I was a member in WA for two years. I would say they are more a fraternal organization than anything. I think they overstate their power/effectiveness, and play the scare game a little too much. They have created a sort of "public land puritanism" whereby hunters are often "litmus tested" whether an animal was killed on public lands or not. If not, they are ridiculed. This happens on social media like mad. They have exhumed poor old Roosevelt to the point it's nauseating, and I don't think they are as transparent in their spending as they should be. BHA pays Tawney about 100K, spends another 100K on travel (?), and gets about 1.1 mil in contributions. Would like to see those detailed out. This would go a long way allay fears of the green decoy bit. Listening to Land in interviews, I'm weary of how often the "just being there' line is brought up. Yes, just being there is important, but that does nothing for fishers and hunters. And I think an unintended consequence of being a single-idea org is that while voting in public-land friendly people might help pubic lands, those same people are not as sympathetic to the interests of hunters. I think BHA needs to focus more on working with pro-hunting people who need to be more pro-public lands than the obverse. I can convince a more conservative person to be pro-public lands, than a big gov't liberal to be pro-gun or pro-hunting. I think this is why they get labelled green decoys as well. And I think it's shortsighted on BHA's part not to recognize that. Tawney has often said, "The name of the org is hunters and anglers," but forgets that the actions speak louder than words. They have yet to fully realize the enemy of your enemy is NOT your friend.
