They’ve been accused of raiding crops, ransacking trash cans and boldly breaking into homes to steal food out of the refrigerator. In at least two cases last year, black bears were even reported to have attacked people in Connecticut.

Alarmed by the steady stream of headlines documenting their run-ins with humans, some lawmakers say it’s past time for the state to open a hunting season on bears.

The debate over bear hunting has persisted for years between Connecticut farmers, wildlife advocates, hunters and, increasingly, suburban homeowners. On one side, supporters argue that a hunt will cull bears that roam closest to populated areas, while opponents reject that notion and say the animals should be left alone.

“I’ve encountered bears in the woods many other states. When they see you, they smell you, they run away,” said Chas Catania, a hunter from Sherman, said during a public hearing before the Environment Committee on Monday. “Connecticut bears are habituated to people. They are not afraid of us.”

Connecticut is home to between 1,000 and 1,200 black bears, according to estimates from the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. Though the population is mostly concentrated in the Litchfield Hills, sightings have been recorded in nearly every city and town across the state.

The idea of a limited hunt has gained the backing of a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers as well as Gov. Ned Lamont, though vocal opposition from conservation groups has so far kept the hunters at bay.

“They’re framing it as a public safety issue, but the science is very clear on that — in states that do allow hunting, it’s done for recreational purposes, not to manage human-bear conflicts,” said Annie Hornish, an animal rights activist and co-founder of CT Coalition to Protect Bears, after Monday’s hearing.

“The reason they can’t come out and say it is because the public doesn’t want it,” she added. “They don’t like trophy hunting of bears.”

This year’s legislation, Senate Bill 1523, would require DEEP to establish a bear hunting season, which officials say would likely take place in the fall. The bill would also give the agency the authority to prescribe the methods of hunting, the cost of fees and limits on the number of animals that could be killed.

The public hearing on the bill Monday drew testimony from hundreds of advocates and opponents of a hunt.

Jason Hawley, a wildlife biologist working on DEEP’s bear program, told lawmakers that data from Massachusetts — which manages an annual culling of a few hundred bears — offers clear evidence for the effectiveness of a hunt.

Over the last few years, Connecticut has averaged more than three times as many home entries by bears than its northern neighbor despite having many fewer bears, according to DEEP. Last year tied a record with 67 home entries, along with dozens of additional reports of unsuccessful attempts.

“Honestly, it’s getting dangerous,” Hawley said. “Someone’s going to get killed or severely hurt. We’re on that track if we stay where we are right now.”

To address the growing number of conflicts with bears, lawmakers in 2023 approved legislation clarifying when people may kill a bear in self-defense and authorizing DEEP to issue permits to farmers to kill nuisance animals that have damaged crops, livestock or bee hives. The law also prohibited the intentional feeding of bears.

A total of 15 bears were killed under those provisions last year, and DEEP officials say they anticipate demand to grow as more people become aware of the program.

State Sen. Henri Martin, R-Bristol, criticized opponents of the bill for what he said was an anthropomorphization of wild bears.

“We’re not talking about Winnie-the-Pooh, or Yogi Bear, or Smokey the Bear,” Martin said. “We’re talking about black bears that are becoming more and more dangerous as they get used to humans.”

Opponents, meanwhile, say that those pushing for the hunt are reacting to the public’s fear of bears rather than scientific data.

During the public hearing on Monday, they criticized a study from New Jersey showing that conflicts with humans rose sharply after the state ended its hunt in 2021, arguing that neighboring New York saw similar trends despite making no changes to its hunt.

The last complete census of the state’s bear population was conducted by the University of Connecticut in 2014, and officials have since updated their estimates each year based on their understanding the population’s growth rate. Hawley, the DEEP biologist, said that conducting another study would likely cost around $500,000 and take three years to complete.

“Until that happens, I don’t think that we have enough information to move forward with any sort of bear hunt,” said Tanya Bourgoin, the wildlife committee chair with Sierra Club Connecticut.

During this week’s hearings, several lawmakers also sought advice about non-lethal methods of managing the bear population, including educating people about how to avoid bears, fining them if they ignore the warnings and, some suggested, using birth control.

“Can that be tried? Has it been tried?” asked state Rep. Mike Demicco, D-Farmington. (Hawley responded that despite attempts in other states, the sizes and breeding habits of Connecticut’s black bears make birth control an ineffective option).

Advocates have also pushed for DEEP to step up its ongoing public relations campaign about steps people can take to avoid attracting bears, such as taking down bird feeders or moving garbage cans inside.

The last serious push to allow bear hunting, in 2023, failed to coalesce support among members of the legislature’s Environment Committee and resulted in the passage of the more limited measure focused on nuisance bears and feeding. The co-chair of the committee this year, state Sen. Rick Lopes, D-New Britain, said this week he is attempting to gauge if members will support a lottery-based hunt before a vote on the bill is held, possibly as soon as Friday.

Earlier this month, another measure, House Bill 7051, was advanced by the Committee on Public Safety and Security to require the state to develop a bear management strategy, though it does not address hunting specifically. That bill is currently awaiting a fiscal analysis.

Connecticut is in the minority of states without a managed bear hunt. Hunting is currently allowed everywhere else in New England, with the exception of Rhode Island.

While black bears are native to Connecticut, their numbers dwindled for more than a century due to the extensive clear-cutting of forests for farmland and other human endeavors.

Beginning in the 1980s, scientists began recording a comeback that has since spread to every corner of the state, even in dense cities such as New Haven and Hartford.

That recovery is now at risk of backsliding as a result of the public’s souring sentiment towards bears, according to Hawley, who explained that he has gotten a sense of that shift in the thousands of calls he fields each year from people reporting bear sightings.

“I have residents that would call me and say ‘I saw a bear, I’m excited,’” Hawley said. “Now they call me and they’re like, ‘I’m sick of it, get this bear out of my yard.’ It’s kind of sad to see that happening.”