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HB 1462

Criminal procedure; directing courts to prioritize orders of payments of restitution; effective date.

2025 Regular Session Introduced by Todd Gollihare and 1 co-sponsor

ND HB 1462 aimed to clarify hunting/fishing license exemptions for landowners, residents, youths, certain institutions, and service members - but it was withdrawn and never enacted.

Approved by Governor 05/28/2025
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Bill Summary · HB 1462

Summary — HB 1462 (North Dakota)

A bill to amend and reenact section 20.1‑03‑04 of the North Dakota Century Code (when licenses to hunt, fish, or trap are not required of landowners)

Purpose

HB 1462 would revise and reenact NDCC § 20.1‑03‑04 to clarify and restate the situations in which a hunting, fishing, or trapping license is not required. The bill focuses on exemptions for landowners, residents, certain minors, institutional populations, and other specific circumstances.

Key provisions (what the bill says)

The bill replaces/re‑enacts NDCC § 20.1‑03‑04 and specifies that, subject to the title:

  1. A landowner or resident — or a member of that resident’s family who customarily resides with them — may hunt small game, fish, or trap during open season without a license when on land owned or leased by that landowner/resident.
  2. Residents and nonresidents under age 16 may fish without a fishing license.
  3. Residents may fish at a private fish hatchery without a resident fishing license.
  4. Specified institutional populations may fish without a resident fishing license; these include patients/clients or students of certain state institutions (life skills/transition center patients, youth correctional center students, school for the deaf, school for the blind, state hospital patients, clients of regional human service centers under direct therapeutic care, and residents of facilities licensed by the Department of Health and Human Services). Institutions must identify patients and the Department shall issue authority to each institution.
  5. Residents may fish without a license on free fishing days; the governor may set the dates by proclamation.
  6. Residents under 16 may take fur‑bearers without a fur‑bearer license.
  7. Residents under 16 may take small game or waterfowl without a small game license.
  8. Residents enrolled as students or serving as certified instructors during official aquatics education program events of the Game and Fish Department may be granted free fishing privileges at the director’s discretion.
  9. A resident on active duty in the U.S. armed forces or U.S. merchant marine who presents valid leave papers and a valid North Dakota operator’s license may hunt small game, fish, or trap during open season without a license while on leave.

Who would be affected

  • Primary beneficiaries: landowners and residents (and family members living with them), minors under 16, specified institutional populations, participants and instructors in designated aquatics education programs, and service members on leave.
  • State agencies: Game and Fish Department (administration/enforcement, issuing institutional authority), Governor (setting free fishing days).
  • No explicit fee or revenue provisions are included in the text.

Procedural history and status

  • Filed: November 22, 2024
  • Read first time: March 11, 2025
  • Referred to: County & Regional Government (and/or City, County & Local Affairs Committee per referral records)
  • Withdrawn by author: March 18, 2025
  • Current status: Withdrawn from further consideration (no enactment)

Notes / Impact

  • The bill largely restates and organizes license‑exemption situations found in the hunting/fishing statutes. It does not attach new fees, appropriation changes, or bond/finance provisions.
  • Because the bill was withdrawn by the author (March 18, 2025), it did not advance to become law and has no legal effect.
  • Sponsors listed in the bill text: Representatives Grueneich, Dockter, Heinert, Brandenburg; Senators Conley and Wanzek (per the introduced version).

If you would like, I can compare the enacted text (current NDCC § 20.1‑03‑04) to this bill version and highlight specific wording changes or clarifications.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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