LANSING — On your next trip to the sporting goods store, you may be able to pick up your fishing line, ammo and voter registration cards.

            Rep. Scott Hummel, R-Dewitt, wants to require retailers that sell hunting, fishing and fur harvester’s licenses to display voter registration information for customers.

            Under the proposal, a pamphlet would direct hunters, anglers and trappers to Michigan’s voter registration application Web site that will allow them to register.

            “I was reading a national sportsmen’s magazine and I read that Florida had a similar bill so why can’t we,” said Hummel. “I wanted to give the opportunity for sportsmen to stay politically involved.

            “It probably won’t pass this session, but it is always good to have on the books for the next.”

            The total number of licenses sold last year was 4.5 million. The number has steadily declined from a record high of more than 5 in 1998. Hummel said he wants to get more people into hunting and fishing, and keep them in those activities by getting them involved in politics.

            Michigan United Conservation Clubs representative Jason Dinsmore said the organization supports the bill as a tool to get pro-hunting people to the polls.

The legislation probably is too late to affect voting on Proposal 3, which would reinstate a 99-year total ban on dove hunting if it passes in November.

            Julie Baker, the director of the Committee to Protect Doves, said she had not heard of the bill.

            “Sportsmen and women have been helpful across the state and we respect their heritage,” Baker said. “A poll in the Flint Journal found that hunters support the ban on dove hunting.”

            Around 1,700 retailers would be affected if the bill becomes law. Retailers that sell hunting and fishing licenses currently are required to provide fishing, hunting and off-road vehicle regulation books.