For the first time, those people who are young enough to need hunter safety before getting a license are allowed to get one firearms license without going through the hunter safety programs. This is a big success for those of us who are trying to get new people out hunting. In the past, if you had a friend or coworker who wanted to try hunting, they had to go thru the whole course before they got a chance to try it. NOW we can take them and get them a one year bye on the HST in order to get them hooked and still be legal about it.
Last year we had a young woman join us at deer camp who was not legal, and while we not happy about it, we decided that getting her into hunting was more important than the letter of the law, NOW before you all jump down my throat about it, she was hooked, we tagged her deer with bonus tag, and she went thru hunter safety on her own and is joining us again this year. So she will be legal from now on. BUT exactly this situation was one that was keeping new hunters from getting to experience it before they got to go thru the HST.
Now you can tell your friends, hey wanna try hunting? get them legal and hooked then accompany them thru HST and have them ready for next year. A lot of people who get hooked on hunting who do not have the family tradition get hooked on this same spur of the moment invite and we need more new hunters.