Lake Bowen
SPARTANBURG COUNTY, S.C. —
There is one waterfowl hunting permit for all of Lake Bowen in Spartanburg County.
It belongs to Walter Montgomery.
Montgomery’s son, John, is chairman of Spartanburg’s Public Works Commission, the public body that manages the lake.
John Montgomery told WYFF News 4 Investigates the family doesn’t use the permit. He said the family of hunters stays on private ponds and streams on their property on the northwest corner of Lake Bowen.
“When the opportunity came available,” Montgomery said, “we applied.”
Spartanburg Water CEO Sue Schneider signed the permit in September 2014.
“Based on our more stringent requirements than (the Department of Natural Resources),” Schneider said, “there is only one property, and that would be the Montgomery property.”
Spartanburg Water doesn’t allow waterfowl hunting within 300 yards of a home. SCDNR sets the distance limit at 200 yards.
Schneider said the holder of the permit has nothing to do with Montgomery’s position on the commission.
“It's a combination of them asking and their property being the only one that is capable of having that,” she said. “They own property all around that cove and that makes it more conducive for hunting.
“We have a lot of people who are family to each other throughout the county. That's just a way of life whether you're a teacher, a doctor, a journalist.”
Montgomery acknowledged the optics of the situation can appear biased toward a public official.
“We don’t utilize the permit,” he said when asked if the family would consider dissolving the agreement. “It wouldn’t be any sweat on us to not have it.”
Montgomery said the permit is in his father’s name, and it would ultimately be his father’s decision.
The permit requires a yearly report from Montgomery. The report is due each March 15 and is supposed to include the number of each species of waterfowl harvested in the area.
No reports have been filed.
“To our knowledge, they have not used the permit at all,” Schneider said. “That’s based on the reports not being filed. It’s also based on not getting any complaints from adjacent homeowners.”
The Montgomerys' neighbors
Grady Barnes lives right next to the Montgomery property. He has documented his attempts to complain, specifically his efforts to get in touch with Schneider.
Even if the Montgomery family isn’t utilizing the permit, hunting is happening on its property.
Barnes has documented the number of times he says shotgun blasts have set off his home alarm system.
It became such a problem for him, he had to start writing Spartanburg County to make sure he wasn’t fined for false 911 calls.
Barnes feels his attempts to stop the hunting on the Montgomery property are like “fighting a fire that can’t be put out.”
While he is hoping the hunting stops, other neighbors want to know why there aren’t more permits.
On Monday, Schneider said the Montgomery property is the only one on Lake Bowen that fits Spartanburg Water’s waterfowl hunting rules.
On Tuesday, an agency spokesman sent an email to WYFF News 4 Investigates saying other property owners are “welcome to get in touch with us and fill out the application.”
History of hunting on Spartanburg Water's lakes
The Lake Bowen permit was signed months after waterfowl hunting became legal on Lake Blalock, another Spartanburg Water reservoir.
Spartanburg Water provided a 2011 letter from SCDNR’s director asking the water company to consider allowing the hunting. It was part of an effort to establish public space on both lakes and increase managed hunting in the Upstate.
Image of DNR letter at https://www.wyff4.com/article/only-p...ather/22729137
The 2011 letter from SCDNR to Spartanburg Water with a waterfowl hunting proposal.
The water company went to Sen. Glenn Reese with a proposal to allow hunting only on Lake Blalock.
“It was a complete surprise to me,” Reese said. “They wrote (the bill) up.”
Reese added a way out of the bill.
“If we do this, we need to sunset it because the area could develop,” he said. “The whole time, I’m thinking, ‘this is kind of strange.’”
Reese said he was never told about the SCDNR proposal.
His bill passed. There are currently two areas on Lake Blalock where waterfowl hunting is open to the public during the season.
The law was set to expire in 2018, but a new version signed by the governor in May extended the legal hunting on Lake Blalock into 2023.
It was around that time Reese found out the Montgomery family is allowed to hunt on Lake Bowen, a lake Reese has lived on for decades.
“I had never known about any hunting on Bowen,” he said.
He said Spartanburg Water never approached him about allowing hunting on Lake Bowen.
https://www.wyff4.com/article/only-p...ather/22729137
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Originally Posted by Highstrung
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