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written by - Don Tryon
 In late 2004, the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act (FLREA) replaced the Recreation Fee Demonstration Program launched in 1996. Both programs emerged from legislation attached to appropriation riders by Ralph Regula (R-Ohio). FLREA, more commonly known as the Recreation Access Tax (RAT), requires fees of those recreating on Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service or Bureau of Reclamation administered public property.
The trend in our society is replacement of tax funding with fees. Government has used the strategy to flatten corporate and private income tax. New World Order, twenty-first century America is evolving into a substantially different creature than last century America.
RAT advocates act as if dramatic increases in public land recreation have created intense burdens on public land agencies, requiring substantial new sources of funding. America just can’t afford to provide these free services anymore, they insist.
America isn’t getting poorer. It is absurd to argue the federal government cannot afford to provide federal services it could afford to provide fifty or thirty years ago. The greatest period of public land recreation related construction in US history occurred late in and shortly after the great depression. It is silly to argue we can’t maintain trails or facilities today that the country could afford to build and maintain seventy years ago, when America was at her poorest.
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The amount of land the affected agencies administer in the lower
forty-eight states has changed very little in the past half century.
What has changed is the population. In the eleven western states, for
instance, the population has more than tripled. Even without a per
capita increase in economic growth, the federal land management
agencies would be swimming in money, all else being equal.
Federal land agencies lack funding because current political leaders
would rather provide tax breaks to corporations and the wealthy, and
direct subsidies to powerful special interests. The data suggests poor
Americans are getting poorer, the middle class is eroding and wealthy
Americans are getting much wealthier. This isn’t a result of manifest
destiny, the will of God or the nature of things, it is a direct result
of government policy.
Policy makers would rather transfer wealth to the wealthy than fund public land.
In the middle of the Clinton era, the Forest Service projected dramatic
increases in outdoor recreation. The projections dovetailed with the
assertions of environmental groups, who argued “pay to play” would
demonstrate the desirability of adopting policies favoring recreation
over resource extraction. Interestingly, under the Bush
administration, the same US Forest Service claims only about a quarter
of projected recreation actually occurred. How convenient.
I do place some faith in data, and it suggests participation outdoor
recreation practiced on public land has actually decreased over the
past five years. People are not loving the outdoors to death. We
spent four decades convincing ourselves we were overcrowding our public
lands without questioning the myth. Go out and look around.
Advocates of Fee Demo insisted fees would supplement appropriations and
the result would be substantial improvement in outdoor recreation
services, leading to more support for fees. In reality, federal land
funding has decreased and recreation infrastructure is degrading. What
the past decade has demonstrated is the correctness of critics of
recreation fees. In essence, fees are a form of double taxation.
Recreation fees do not exist to improve our public lands; they exist to
serve political agendas harmful to natural resource conservation and
responsible use.
Recreation fees for public land use are a radical idea, at odds with generations of American policy.
The Land and Water Conservation Fund Act states, “No admission fees of
any kind shall be charged or imposed for entrance into any other
federally owned areas which are operated and maintained by a Federal
agency and used for outdoor recreation purposes.”
The National Park Service Organic Act - “...and no natural curiosities,
wonders, or objects of interest shall be leased, rented, or granted to
anyone on such terms as to interfere with free access to them by the
public.”
The Forest Service Organic Act - “Nor shall anything herein prohibit
any person from entering upon such forest reservations for all proper
and lawful purposes.”
For a century, the American people and their elected representatives
supported free public access to public land. Both Democrats and
Republicans conspired to change that agenda in 1996.
Recreation fee critic Scott Silver introduces his interesting web page
(www.wildwilderness.org) with this: “For the past 100 years, our
nation’s public lands have been managed so as to maximize value that
could be extracted from them. Today, a major shift in federal land
management policy is being developed and implemented. Instead of
extracting commodities from nature, nature itself is being converted
into a commodity to be repackaged, marketed and sold in the form of
value added recreation products.”
Mr. Silver is largely correct. Most of his criticisms and predictions have proven accurate.
Greed is the root cause of recreation fee policy, but ideology plays a supporting role.
The primary architect and supporter of federal land recreation fees is
the American Recreation Coalition (ARC). For the most part, ARC is
composed of companies and organizations wishing to make a profit off
your recreation. If you merely skim over ARC public statements and
comments, they sound interested in promoting health and vigor. If you
take the time to read their congressional testimony and various
documents, it becomes clear they want to, “commercialize, privatize and
motorize public lands,” as Scott Silver claims. Recreation fees do not
exist to help your public land; they exist to facilitate private profit
from public resources. If the recreation industry wants to buy private
property and develop it for industrial strength recreation and profit
maximization, more power to them, but...
public conservation lands shouldn’t be turned into playgrounds any more
than they should be turned into tree farms, or cow pastures.
