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Pasted below is an article that ran on the Front Page of the Denver Post under the banner headline - "Forest Plan Trims Access".
There are a number of important issues that are not addressed here. Not the least of those are the RSFMP's heavy reliance on access fees to achieve its goal of self-sustainability (profitability), thereby replacing appropriated funding. We are very concerned about the enormous negative impacts to local economies, lack of public comment through the federally mandated NEPA process and additional barriers to public use and enjoyment of public land. The Western Slope No-Fee Coalition has estimated that between 3,000 and 5,000 sites are to be decommissioned, closed, or "returned to dispersed use" with many sites being gated. Having reviewed additional forest RSFMP 5-year Plans we stand by those numbers. We will update estimates when and if additional RSFMP 5-year plans are made available to the public for review. Closures and decommissionings are just one aspect of the RSFMP. Additional fee sites, reduced operating seasons, turning sites over to concessionaire operation and other barriers to public use add to impacts of the RSFMP. The WSNFC's ground-breaking report on RSFMP can be read at http://www.westernslopenofee.org
Robert Funkhouser
President, Western Slope No-Fee Coalition
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11/19/2006
Hundreds of campsites may close
Analysis of cost: A backlog in maintenance led to the proposed cuts. Officials hope private groups adopt some sites.
By Jeremy P. Meyer - Denver Post Staff Writer
Hundreds of campgrounds, picnic areas and other recreation facilities
in national forests and grasslands could close under a sweeping U.S.
Forest Service cost-cutting exercise.
Every one of the roughly 15,000 campgrounds, trailheads with bathrooms
and other developed recreation sites in the 193 million acres under the
agency's authority is being evaluated.
The value of each site is being weighed against the costs of maintaining it, federal officials say.
Forest Service officials say they are being forced to juggle priorities
as the system faces a $346 million backlog in maintenance, a growing
tab for fire suppression - now 42 percent of expenditures - and an
annual budget that was cut 2.5 percent to $4.9 billion for 2007.
"We are looking at reality here," said Jim Bedwell, the Forest
Service's national director of recreation and heritage resources.
"We're trying to best focus our funds as well as look at other ways to
operate."
So far, about 10 percent of facilities in 44 national forests that have
completed their studies are targeted for decommission or closure.
Each of the 155 national forests and 20 grasslands must complete a recreation-site facility master plan by the end of 2007.
The process calls for recreation facilities to be itemized and ranked
in order of their condition, frequency of use and how they fit in the
forest's recreation focus, or "niche."
"There is a whole range of potential outcomes ... from closing sites to
actually upgrading them," said Steve Sherwood, director of recreation
for the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Region.
The public will have a chance to weigh in once the sites have been
selected. Implementation of the plans will take five years, Forest
Service officials say.
"Some of the sites being looked at have extremely low occupancy rates, in the 5 to 10 percent range," Sherwood said.
"We recognize there will be people who have strong connections," he
said, "but we also know people in Maine and California expect us to
take a hard look at those locations because it is their tax dollars
going to support these small sites."
Forest Service officials say perhaps local volunteers, civic
organizations and private groups could step in and run some of the
facilities on the list.
"An enormous change"
Decommissioned campgrounds will still be available for camping, but
they won't have toilets, trash cans, picnic tables or water systems,
Sherwood said.
Critics say the Forest Service is sneaking the process through with
little public involvement and the result will be less access to forests
and fewer recreational opportunities.
"This is an enormous change for the Forest Service," said Robert Funkhouser, president of the Western Slope No-Fee Coalition.
"What you have here is a policy that mandates all sites are
self-sustaining or profitable or they must be closed. ... That's not
OK," Funkhouser said.
In the Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnison national forests, 50 of the
forests' 140 recreation amenities will have to close or be modified,
said Lee Ann Loupe, a Forest Service spokeswoman.
The public will be able to comment on the process, and "nothing is set in stone yet," she said.
The Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest and Pawnee National Grassland managers are starting their processes.
Arapaho-Roosevelt has enough money to operate 64 of its 177 recreation
sites - with some others run by concessionaires, said Paul Cruz, forest
recreation staff officer.
The White River National Forest plan is nearly complete - identifying
142 inventoried recreation sites. Details about what the forest is
planning haven't been announced, Loupe said.
The Pike-San Isabel National Forest and Cimarron-Comanche National
Grassland will begin their recreation site master planning in March,
said Barb Timock, a forest spokeswoman.
One goal of the service's overall plan is to cut the $346 million
maintenance backlog 20 percent by 2010, 70 percent by 2015 and 90
percent by 2020.
Water systems outdated
Another factor driving the review is the need to upgrade campground
water systems to meet tougher federal drinking-water standards,
officials say.
Most campgrounds were built in the 1960s and are out of date or falling apart, the Forest Service's Bedwell said.
"There has been a lot going on in the 40 years since then - there is
more people, shifts in population, a diverse mix of visitors, different
styles of recreation activities," he said.
Scott Silver, director of the Oregon-based Wild Wilderness, said the
Forest Service is placing too much emphasis on cost- cutting and
outside groups' taking over facilities.
"It is a way to allow the government to get the job done without using
tax dollars," Silver said. "When you starve government of the needed
money, you force these other alternatives. You start to make government
fail. Americans are becoming used to government failing."
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- Land management 
