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The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency has announced that all of the 2008 deer hunts scheduled for the Volunteer Army Ammunition Plant located near Chattanooga have been canceled. The cancellation is a result of the impending construction activities associated with the new Volkswagen manufacturing plant being built on the VAAP.
It was announced on July 15 that the new Volkswagen plant would be built in the area. To meet a scheduled finished deadline date of January 2009, construction for the new plant will be conducted around the clock through 2008, which makes hunting in the area impossible this year. Unfortunately, construction for the new plant began after hunter applications were mailed to TWRA for Wildlife Management Area (WMA) Big Game quota hunts.
The TWRA has set a procedure to address the cancellation of the VAAP hunts during the drawing process. Those applicants who listed only VAAP hunt choices (hunt codes 49 and 50) will be unsuccessful and therefore awarded a priority point for next year's WMA Big Game quota hunt drawing. If an applicant listed other choices besides VAAP, the computer will run the remaining hunt choices in the order entered on the application until it either finds a hunt with vacancies or it runs out of choices. If there were no vacancies, the applicant will be awarded a priority point for next year's drawing.
"TWRA regrets the disappointment caused by the hunts' cancellation," said Ben Layton, Region III Lands Management Biologist. "However, in keeping with TWRA's goal of providing Tennessee hunters with quality big game hunting experiences, elimination of these hunts for the 2008 season and the awarding of priority points for next season, seemed to be in the best interest of the hunters."
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