Landowner tells kayaker not to fish on ‘his’ side of the river

“You can fish privately from this riffle to the bottom of the hole,” Smith says in the video as he grabs the bow of Stamps’ kayak. “On the other one [right] side of the river, there, help yourself. But that acceleration [up there] up to the centerline of the river all the way to where the river drops down to the mountain hole is private for fishing.”

Not wanting to argue, Stamps wishes Smith well and continues his way downriver. He later started posting on Instagram the video of their interaction, highlighting a long-simmering debate over Georgia’s power access laws.

After his video racked up millions of views on social media, Stamps returned to the same stretch of Flint with a local news crew. Floating past the same “No Fishing” signs on the left bank of the river, they danced around an important question now being considered by state lawmakers: Can you legally fish on a public river in Georgia?

How (and where) things got complicated

For generations, Georgians have enjoyed the privilege of floating, hunting and fishing along the state’s great rivers. (Smaller streams and creeks are a different story, and on many of these waterways the streambeds are considered private property.) This has been a privilege since Georgia gained statehood in 1788, when the state (and by extension its residents of the state) became the owner of all navigable streambeds. But the public’s ability to use and access these streambeds came into question in the early 2000s, when some landowners on the Flint River began to question the long-standing idea of ​​navigability. Flint Riverkeeper director Gordon Rogers explains Living outside that similar controversies had also arisen in other public streams, including the Chestatee, the Toccoa, and the Ichawaynochaway.

The landowners on the Flint had property along a well-known stretch of the river’s headwaters known as “Yellow Jacket Shoals,” which provides great fishing for shoal bass. It’s also the same area where Stamps confronted Smith in May.

These private landowners argued that because their property deeds predated 1863, when a written definition of “navigable streams” was added to the state constitution, the stretch of river in front of their properties was not considered navigable. They argued that this gave them ownership of the streambed from their bank to the center line of the river, leading to a series of disputes with local outdoorsmen who had been floating and fishing there for years.

In 2020, one of those landowners fired a gun at a family of rowers, and he is currently serving a 10-year prison sentence for that action. But his brother, Ben Brewton, sued the state and reached a settlement in 2023, declaring that his pre-1863 deed gave him ownership of more than half of the streambed in the portion of the Flint adjacent to his property. It didn’t take long for more “No Fishing” signs to pop up along that stretch of the Upper Flint.

This prompted a fierce backlash from anglers and other public access advocates in Georgia. They saw this new exception on the Flint River as an attack on their right to paddle, hunt and fish the state’s major rivers. So they flooded the inboxes of their representatives and the state Department of Natural Resources. And although the DNR had a legal obligation to enforce the injunction, the agency sided with the public by announcing that it would not charge anglers for fishing along the private bank at Yellow Jacket Shoals, the DNR said. Georgia Recorder.

State lawmakers followed suit by hastily drafting a bill that reemphasized and guaranteed Georgians their right to hunt, fish and paddle in the state’s navigable rivers and streams. The Fishing Rights Act was passed and Governor Brian Kemp signed it into law in May 2023. Rogers says an amended version of the law passed earlier this year, restores the public’s right to fish in places like Yellow Jacket Shoals and other navigable streams.

“What Mike Smith claims in that video is, as far as I’m concerned, plainly false. And more importantly, the DNR is not enforcing his claim in that area,” Rogers clarified. “It is easy to confuse ownership of the riverbed (in navigable waters) with an absolute right to control fishing rights in those waters. What the new law does is correct that misconception. The new law is very clear that the public, regardless of ownership of the riverbed, has the right to fish in the navigable waters of Georgia.”

But there is still a glaring problem with the new legislation: it does not define “navigability” as it relates to Georgian rivers. Which leaves Georgians’ recently restored right to fish in public rivers up to interpretation.

The problem of navigability

Laws regarding stream access and ownership of streambeds vary by state. And Georgia isn’t alone in facing stream access controversies in recent years. The debate over who owns the riverbed has led to legal flare-ups in several Western states, including Utah, Colorado and New Mexico — where the fight over access to the rivers has become particularly bitter since 2022, when the Legislature state restored public power. constitutional right to wade and fish in rivers flowing over private property.

Read next: A victory for fishermen: The U.S. Supreme Court reaffirms New Mexico’s decision that all streams in the state are public

In many states, the root of the problem comes down to one word: navigability. But its definition (which in many cases is seriously outdated) has generated so much conflict and confusion that some key decision makers, including the Colorado Supreme Court, have refused to address the matter. And because Georgia’s new law failed to provide an updated definition of the word, many believe the state’s power access laws are now murkier than before the new law came into being.

“It is much more unclear whether fishermen, hunters and paddlers can touch private streambeds,” Senator Elena Parent told the US Secretary of State. Georgia Recorder in March. “And we should not set up a system where people can no longer use these navigable rivers they have used for decades if an adjacent property owner suddenly decides that the public cannot anchor or use bottom lures . ”

State lawmakers have attempted to remedy this oversight by creating a commission tasked with deciding which rivers (and possibly which parts of those rivers) should be considered navigable. A bill introduced earlier this year names 64 different rivers and streams, including the Flint River, as potential candidates. The committee plans to study these waterways this summer and has made recommendations to the House on Dec. 1 Associated press.

Their task is not easy. They will have to consider the federal definition of navigability, which states that if the river was used by people for trade and commerce when Georgia became a state, then the river is considered navigable today, according to a room NPR connected. This differs slightly from the more specific state interpretation of the word, which was established in 1863 and defines a navigable waterway as “a stream capable of carrying boats loaded with freight in the regular course of commerce, either during the whole year or part of the year.”

It is also possible that committee members will consider the concept of navigability on a segment-by-segment basis, rather than declaring entire streams navigable or not. This could lead to an entirely new watershed map in Georgia, with some stretches allowing public fishing and others allowing private landowners with deeds dating from before 1863 to declare ownership of the streambed.

Read next: Watch: Armed Alabama man charged after taunting bass tournament fishermen

Until these decisions are made, Stamps says he and other outdoorsmen are both confused and concerned about the state of public fishing on Georgia’s rivers.

“The game wardens told me one thing. I have had legal representatives tell me otherwise. So myself and other fishermen are just not sure what the law actually is,” Stamps told reporters earlier this month. “It could be a stepping stone to more public spaces and more things that go private and are not accessible to the public.”

This article was updated June 27 with input from Gordon Rogers, executive director of Flint Riverkeeper.