As the Pennsylvania deer season draws nearer State Representative, Ed Staback, the minority chairman on the House Game and Fisheries Committee is asking sportsmen across the state who want Sunday hunting open to speak up – and speak up now.

"If they [hunters] choose to continue to sit it out, then the only people my colleagues in the General Assembly will hear from are the naysayers - the opponents of Sunday hunting like the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau - and the legislators will not vote for it”, stated Staback in a recent interview with the Pennsylvania Outdoor News.

"This is the kind of a bill that we will get only one shot at and if it fails now, it will not come back for a long, long time," Staback continued. "This seems to be the ideal time for it - the General Assembly and the governorship are controlled by one party, and that party is promoting it. People who support Sunday hunting better start contacting legislators if they want this effort to succeed."

First persuaded by several pro-hunting groups including the National Rifle Association (NRA), the National Wild Turkey Federation (NWTF), and the U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance, Staback has been helping to lead the charge to a final lift of the 138 year ban on Sunday hunting. Nearly the last of the state’s blue laws that is still intact.

If the ban is lifted it’s estimated that Pennsylvania would add 8,190 new jobs paying more than 245 million in wages. The yearly economic impact could be as much as three-quarters of a billion dollars.

A public hearing on the issue is scheduled for September 15, 2011, in Allentown. Another hearing is not yet scheduled but will occur sometime in October.

Pennsylvania hunters who support the lift on Sunday hunting are encouraged to get in touch with their representative immediately. Pennsylvania is one of eleven states that still ban Sunday hunting. Its neighbor, New York, is also in a heated debate over the issue.

The Hunting Network staff asks Pennsylvanian hunters where they stand on the issue. Are you for or against Sunday being open to hunters?

Log-On to the Bowhunting.Com Facebook page and tell us what you think.