Letter in 9-9-07 AZ Daily Star:
Regarding the Sept. 6th Article "Hiker fined $100 for disregarding $5 recreation fee". Christine Wallace is in the right and Judge Roll's decision will hopefully be overturned in the 9th Circuit. The Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act (FLREA) states that an "area" must have the following amenities to charge a fee: designated developed parking, a permanent toilet facility, a permanent trash receptacle, interpretive sign, exhibit, or kiosk, picnic tables, and security services. The intent of the law is crystal clear, an "area" means a campground or other such facility and not an entire mountain range such as the Catalina's.

FLREA also states that no fees may be charged for the following: solely for parking, picnicking, horseback riding through, general access, dispersed areas with low or no investments, for persons passing through an area, camping at undeveloped sites, overlooks, public roads or highways, private roads, hunting or fishing, and official business. Yet we are all charged for such activities in the Catalina's.

Recreation fees are not the funding answer for public lands. It is not American to prevent citizens from using their own land simply because they can't afford to do so. We are not customers on our own land.

The relatively miniscule funding that our public lands need to run should be funded by the US Treasury.

Sky Jacobs
Public lands fee resister

More info at:
Western Slope No Fee Coalition
Wild Wilderness
AZ No Fee Coalition

NO MORE RECREATION FEES NO PUBLIC LAND!

Contact your Pima County supervisors and ask them to remove the fee booth in the middle of the county controlled highway. Our supervisors wisely supported an unfortunately non-binding resolution against the public lands fee program years ago. Now they should do something about it.

Ann Day -- district1@pima.gov
Ramón Valadez -- district2@pima.gov
Sharon Bronson -- district3@pima.gov
Ray Carroll -- district4@pima.gov
Richard Elías -- district5@pima.gov

First as the Fee Demonstration Project and now as the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act, new recreation fees have been a failure and have caused mistrust and discontent toward federal land managers all over the West. Many states, counties (including Pima County), and cities have passed resolutions opposing the fee. There will soon be federal legislation to repeal the fee introduced by Senator Max Baucus of Montana. Feel free to contact AZ Senators to encourage them to co-sponsor the bill.

The fee creates a private enterprise model on public lands. We are already seeing the Forest Service treating the public as consumers (not citizens) and the land as a product (and not our Natural heritage). Environmentalists should especially be concerned as recreation is seen as the new "extractive industry" on public lands and public/private partnerships are part of the fee plan. Behind Fee Demo and FLREA are mostly corporations pushing a motorized, playground future for our public lands. Mt. Lemmon already has 3 privately run campgrounds.

Even though FLREA is very bad legislation, it wasn't bad enough for the Forest Service, who had to charge the fee in places the law doesn't even allow! This includes Mt. Lemmon and the "High Impact Recreation Area" the F.S. made up in a lame attempt to get around the clear wording of the law, which does not allow fees to be charges for simply parking, hiking and other activities in undeveloped or less-developed sites. See letter to editor at left for more specific info on what the law allows.

Proper land management is relatively cheap and should be fully funded by the U.S. Treasury.We call for FLREA to be repealed and proper federal funding restored to protect our Forest Service, BLM, Wildlife Refuges, and other public lands.

Significant current recreation fee news:

1. Christine Wallace and her lawyer Mary Ellen are filing a civil injunction called a Motion for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief which would challenge the Forest Service's HIRA implementation.

2. Federal legislation will be introduced by Senator Max Baucus of Montana very soon to repeal FLREA, the law that made Fee Demo permanent!!!

3. The Coronado National Forest is doing its recreation facility analysis and just put out its "5-year Proposed Program of Work and Programmatic Effects of Implementation" (PDF here). Through this process the Coronado will be pushing to make recreation pay for itself by removing current amenities at non-fee recreation sites (closing some sites) as well as adding fees, raising fees, and contracting out to private companies at other improved sites. Please contact the Coronado and let them know what you think of Recreation Fees -- mailroom_r3_coronado@fs.fed.us