual interest," says the Humane Society's Kelly Peterson in Portland.
"It's a very unique situation in Oregon, and I think it's a model for how groups on opposite sides on some issues can work together," Peterson says. "But we disagree on more issues than we agree on."
Peterson says she would prefer to see the OHA weigh in more strongly against what she considers unethical hunting practices that might divide its membership.
Dungannon says the differences between the sides remain strong, and he bristles at the notion of the OHA working with HSUS on issues.
"There are times when we have a common objective," Dungannon says. "It's not like we come to their meetings and they go to ours."
A new era for the OHA begins Friday when Medford-based attorney Bob Webber, one of the OHA founders in 1983, begins his first meeting on the seven-member Fish and Wildlife Commission.
One of the first issues he'll tackle as a commissioner is the mandatory wearing of hunter-orange while afield beginning in 2011.
The commission last fall asked the ODFW to draft some version of mandatory orange to be considered in May as part of the 2011 package of big-game hunting rules.
The OHA didn't wait for the language before it weighed in.
Association leadership conducted a poll of about 1,000 members and found 70 percent wanted the wearing of blaze orange to remain a personal choice.
Armed with that data, Craig attended the Feb. 19 meeting and informed Elicker that the OHA plans to oppose any version of the blaze-orange proposal.
"Our position is very simple," Craig says. "We have a very strong mandate from OHA, you get a big, red no."