ARC members don’t want to buy private land, pay taxes and cover the
downside costs of “playground” development. Like the timber industry
(thinks you should pay them to “log public forests back to health”), or
the livestock industry (believes they should pay about ten percent as
much to graze on National Forest or BLM land as on private land), or
the mining industry (has argued public minerals should be free for the
taking, the ARC wants to exploit your public resources for modest fee
or free. Along the way, they wish to collect income directly from you
and have your tax dollars pay for infrastructure, administration and
environmental amelioration. What a deal!
ARC members have plenty of motivation to cash in on the possibility of
converting your conservation lands to partnership playgrounds, what is
the motive for other parties interested in user fees?
I have mentioned environmentalists wishing to demonstrate the value of
public land recreation through adoption of pay to play programs.
In some respects, the recreation fee story is another sorry chapter in
the sad sack saga of the sagebrush rebellion. Shake open the bag of
most vocal congressional fee proponents and out tumble warmed over
rebels who hate public land.
In addition to a host of private think tanks, you can scratch the
surface of university economics departments and find advocates
supporting free market solutions to about any public land question. I
know and like some of these folks personally - they are just wrong.
Economists write and speak as though we all desire a world of rational
asset allocation. Unfortunately, assets are not rationally allocated.
Some people are rich and some poor. Historically in North America,
people born with less intelligence make less money. People of color
make less money. People from broken homes make less money. Some
people don't work very hard and make a lot of money. Some people work
like dogs and make little money. Why should race, intelligence, family
history or salary level determine whether a person can engage in the
timeless sport of standing in a stream and casting a fishing rod, or
hike along a mountain trail, or take the family to a lovely natural
setting for a picnic on a perfect fall day?
I was raised to believe America was special because we were a nation of
law. Everyone got fair, due process, without regard to race, economic
status or shoe size. I lived in Venezuela as a boy. I remember my
father and his friends complaining about graft, corruption, bribery and
payola. I didn’t understand they were complaining about the
progressive idea of management via incentives.
When you reserve a table at an elite restaurant, arrive and find they
lost your reservation to someone who crossed a palm with big green,
that’s the world of incentives.
When your Secretary of Defense is given the top job at a major federal
contractor, then becomes Vice President and the federal contractor is
granted numerous non-competitive bids, that’s incentives at work.
Some recreationists take the fee argument at face value. The places
they like to recreate are running down, litter is increasing and law
enforcement may be needed. They feel a modest fee can help ameliorate
the problems and nobody should complain about a few bucks to
participate in wonderful public land recreation opportunities. This
brand of recreation fee supporter tends to be well educated, middle
class, from larger towns or cities, and white. Fee critics have
suggested "elites” are interested in keeping riffraff away from “their”
recreation, or even that motivations are racist. At the least, they
are selfish, self-centered people lacking empathy.
Some fee advocates emphasize they are opposed to fees for land use but
insist the public should pay for amenities and service from which they
benefit directly. Maybe it is just me; I cannot grasp the logic. If a
private landowner elects to build a picnic table on her land with her
own money, it seems perfectly reasonable for her to charge me a fee to
use the picnic table. However, if a federal agency we pay with tax
dollars to administer our public land elects to build a picnic table
with public tax dollars, why do I have to pay to use the public picnic
table?
Trying to disaggregate services and land doesn’t work because it is
impossible. From the perspective of a federal land manager, all land
use requires management. There is no such thing as public use without
public service. In fact, most of the managers I know would argue it
requires less agency service to administer an area with formal picnic
and campsites than a similar area with active dispersed recreation.
Trying to separate public land services from the public lands
themselves is a dishonest ruse.
Let’s look at the efficacy, fairness and cost of a longstanding fee based recreation program:
In the US and Canada, fish and wildlife are largely the responsibility
of states and provinces. Some, most or nearly all funding for the
agencies responsible for administering fish and wildlife programs
derive from fees - hunting and fishing licenses and tags.
Where I live, in Washington State, if you want to fish freshwater,
saltwater, collect shellfish and razor clams the cost is about $42 per
year. To hunt common species of big game will set you back about $72.
