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Coalition seeking support Posted: Thursday, Jun 23, 2005 - 08:13:40 am PDT By KEITH KINNAIRD News editor
SANDPOINT -- Opponents of a new federal recreation fee program invited North Idaho lawmakers to join their crusade on Wednesday. Members of the Idaho No-RAT (Recreation Access Tax) Coalition met at Sandpoint Community Hall to share their concerns about the program and consider ways of halting it before its implementation in October."The time to stop RAT is now, before it fully goes into effect," said Ken Fischman of Idaho No-RAT. The group is circulating a petition calling for Idaho Sen. Larry Craig to oppose the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act. Idaho No-RAT is also calling on Idaho's state legislators to adopt a resolution deposing the act. The group said lawmakers in Montana, Oregon, Colorado and Alaska have already adopted such resolutions.
There are only a couple of fee demo sites in Bonner County, such as the U.S. Forest Service's Lunch Peak Lookout, a former fire lookout station converted into overnight accommodations for forest visitors. But Idaho No-RAT worries the act will enable the federal government to enhance existing fees and implement ones where none currently exist. No-RAT's Lanie Johnson, who has been studying the act for the past five years, said the fees can be implemented if a site has certain amenities, such as toilets, paved parking areas and other features. Johnson pointed to the Gold Hill trail and Roman Nose Mountain recreation site. Both already have some amenities, said Johnson, adding that language in the act enables land managers to group nearby facilities into areas in order to meet amenities criteria and charge fees. "They could easily be set up to charge a fee," Johnson said of Gold Hill. But not everybody flogged the fees. A couple of people said they didn't mind paying them as long as they were spent on upkeep of the site or if the amenities went beyond the primitive. Angler Loren Albright feels some fees are justified, but worries the act will allow public lands to be sold into private hands if the facilities are deemed financially unsustainable. "That is probably the part that scares me the most," he said. Some of the night's harshest criticism came from the Selkirk Conservation Alliance, which is often at odds with state and federal officials over the way resources are managed in the Panhandle. "It is the corporate foot in the door," alliance Executive Director Mark Sprengel said, charging that the driving force behind the act is the American Recreation Coalition, a large group of corporations which includes Walt Disney and Kampgrounds Of America. Sprengel said the act will lead to the privatization of facilities, which shifts decision-making on public lands away from land managers and into the hands of large companies. The Panhandle lawmakers who attended the meeting -- Sen. Shawn Keough and Reps. George Eskridge and Eric Anderson -- made no promises on Wednesday, outside of pledging to take a long hard look at the act and its impacts. Eskridge said he was disappointed to see the act was tacked onto must-pass federal legislation, which stifled debate. Keough said she opposes fees to access forests and reminded the audience she lobbies for multiple use of forests. Anderson comments attracted the most reaction of the three lawmakers. He pointed out that some fighting the act are the same people that have worked to keep loggers from accessing public lands. One member of the audience accused Anderson of trying drive a wedge between the various interests that have united to fight the act. But Fischman said the diversity of Idaho No-RAT is a beautiful facet, not a flaw. Taking it all in was Dick Kramer, ranger of the Forest Service's Sandpoint District. He did not speak during the meeting, but said afterward that there was a misconception that fees generated by the act would be deposited into a bureaucratic black hole in Washington D.C. Kramer said the funds would stay here much in the same way they do under the fee demo program. Also, a locally appointed committee would be involved in how those dollars are spent. Kramer added that some of the amenities, such as road paving and flush toilets, are too expensive to be implemented at many sites in the Sandpoint Ranger District. The agency is already struggling with a limited facility maintenance and operations budget. "We've never had as much money as we would like to manage the facilities at the level we would like to," he said. POST YOUR OPINION
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Bonner County Daily Bee
P.O. Box 159 / Sandpoint, Idaho 83864 / 208-263-9534
Bonner County Daily Bee Online is updated at 10am PST.