House-passed bill to allow deer baiting likely to die with legislative session

A piece of legislation that would lift a ban on deer-baiting in Michigan’s Lower Peninsula passed the state House earlier this year but is likely to die when the current legislative session ends.

House Bill 4445, introduced by Rep. Jennifer Wortz, R-Quincy, would allow deer or elk baiting during open season. It passed the Michigan House on a party-line vote on Feb. 4 and has been sitting in the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Agriculture since then.

House Bill 4191, a companion bill introduced by Rep. Timothy Beson, R-Bay City, would create a regime for purchasing, for $20, a license to bait deer or elk. It would direct the license fees toward wildlife disease research, surveillance and testing. The bill has been in the House Committee on Natural Resources and Tourism since March 11.

Baiting was allowed throughout Michigan until a ban on baiting in the Lower Peninsula went into effect Jan. 31, 2019, as the nonpartisan House Fiscal Agency noted in its analysis of HB 4445. The analysis cited a desire to limit the damage caused by chronic wasting disease and bovine tuberculosis.

Minutes from a May 15, 2019, meeting of the Michigan Commission of Agriculture and Rural Development suggest that state officials acted out of uncertainty when they enacted the ban.

“Ultimately, it was felt the scale of (chronic wasting disease) in the Lower Peninsula was not known; therefore, they recommended, and it was passed, to implement a Lower Peninsula Baiting and Feeding Ban that became effective January 31, 2019,” the minutes read.

Michigan has the nation’s second-largest deer population at roughly 2 million, Wortz said in a Feb. 4 press release that called for repealing the ban.

“The baiting ban has not stopped disease,” Wortz wrote. ”What it has done is fuel overpopulation, increase crop damage, and make our roads more dangerous.”

More than 50,000 deer-related crashes have occurred each year in Michigan since at least 2018, according to the Michigan State Police. The number has exceeded 58,000 per year since 2022.

Deer-related crashes cost Michigan drivers $130 million annually in vehicle repairs, the Michigan Department of Insurance and Financial Services said in 2023, citing a 2019 AAA of Michigan report.

The DNR did not respond to a request for comment.