Animal rights protesters gathered at the Statehouse in Trenton this afternoon to call on Gov. Chris Christie to use his executive power and cancel the bear hunt scheduled to begin Dec. 6. The state has not had a bear hunt since 2005 and officials at the Department of Environmental Protection, which administers the Division of Fish and Wildlife, maintain the bear population has grown exponentially. A controlled hunt, officials say, is the only way to keep the population in check. But activists dispute the DEP's data and call for bear management policies that exclude the killing of bears. (Video by Nyier Abdou/The Star-Ledger)
