This candidate wants you to be able to eat roadkill (if you want to)
Tink Nathan is a Republican hoping to become elected as a state representative Texas’ District 53. On his website, he writes, “We need and deserve leaders who believe in Texas and share its values.” One of those values happens to be his belief that Texas should end its ban on eating roadkill, as the Dallas Observer reports.
The San Antonio Express-News, via the AP, reports that for Tink, it’s a matter of not letting good meat go to waste, saying that one deer can provide 80 pounds of edible meat valued at $26 a pound. He cited records that in one county in 2006, nearly 1,500 dead deer were removed from state highways. He acknowledged that not all of the meat would be usable, though, telling the Express-News, “Certainly not all of it could be saved. Nobody will take it if it's stinking.”
The Dallas Observer believes that he’s currently the only candidate who is campaigning on this issue and notes that currently picking up roadkill is illegal, noting, “this is because of health-and-safety concerns (hard to know what vile pathogens might be swarming over any given carcass), partly it's to discourage people from using their cars as hunting weapons.” They also noted that other states like Illinois and Montana have started to let people grab roadkill.
More info: Dallas Observer, AP (via KHOU)
