Staff photos / Ed Runyan - Attorney Marc Dann explains an objection in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court on Thursday to testimony in a hearing to determine whether to temporarily stop a deer reduction program planned for Mill Creek MetroParks.

YOUNGSTOWN — Testimony Thursday in support of four people who filed suit to stop Mill Creek MetroParks from carrying out its planned deer reduction program came from a somewhat surprising source: Trumbull County Commissioner Dennis Malloy, who is also a regional director of Whitetails Unlimited.

The daylong preliminary-injunction hearing was presided over by Magistrate Nicole Alexander of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, who said she planned to issue a ruling today. Alexander works for Judge Anthony Donofrio.

The hearing was held in response to the lawsuit filed by four people who live near the MetroParks and want to stop the deer-reduction program. The preliminary injunction was sought to stop the MetroParks from starting to carry out the program in the coming weeks, before the lawsuit is resolved.

Malloy has worked for the national nonprofit deer management and conservation organization Whitetails Unlimited for 24 years and also worked eight years as a state wildlife officer for the Ohio Division of Wildlife in Cuyahoga and Trumbull counties and worked three summers for Mill Creek Park, he testified.

Malloy said he has a problem with the MetroParks’ deer reduction plan: It came from a “statistical study based on thermal imaging from a camera that I believe is flawed. The park district concluded that there were “close to 385 deer per square mile, which has never been heard of in any wildlife population regarding white tailed deer species anywhere in America,” Malloy said. “That would be the equivalent of me saying there is 3,000 people in this courtroom right now.” The room was nearly filled to capacity, but that was only about 40 people.

Malloy said the largest per-square-mile measurement he has ever heard of was 90 deer per square mile in the Sharon Woods area of Columbus.

Malloy testified that Mill Creek MetroParks should delay its deer-management plan a year or two to “do a better study, implement a more scientific study, more biological study.”

He said he thinks if Mill Creek MetroParks goes forward with the deer management plan it is proposing, the deer in the park could be “decimated” like they were in an area of the Cuyahoga Valley National Recreation Area in the Cleveland area.

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources Division of Wildlife approved a permit for Mill Creek MetroParks to kill 30 deer in Mill Creek Park in Boardman from Midlothian Boulevard to U.S. Route 224 this fall and winter using U.S. Department of Agriculture employed sharpshooters hunting at night when the park is closed. That is called a “targeted” deer reduction program.

HUNTING ETHICS

Malloy said he thinks a program using sharpshooters to kill deer is unethical, calling it “legalized government poaching. When you bait the deer in. When you domesticate to the point where it comes in to eat food at night and feels comfortable and safe, especially in a park environment, and then one day, you turned the lights on, bam, you assassinate them, that … makes my stomach turn.”

He added, “There is no tradition with that. There is no sport to that. That is basically calling an exterminator to get rid of the deer.”

But what Malloy dislikes most about the Mill Creek MetroParks’ proposed program is that it allows people from far away from Youngstown to participate “who have never been to our park.” He said they will not know the boundaries they are supposed to remain inside and will not “have the same respect as if it was a local person.”

Malloy said he has actually been approved to participate in the “controlled hunt” part of the deer reduction plan that will take place in some of the parks, such as Hitchcock Woods and Huntington Woods in Boardman, which will be archery hunts, not gun hunts. Gun hunts are planned for some of the more rural parks. No deer reductions will take place in any portion of Mill Creek Park within the Youngstown city limits because of the city’s law against discharging a firearm within the city limits.

Another witness was Katherine Hamilton of Boardman, who lives near Hitchcock Woods in Boardman south of U.S. Route 224. She said her biggest concern is the safety of children like hers who play in the back yard near the woods. She said the deer-reduction program will mean kids will no longer be able to play in their back yards or “have events at their homes for their safety.”

She won’t let her children play outside anywhere at her home. “I can’t safely let my children out there.” She fears that the hunters coming into those woods will not know where the boundary lines are or won’t care if they get outside of the boundaries.

METROPARKS WITNESS

Nick Derico, Mill Creek MetroParks Natural Resources manager, was the first witness for the MetroParks. He said when he was hired in 2018, he found “pretty clear evidence” that the park deer had caused damage to the the park’s plant life because of the “browse lines” he saw, which means the lack of vegetation from the ground up to about the height of a deer — five to six feet.

The solution to the damage being caused was a deer management plan, which Derico wrote. The parks board approved the plan in April.

In addition to the targeted program that involves sharpshooters, the deer management plan includes a controlled hunting program, Derico said. This type of program allows licensed hunters to kill deer in rural and regional parks. Derico said the MetroParks did not need a special permit from the Division of Wildlife to have a controlled hunt.

It fell under the controlled-hunting program the Ohio Division of Wildlife already has in place, Derico said. That involves the Division of Wildlife carrying out a lottery to pick the hunters who would be issued licenses to participate. “The MetroParks just joined that system this year,” Derico said.

Derico said there are regulations in place for controlled hunting, a 300-foot buffer zone around residential areas and 100-foot buffer around trails.

Derico said 10 people will be allowed to hunt at a time in Hitchcock and Huntington Woods in Boardman, for instance. Only archery will be allowed there “because of the number of homes around those properties,” Derico said.

The following parks will not have any deer reduction program, Derico said during his testimony: Sebring Woods, McGuffey Wildlife Preserve, Egypt Swamp and Cranberry Headwaters. The targeted hunting program in Mill Creek Park will only occur south of Midlothian Boulevard and will only occur for two to four nights, Derico said. It is likely to take place from mid to late October, Derico said.

Each archery permit will have a “permit window” from Oct. 1 through the end of January with Huntington and Hitchcock Woods being first because they are “archery only,” Derico said. Archery permits on other properties will run from Oct. 1 to mid or late November.

The 208-page Mill Creek MetroParks White-Tailed Deer Management Plan, last updated Sept. 7 on the MetroParks website, states that “Firearm permit periods will be 2 days in length with five separate permit windows being allowed for firearm hunts, which will take place every other weekend through December and January.” It does not state when they begin.

The full plan is available at www.millcreekmetroparks.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/WTD-Management-Plan-Full-Final-9.7.23-Update-Web-1.pdf

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