Small game is another $33. If you don’t live in Washington, the fee is
about double for fishing but about ten times more for big game
hunting. If you want to enter a drawing for goats, moose or sheep, an
application fee is $5.48/per critter. If your number is lucky, tag
cost is $109.50 per tag if you live in Washington. If you don’t live
in Washington, the application and tag fees are about ten times the
resident fee. Most of these animals live on federal land. Hunters
mostly hunt on federal land. Habitat is predominantly administered by
federal officials. Why does the state get over a grand from some Joe
from New Mexico who wants to hunt a moose once in life?
There isn’t any logical reason for non-residents to pay ten times more
than residents. While residents may contribute state or provincial tax
dollars toward conservation, they routinely contribute more tax dollars
toward exploitation and resource degradation, something non-residents
do not do. The most insidious justifications center around locals
going without the advantages of resource exploitation, as if people
have a God given right to destroy fish and wildlife in the pursuit of
profit.
Anglers and hunters pursue a modest percentage of fish and wildlife
species. Non-game programs lack funding or other support. Species
slip into threatened or endangered classifications. States divert
funds from game programs to non-game, hunters and fishers have been
gracious, but are becoming more critical of this practice.
Several years ago, I worked with a state attempting to broaden the
funding base, especially to include non-consumptive wildlife “users”.
After extensive research and coordination with other states, the
Wildlife Commission adopted a single new bird hunting tag. And so it
goes. States have spent decades attempting to develop a fee system to
capture non-consumptive wildlife user dollars, with little success.
When I lived in Idaho, a talented Fish and Wildlife Department Director
elected to leave Idaho for the equivalent position in a smaller, less
exciting (from a fish and wildlife perspective) state. Why would
anyone leave the Idaho F&W top post for the same position in a
state like that, I asked myself. Idaho DFW relied almost solely on
fees while the Department of the other state received generous tax
support from the legislature. This is all one needs to know about fees
versus tax funding.
I was in a sports shop in Spokane one afternoon. A man asked a clerk
about hunting licenses. The clerk explained the options and tried to
convey the economic advantages of buying packages of licenses and
tags. The clerk thought the customer didn’t understand. Finally, the
fellow turned his face down, his cheeks reddened and he said, “I
understand, I just can’t afford them.” He turned and quickly walked
out of the shop.
Roughly, half of American households have no month-to-month savings.
In fact, in recent months the national savings rate has been negative.
Many Americans are spiraling deeper into debt every month.
It doesn’t matter whether fees are minor or major, millions of Americans can’t afford to pay them.
For thousands of generations, all around the world, people were hunters
and gatherers. Now in America, the richest country in the history of
the world, people who spend their lives putting in an honest days work
for an honest days wage don’t feel they can afford to go fishing or
hunting anymore.
The future of fees?
In British Columbia, one has to purchase additional licenses to fish
some of the blue ribbon fisheries. There was little criticism until
this past year, when a local committee in southeast BC was concerned
about actual or potential crowding on some rivers and streams. They
asked provincial authorities to add the streams to the Classified
Waters category. A non-resident alien fishing license cost $20 per day
in BC (or an annual license for $80), but to fish these waterways, if
you are a non-resident, costs you the license plus an additional
$20/day Classified Waters license. The objective is to reduce
“crowding” by pricing working class Albertans and Americans off the
rivers. The program is designed to make the experience less affordable
for working class people and less crowded for locals and the wealthy,
and therefore more attractive to locals and the wealthy. There isn’t
anything non-locals can do about it since they don’t vote in British
Columbia, except boycott the province.
If a wonderful, progressive, freedom loving place like British Columbia
can do this, so can Idaho, or Washington, or any other political unit,
anywhere. If it can be done for fish, why not river running, why not
the best Wilderness areas, trails, parks, lakes, picnic areas? Why not
libraries? If $20/day doesn’t weed out the undesirables, how about
$100/day?
Do you really want locals to have a greater say in the administration of public resources?
Most of us believe the vast array of fish and wildlife are fellow
travelers on planet earth, or at least public assets. We agree they
are worthy of conservation and stewardship. We can tax ourselves in
support of the broad spectrum of life we share the planet with or
remain mired in a system that is inequitable and inadequate - a system
that places unreasonable burdens on agencies and narrow user groups,
who have largely been working class and less than wealthy.
We don’t have to fantasize about the benefits of public/private partnerships, or efficacy of private investment on public land.
