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Candywood preserve to allow hunters to kill animals for money
By Ed Runyan
VIENNA
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources has approved a permit to allow owners of the former Candywood Golf Course on Scoville North Road to operate a business that lets hunters kill various captive animals for money.
The preserve is called Candywood Whitetail Ranch LLC, according to a copy of the application provided to The Vindicator by the ODNR. The application says the property has 276 acres. The license is good for one year.
Anthony J. Candella Jr., a member of the family who owns the golf course, applied for the permit in December. The application says it will have hunts for white-tailed deer, elk, fallow deer, red deer, rams, sheep, hogs, buffalo, aoudad (Barbary sheep), red deer hinds (females) and blackbuck antelope.
Jamey Emmert, ODNR Division of Wildlife communications specialist in Akron, said it appears that the approval allows the owners to provide all of those types of hunting.
An attempt to learn more about how the business will operate was unsuccessful Friday. Two men standing in the driveway at the former golf course said Friday afternoon they did not want to talk to a Vindicator reporter.
“After careful review of the application and multiple on-site visits, the ODNR Division of Wildlife determined that the application has met the legal requirements for licensure. The license has been approved,” Emmert said in an email.
Holly Justice of Youngstown opposes the establishment of the hunting preserve because she has concerns about stray bullets injuring or killing people living nearby or driving by on Scoville North Road or state Route 82.
“People are definitely concerned about property values and their safety,” she said. “People have said, “I’ve got golf balls in my yard. How do I know there won’t be bullets flying?”
She also opposes such hunting on ethical grounds, calling it “cruel” because the animals are held in a fenced area. She added that a lot of hunters say, “There’s no sport in it.”
She organized a rally for 6 p.m. Monday at Vienna Township Hall on Youngstown-Kingsville Road, one hour before Vienna Township’s trustees meeting, to bring awareness to the issue.
Justice said another issue is that the ODNR does not provide the public with notification when an application is filed.
“What do we need to do to make sure this doesn’t happen in Mahoning County, that it doesn’t happen in the future, that it doesn’t happen under our noses?” she said.
She learned that the preserve was in the works just a couple of weeks ago, she said.
Emmert said one of the primary responsibilities of the Division of Wildlife when it inspects a proposed preserve before licensure is to ensure that all wild deer have been removed from the property before any game or non-native wildlife are released into it. This is done to keep the native animals from mixing with the non-native animals to prevent the spread of disease.
The preserve needs another type of approval – a permit from the Ohio Department of Agriculture – but that agency’s focus is on preventing and managing diseases in the animal herds at Ohio’s hunting preserves, said Erica Hawkins, ODA spokesperson.
The ODA approves a license for a hunting preserve as a result of the license being granted by the Division of Wildlife, she said. The ODA’s role is related to monitoring the health of the herd while the preserve is in operation, not to review the operation before it starts, she said.
The former golf course now has a fence surrounding it with signs saying: “Licensed hunting preserve.”