Over the past half-decade or so in the Butler Eagle's letters to the editor section, hunters have expressed opposition to — and frustration with — the Pennsylvania Game Commission's seven-year-old deer management plan.

Concerns and criticisms in those letters dealt with such issues as the size of the deer herd, the size of deer, bag limits, manipulation of hunting seasons and the plan's effect on forest health.

All of those are legitimate bases for discussion by hunters and sportsmen's organizations. They also are issues for lawmakers to monitor.

One lawmaker, state Rep. David Levdansky, D-Allegheny and Washington counties, who is a member of the Game and Fisheries Committee, has been quoted as saying, "It's important we address this issue (deer management plan) because it goes well beyond the impact on a hunter's odds of killing a deer. It affects tourism, local economies, forest regeneration and other wildlife."

Despite negative comments many hunters have voiced in recent years about the state's current deer management efforts, an independent study by the Wildlife Management Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based conservation organization, says that the Keystone State deer management plan is essentially sound, although it did identify areas for improvement.

For example, the audit determined that the plan has been inefficient in estimating deer numbers. It also concluded that the commission has been consistently weak in communicating its goals and efforts to hunters and other members of the public.

Maybe an Allegheny County sportsmen's organization can be construed as a bellwether of how other sportsmen's groups might judge the study, once they have had time to digest its details. A representative of the Allegheny County group, quoted in a Pittsburgh newspaper last month, characterized the Wildlife Management Institute as basically a biological accountant and said the fact there was no field study connected with the audit made its findings "somewhat predetermined."

Others will judge whether that assessment is correct, but the Game Commission's management plan does deserve ongoing comments from the people most affected — the hunters. The commission should keep an ear open to all reasonable suggestions on how the plan might be improved.

What has angered many hunters in recent years is that they are seeing fewer deer on opening day compared with season starts in years past. Many hunters believe there must be something wrong with a program that has intentionally reduced deer populations — drastically in some of the state's 22 Wildlife Management Units — by allowing many more doe to be killed than in decades past.

The Wildlife Management Institute audit recommends that the Game Commission publish estimates of the deer herd population without leaving any unanswered questions about how those numbers were compiled, which is a reasonable suggestion.

But as the audit is further scrutinized by hunters, some hunters — including many longtime hunters — might continue to wonder whether it's worth buying a hunting license in the Keystone State anymore because of what they perceive as a greatly reduced deer population.

The audit refers to that problem:

"The strained nature of the relationship between the Pennsylvania Game Commission and some hunters is problematic, and in the long-term, damaging to society's perception of how hunters and the Game Commission must work together."

The Wildlife Management Institute was right in observing that the Game Commission and hunters need to end their feud, and perhaps that's the biggest challenge that lies ahead. One path to better relations would be more face-to-face meetings between commission officials and sportsmen's organizations geared toward productive discussion, not confrontation.

Levdansky did hunters and the commission a favor in introducing the resolution in 2008 that paved the way for the Wildlife Management Institute study, even while realizing that its findings wouldn't be universally accepted.

The most important conclusion to be derived from the audit — even though it shows that Pennsylvania's deer management plan basically stacks up well against the seven other states that manage white-tailed deer — is that more work needs to be done.

That will require cooperation from all interested people and entities, as well as a desire and commitment to put the ongoing, protracted friction to rest.