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The appended article from the Society of American Foresters does a remarkably good job of explaining what's going on with the increasingly controversial Recreation Site Facility Master Planning process now being implemented nationwide. In this article, the US Forest Service's director of Recreation, Heritage and Wilderness Resources, Jim Bedwell, appears to have stepped into a deep puddle. Bedwell is quoted as saying:
[ "There's no intent to pull back or curtail recreation. What we're seeing so far is that less than ten percent of sites will either have operations modified or closed." ]
The facts suggest that Bedwell's ten percent isn't even in the right ballpark.
Here is the summary of RS-FMP proposed actions for my local forest, the Deschutes. This condensed document was handed out at a USFS meeting I attended last week. It can now be read here. The unedited parent document can be read here.
The bottom line for the Deschutes is this -- out of 212 developed recreation sites, "NO CHANGE" has been proposed for just 50 sites.
Operations will be modified at more than 75% of all developed recreation sites on this forest and I've seen similar figures for other forests.
In the appended article, Funkhouser's version of reality is more believable than Bedwell's, or so I would suggest.
-- Highlights from USFS condensed document --
The Deschutes National Forest currently manages 212 developed recreation sites. The following is a summary of the proposed changes ...
- Remove constructed features at 23 sites and manage them as dispersed recreation sites.
- Change the season of management at 85 sites
- Change operator or work force at 9 sites by seeking partnerships to operate and maintain 5 sites, where possible partners have been identified; and by including 4 sites, currently managed by the Forest, in the next (FY 2009) campground Concession permit prospectus.
- improve 12 day use sites to meet public demand, protect resources, and increase recreation opportunities and begin charging day use recreation fees at these sites.
- implement fees at 2 overnight sites where we do not currently charge.
- No change is proposed for 50 sites.
Scott
--- begin quoted ---
The Forestry Source, November 2006
Copyright 2006 - The Society of American Foresters
Forest Service Assesses Future of Recreation Sites
By Steve Wilent - Features Writer, The Forestry Source
Depending on who you talk to, the Forest Service's Recreation Site -
Facility Master Planning process is a secret scheme to close thousands
of campgrounds, picnic areas, and other recreation facilities, or it is
a straightforward means of prioritizing scarce funding for maintaining
and operating those sites.
The former is the position of groups such as the Western Slope No-Fee
Coalition (WSNFC), a Durango, Colo., organization that is opposed to
recreation fees charged by federal agencies and has called for the
repeal of the 2004 Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act, which
authorizes such fees. The WSNFC released a report in August on the
RS-FMP program.
"The light of day is beginning slowly to shine on a new Forest Service
program that could result in drastic changes to National Forest
recreation," begins the report. "Since at least 2002, the USDA-Forest
Service has been secretly implementing an internal policy initiative
called Recreation Site - Facility Master Planning, or RS-FMP, that
threatens to impose a for-profit model on the management of America's
National Forests."
The RS-FMP isn't a secret, but neither is information on the program
widely available. According to Robert Funkhouser, president of the
coalition, 22 national forests have completed RS-FMP plans and have
begun implementing them, yet none of the plans has been publicly
released.
One source of general information about the program is a Forest Service
Region 3 Web site that is "intended for use by National Forest
personnel and contractors engaged in the RS-FMP process"
(www.fs.fed.us/r3/measures/Prioritize/RS-FMP.htm). A Process Guidebook
and other documents on the site offer insight into the planning process
but provide little information about specific actions that have
occurred or may be taken.
The overall goal of the program is to "enable us to focus limited
resources on our highest priority sites and facilities," explains the
Guidebook. "The results of this effort will provide Forest Supervisors
the information they need to improve quality recreation opportunities
and reduce our deferred maintenance burden." The RS-FMP helps forest
managers examine the capacity, level of use, operational costs, and
maintenance backlog of each site, and then rank each site based on
these criteria in light of expected and recreation trends.
The maintenance backlog is high - and recreation funding low. The
Forest Service estimates that the cost of deferred maintenance at its
recreation sites nationwide is $346 million. Together, the 155 national
forests and 20 grasslands attract about 205 million visits per year.
The 14,497 recreation sites the agency owns and manages have a capacity
of 342 million people-at-one-time (PAOT) days. However, in fiscal year
2004, funding was available to provide fewer than 84 million PAOT days
at sites managed at a "quality standard" - about 25 percent of total
capacity.
Another 5,600 sites are not included in the RS-FMP program, including
abandoned sites or those that have little or no development (assets
such as signs, fire rings, or toilets), as well as sites that are not
owned by the agency, such as private summer homes on leased federal
lots.
Of its total appropriations of $4.87 billion for fiscal year 2007, the
Forest Service allocated $251 million to its recreation and related
programs - about four percent less than in 2006.
Jim Bedwell, the Forest Service's director of recreation, heritage, and
wilderness resources, said the RS-FMP program is designed to help the
agency be as efficient as possible with its limited recreation funding.
"It allows us to take an overall strategic look at recreation across
the national forests and grasslands that, frankly, we haven't done for
a very long time," said Bedwell. "We have a number of facilities that
are old and inefficient, and not really serving contemporary demands
very well."
The average age of Forest Service recreation facilities is over 40 years, he said.
"A lot of our facilities were developed in reaction to where people
went, with no real master plan," said Bedwell. "We've been going along,
trying to keep those together, and except in localized areas we haven't
taken a step back to say, what are we about? And does what we have
really meet our contemporary and future needs? So we thought we needed
a systematic process to look at all of those sites and to best utilize
the dollars we have."
Funkhouser says his projections show that 3,000 to 5,000 recreation
sites will be closed or decommissioned nationwide, and as many as 4,000
more will be converted to fee sites or turned over to private
for-profit concessionaires to manage.
"The RS-FMP program is going to send shockwaves through National Forest
gateway communities nationwide. We're concerned about the economic
impacts that this amount of decommissioning and closures represents for
local communities, as well as the increased fees and reduced season of
use. It all adds up to reduced availability to the public," Funkhouser
said.
Bedwell said Funkhouser's estimates are high, and while some sites might be closed, others could be expanded or improved.
"There's no intent to pull back or curtail recreation. What we're
seeing so far is that less than ten percent of sites will either have
operations modified or closed," Bedwell said.
Once an inventory of sites is complete, said Bedwell, stakeholders at
the local level are involved in a dialog about recreation needs.
"Once we have that snapshot, let's talk about what our niche is. What
is this forest or grassland really about, in terms of recreation? At
that point, we have a discussion with key stakeholders about what the
highest and best use of this forest is. Is it a day-use forest or a
destination forest? What are your outstanding attractors? What are we
trying to provide, overall. So there's involvement at that point."
Bedwell said this sort of public participation "has already occurred in some places, and will occur everywhere."
Part of that discussion with stakeholders involves looking at funding levels and where those dollars ought to be spent
"And then you go back to the public and say, 'Here's our list, and
here's how far our current budgets go. We've got some issues here at
these lower-ranked sites that are less efficient and so forth. How
important are these sites to your community?'" Bedwell said.
This sort of public dialog offers an opportunity to look for
alternative means of operating some sites, said Bedwell, such as
allowing a volunteer or service group to manage a picnic site.
But Funkhouser says no public or congressional review of the RS-FMP policy has yet occurred.
"It is imperative that this secret policy see the light of day," he
said. "This is a drastic change to national forest recreation
management that should not be allowed to proceed behind closed doors."
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