hi everyone,
I'm fairly new to the herp community (I've had snakes for about 3 years now) but I'm not new to all the AR crap that's going on. I hunt and fish, so basically everything I do has come under attack from the radicals. I sympathize with your cause, for I am a part of another fight in NC to keep the Outer Banks seashore open to people. It has been a constant battle over at least the past 15 years, with compromise after compromise, which means they are slowly closing off more of the island and thus, AR is winning. At Hatteras, in recent years they have abused the Endangered Species Act by closing off miles of shoreline for single nesting pairs of Piping Plovers, and they keep proposing more "critical habitat" closures.
It's sad and sick at the same time, to think that a few nuts in California (and other areas) have so much say in North Carolina, and other parts of the US for that matter. I live in Virginia, so I have very little knowledge about what goes on in Texas, but it seems like it is the same everywhere you go
So my point for this long message is to ask: Have any organizations been formed to help raise money for legal battles and the distribution of information pamplets for this type of battles? In Cape Hatteras, you have the Outer Banks Preservation Association (OBPA) which takes donations, and has membership dues to raise the money needed to fight legal battles. They also send out news letters to all members to keep us informed of current situations. They have won a couple of lawsuits in the past few years to help keep the beach open, but it is (and probably always will be) a continuous fight. I am not wealthy, but I would donate all I could to an organization that was formed to help protect our rights. I don't know if one exists fighting for your cause, or if anyone has put much thought into it, but I think it would really help in the long run, because the recent ban on roadside collection is just one law amoung many that will not go away.
-----
-David

1.0 ball python (Pandora - don't ask)
1.0 argentine boa (Prometheus)
0.1 hogg island boa (Andromeda)
0.0.1 brazilian rainbow boa (Inara)
1.0 kenyan sand boa (Diablo)
1.0 normal corn snake(Cypress)
0.1 amery. corn snake (Morgan LaFay)
0.0.1 banded cali. kingsnake (Cain)
1.0 tangerine honduran milksnake (Narcissus)
0.0.1 snow corn snake (Valkyrie)
1.0 amazon tree boa (Pegasus)
0.0.1 sandfish skink (Slick)
0.0.1 fire skink (Phoenix)
1.0 dog (Luke)

the wife's pets:
1.1 ferrets (Ares, Enyo)
0.0.1 betta fish (Captain Morgan)
1.2 cats (Galahad, Ripley and Sassy)