PRATT – If you’ve been thinking about buying a lifetime license for yourself or giving one as a special Christmas gift to a lucky young hunter or angler, buy it before the end of the year and save. The price of a lifetime hunting or fishing license will go from $440 to $500 and a lifetime combination hunt/fish license will increase from $880 to $960 on January 1, 2016.

Kansas lifetime hunting and fishing licenses are available to Kansas residents who have lived in Kansas for at least a year before making application. Domiciliary intent is required to establish that the applicant is maintaining their place of permanent abode in Kansas. Mere ownership of property is not sufficient to establish domiciliary intent. Evidence of domiciliary intent includes, but is not limited to, the location where the person votes, pays personal income taxes or obtains a driver’s license.

Depending on your age, a lifetime license is a bargain. At the current price of $880 for a lifetime hunt/fish combination license, the initial investment will pay off in less than 20 years, and that’s not accounting for future license fee increases. The holder of a lifetime hunting license is eligible to purchase resident big game and turkey permits even if they move out of the state. And the holder will never again have to worry about buying a new license after the first of the year.

The Kansas Wildlife, Parks and Tourism (KDWPT) Commission approved a proposal to raise fees for fishing and hunting licenses at their public meeting in Burlington on October 22, 2015. The new fees will be effective January 1, 2016. Basic hunting and fishing license fees hadn’t increased since 2002, and the price of resident deer and turkey permits haven’t increased since 1984. Inflation has increased the cost of doing business by almost 30 percent since 2002, and the uncommitted balance of the Wildlife Fee Fund was beginning to decline. Fee increases were deemed necessary to ensure pivotal programs important to hunters and anglers could be maintained and enhanced. License and permit revenues go into the Wildlife Fee Fund to pay for wildlife and fisheries programs, which receive no State General Fund money.

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