Re: [Paddlewise] Kayak Registration

On Mar 23, 2005, at 8:26 AM, James wrote:

> But the bill passed and now we register.  And now the Department of
> Natural Resources listens when we talk and builds us canoe launches 
> when
> we make a good case.  I have nine kayaks (yeah, I know, it's a disease)
> so I pay more than most. But we paddlers now have a bought-and-paid-for
> place at the table when issues that affect us come up.  And, in my
> opinion, we are heard.
>

Very interesting.  Unfortunately yours is a voice of reason and emotion 
prevails with respect to this issue, (as it does with most others).    
Seeing all this coming, I recently proposed on a local mailing list in 
Florida that if the paddling community in the state proactively wrote, 
proposed and lobbied for its own registration bill, we could ensure 
that the idiots in the legislature would not eventually impose a 
nonsensical one of their own on us and that in this way we might even 
be able to limit the cost and ensure that we would get some actual 
benefits from it.

The result was that the entire statewide paddling community, (at least 
so it seemed), rose up in arms against me.  I was inundated by an 
organized campaign of email in protest of my idea.  Many of these 
included a proposal to boycott my business if I continued to support 
such an idea.  I even got a dozen or so hate messages and a couple of 
threatening phone calls.  I was shocked to find this behavior in a 
community that I had heretofore held in high regard.

Unlike the majority of the voting public, I believe that we must all 
pay a fair share of taxes at all levels.  When it comes, (as it surely 
will), I will cheerfully pay the registration fee and then demand fair 
representation.   I still believe however that a bill designed and 
proposed by the citizens concerned before the fact would represent them 
far better than one designed by the representatives and lobbyists of 
the personal water craft industry.

Disgusted in Tallahasse,

Michael
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