We have been there and done that. BLM lands have involved such
partnerships and private investment since before the agency existed.
Assume you are a BLM Resource Area Manager. You administer a chunk of
public landscape you think costs too much to manage, needs
environmental amelioration and presents opportunities for wildlife
enhancement. You believe federal laws direct you to make changes. The
planning documents for the District encourage your course of action.
Changing the way cattle graze is the normal path to improved management
on public rangeland. You write a new grazing plan for the affected
landscape. The rancher appeals the decision. The attorney for the
rancher drags out a plethora of old documents showing decades of
rancher, private investment on the public range, and numerous
documented handshake and verbal deals between the last seven local BLM
managers and the past couple of generations of ranchers. It’s all over
in about an hour. The Administrative Law Judge pounds the gavel and
finds in favor of the rancher.
Public land should be managed by public, professional land managers; with public money, for public purposes.
Federal land management agencies should manage federal land. State
land managers should manage state land, and you and I should manage our
own land. Aren’t these concepts simple enough? Expecting states or
private parties to provide responsible management of federal resources
is like expecting Ford to provide warranty work for folks who bought a
Chevy.
When I was a boy, my mom would shoo visitors and extraneous family
members out of the kitchen with the admonishment, “Too many cooks in
the kitchen spoil the broth.” We all know this is true. Somehow, when
it comes to public land, we have lost our judgment. How is it possible
to have accountability and responsibility when a small army of
stakeholders, partners, contractors and political suck-ups are
reinventing government daily?
When President Carter was in the White House, the Assistant Secretary
of Agriculture in charge of the Forest Service was an academic with a
history of employment for environmental groups. Under President
Reagan, the former chief council for the largest private purchaser of
federal timber held that post. Critics charged the Clinton presidency
with maintaining a revolving door between top natural resource jobs and
major DC environmental groups. Under the current president Bush, the
door revolves between industry and government. It is impossible to
work in that kind of environment. It is remarkable federal agencies,
whipsawed between polarized ideologues, ever do anything but shuffle
paper and spend money.
The federal government is almost 9 trillion dollars in debt. Isn’t it
time for a little prudence? What federal land management agencies need
is a modest, cost effective agenda focused on resource conservation,
rather than intensive timber, livestock, mineral and playground
development. Agencies went down the intensive timber and livestock
management road for decades and the most intensive aspects of the
programs was the amount of red ink and environmental abuse.
There is no "hidden hand" in the public sector. Which largely explains
why the bulk of public land timber sales have been below cost, why
ranchers using BLM and Forest Service range pay a fraction of what is
paid for private range, and why the 1872 mining law, - granting miners
a right to explore for and exploit public land minerals without
compensation to the public - is still the law of the land. Why would
any reasonable person believe the fee program for public land
recreation would be any better than the fee programs for commercial
users of public lands?
Here is a quote from the BLM final recreation fee guidelines, “Business
plans are to be used in determining appropriateness and level of fees.
Plans will include, but not limited to, the level and types of
development; cost and safety of collection; type, season, duration, and
intensity of visitor use; compliance and enforcement capability;
convenience; partnerships; stakeholder input; impacts to underserved
communities and local businesses; private sector alternatives and a
communication and marketing plan.”
Natural resource managers don’t want to be law enforcement officers or
business executives. They have college degrees in disciplines like
range management, ecology, biology, forestry, soil science. Most of
them aspire to a career of applying sound, science based conservation
to a chunk of public landscape. Bean-counting, DC desk jockeys hatch
half-baked ideas about resource agencies needing to function like
businesses, partnerships, treating people like customers instead of
citizens, intensive management and reinventing government constantly.
During a progressive century before 1980, citizens banded together and
improved their lot. Communities developed municipal fire and police
departments, water districts, and parks. Federal land management
agencies were established. Trails, picnic areas and campgrounds were
an excuse to put men to work who needed work. Americans believed in
fresh air, and thought exposure to nature and God’s creations was good
for character development. Small rural towns were happy to have forest
and park visitors spend time and money in their communities. Land
managers were pleased to have some developments to facilitate
management. A campground, for instance, might be constructed between a
river and a road, vastly reducing wildfire potential.
We didn’t get public libraries, schools, highways, police and fire
departments or parks by funding them with fees, we paid for them with
taxes and the nation is better for it. If you are concerned about
taxes, tell your elected representatives you want to stop subsidizing
the private sector. Federal subsidies weaken and stifle the private
sector. Government today has it backward. Politicians try to convince
us government should slash public services and spend our tax dollars
supporting private business (economic development). Politicians feed
us this slop because politics is about money, and the money comes from
corporations and wealthy individuals demanding subsidies and tax breaks
from government.
