Pennsylvania Disabled Veteran Fishing License

The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission runs a two-tier structure for disabled veterans that mirrors the Game Commission's. The statute was rewritten in 2025 and the Commission's older descriptions predate it. Act 21 of 2025 (Senate Bill 232, approved June 30, 2025, effective August 29, 2025) repealed 30 Pa.C.S. 2707(a)(1), the free annual license for a veteran whose disability was incurred in a war or armed conflict or who was rated 100 percent, and rewrote subsection (b) so that a resident veteran with a 100 percent service-connected rating receives a free disabled veteran lifetime fishing license on submitting VA's rating determination letter. The old requirement that a lifetime license be backed by proof the disability is permanent is gone; the letter has to show a 100 percent rating, not a permanent one. A resident veteran with a service-connected disability between 60 and 99 percent as certified by VA may obtain a reduced fee resident annual license, or a reduced fee senior resident lifetime license, for $2.97. The senior lifetime option is the part worth noticing: a veteran who is both old enough for the senior lifetime license and in the 60 to 99 percent band pays $2.97 once rather than annually. Written certification from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs stating the qualifying service-connected disability is the only acceptable documentation. A DD-214 alone will not do it. The initial license has to be obtained in person or by mail rather than online: county treasurers, the Fish and Boat Commission's Harrisburg office, or any of the six regional law enforcement offices. Once the eligibility is on file, renewal is simpler. The statute sets the reduced license at $1 for a resident annual license, and the same $1 for a senior resident lifetime license under 2707(b)(2), which also reaches a former prisoner of war; the $2.97 the Commission charges is that fee plus issuing and transaction charges. The fishing rule no longer carries a war or armed conflict test at any tier: Act 21 struck "incurred in any war or armed conflict" and the statement of wartime service from the 60 to 99 percent tier as well. The Game Commission's hunting license still asks for a wartime-incurred disability, so a veteran turned away from the discounted hunting license on that ground should still ask about the fishing license. The same act widened the $1 license for deployed Guard members in 2707.1 beyond overseas deployments and repealed the separate reserve component provision.