When I was a boy, there was a movement to charge people to use public
lavatories. Stalls had coin boxes mounted on them. You had to insert
coins and turn the handle to obtain access to the toilet. Proponents
argued it cost money to have and maintain public facilities and users
should help cover those costs. Pay toilets spread like wildfire, for a
while.
The “Greatest Generation”, expressing better sense, philosophical
foundation and moral fiber than their children and grandchildren, used
all means necessary to flush the pay to poop movement.
Free public restrooms are broadly available today because your parents
and grandparents refused to tolerate abusive public policy. Now it is
our turn.
There is a simple response to those who insist fancy public recreation
amenities cost money and the people who use them should pay for them:
We don’t need no stinking fancy recreation amenities. Public lands are
conservation lands, not playgrounds. Basic facilities are
appropriate. Federal agents don’t have to pander to every fad the
recreation industry decides to pedal. High dollar investment isn’t
needed. If the private sector thinks there is a demand for expensive
amenities, let them make those investments on private land.
The “pay to play” movement is evil.
It is the work of a totalitarian, run amok government willing to abuse
its own citizens. For thousands of generations, all over the world,
humans roamed land for literal, spiritual and aesthetic sustenance.
Public lands are your birthright. You have a fundamental right (not
privilege) to use them for lawful purposes. By fundamental, I mean
like the right to vote, the right to worship as you choose, a free
press, free speech, to assemble peacefully, or eat pizza. This isn’t a
philosophical gray area people can agree to disagree on. The right to
use your public lands is a basic civil right.
Here are a few RAT killing suggestions:
Organized resistance is necessary. Two good organizations to stay in
touch with include Wild Wilderness (www.wildwilderness.org) 248 NW
Wilmington Ave., Bend, OR 97701, 541-385-5261, and the West Slope No
Fee Coalition (www.westernslopenofee.org) P.O. Box 403, Norwood, CO
81423, 970-259-4616. Avoid paying fees and send these folks a few
bucks instead.
Fees exist because special interests have asked politicians for them
and the public has failed to resist. This is also why the federal
government is 9 trillion dollars (over $28,000 for every man, woman and
child in America) in debt and why pork barrel spending is at an all
time high. Only you can stop this abuse.
DO NOT PAY FEES!
Avoid places that charge user fees. Refuse to cooperate with the user
fee program. I note some places are beginning to advertise that user
fees do not apply in their area - support businesses in those areas. A
few state legislatures have adopted resolutions opposing user fees,
recreate in those states.
Encourage your state legislature to adopt a resolution opposing the RAT.
Any time you have an opportunity to complain about user fees to
government agents, take the opportunity. Complaints flow uphill.
Contact Chambers of Commerce where user fees apply, make a point of
letting them know you decided not to come to their area because you
were avoiding paying recreation user fees.
Try to get organizations you are associated with to adopt resolutions
opposing the RAT. Drop your membership in organizations if they
support RAT and similar fees.
Increasingly, politics is about money. It is important to avoid
businesses, organizations, publications and governments supporting
fees. Avoid supporting the businesses and organizations that belong to
ARC. The recreation industry has generally been supportive of fees.
If you are considering buying outdoor recreation equipment, avoid
businesses that support fees. If in doubt, don’t buy.
I believe some fees step so far over the line a general boycott is
necessary. The decision by British Columbia to use the Classified
Waters program to drive working class people off their best fishing
rivers, reserving them for locals and wealthy visitors, is so
fundamentally wrong a general BC boycott is in order. If the kind of
fee system BC has adopted for their best moving trout and salmon waters
becomes popular, outdoor recreation will become the province of the
wealthy.
I am not enthusiastic about either of the major political parties (the
Clinton administration supported recreation fees). The Republicans,
though, have been horrible on the fee issue. The Bush administration
encourages private industry involvement on public land. Overall, the
Bush administration has an abysmal record on natural resource issues.
For instance, while President Bush is supportive of fishing and
hunting, he is hostile to fish and wildlife habitat conservation; this
“double speak” propaganda characterizes his administration. Modern
“conservatives” don’t seem interested in conserving anything. If real
conservatives won’t take back the Republican party from the crackpots,
dreamers and neo-fascists, please take your conservative vote elsewhere.
Don Tryon, January 2007
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