Mr. Xxxxx Xxxxxxxxx
595 Xxxxxxx Ave.
Oakland, California 94610

Dear Mr. Xxxxxxx:

Thank you for your October 26, 1998, letter to Mike Dombeck protesting trail fees and enclosing a 1-page fact sheet from Wild Wilderness. Mr. Dombeck asked me to respond to you, as manager of the recreation fee demonstration program, of which the trail fees are a part.

We are very much aware of Wild Wilderness and what Scott Silver, head of that organization, alleges. The Public Law 104-134, which authorized the fee demo program, is very specific about the spending of revenues collected under this program. We are obliged to spend the fees on direct on-the-ground costs related to backlogged repair and maintenance, interpretation, signage, habitat or facility enhancement, resource preservation, annual operation (including fee collection), maintenance and law enforcement related to public use. In fiscal year 1997, we spent $426,490 on backlog (which included trail and trailhead maintenance and reconstruction, restroom repairs, water system and campground repairs, and other facility needs in Washington and Oregon alone. In that same year, we spent $776,166 in Washington and Oregon on enhancements, which included trailhead enhancements, safety repairs, expanded interpretive programs, campground repairs, and resource protection.

Mr. Silver is also mistaken in believing that the fee demo program encourages privatization of national forests. Instead, it does quite the opposite. The program allows fees to stay at the site so that Forest Service employees have the funds to manage our recreation sites ourselves instead of having to contract out for those services. For the first time in many years, through this program, our employees feel that they have the power of the purse available to them to improve their recreation programs and offer the public what they really want.

For instance, at Mt. St. Helens, the Johnston Ridge Observatory is now open to the public. Without fee demo dollars it would remain closed. Instead, they were able to have extended summer hours, a full schedule of interpretive programs, full level of maintenance, and limited patrols.

We know of no new federal legislation being drafted that will move public lands to private management for private gain. We are dedicated to the desire to maintain high quality PUBLIC settings, maintained to standards asked for by the public. We continue to be outraged, as you are, by allegations like these.

We agree that wilderness areas should be kept free. National forests need a certain level of maintenance, below which we must close facilities and areas for safety and health violations. We are committed to ensuring that the public has access to free public lands. In places where high impact from people continues to erode the resource, and safety and health issues continue, we seek the least invasive ways to control these impacts. The fee demo program has given us the ability to do just that.

Congress gave us an additional 2 years to test the program, through September 30, 2001. We are now looking at ways of simplifying the program, especially in the Pacific Northwest, so that trail fees and other recreation fees in Washington and Oregon are less cumbersome and intrusive to the public. We are learning and changing.

Thank you for your interest in our public lands.

Sincerely yours,

 
LINDA FELDMAN

Recreation Fee Demonstration Program manager

Wild Wilderness received the letter reproduced above from a third party. We also received the cover letter mailed to that third party along with the US Forest Service response. The cover letter is remarkably telling and is quoted below:

Here's the response I got from the Forest Service regarding fee demo programs. I suspect there's some truth and a whole lot of equivocation. As can be expected even though Linda Feldman personalized her response (and actually had a signature penned), there are some inaccuracies regarding my letter to Mike Dombeck. I didn't enclose a fact sheet from 'Wild Wilderness' in my letter, nor do I know anything about Scott Silver. I can only assume that the word going around to organizations regarding the fee-demo programs has some common origins. Regardless, your interpretation and comments regarding Mr. Feldman's position would be appreciated. --Thanks, Xxxxxxx

This document was prepared by Wild Wilderness. To learn more about ongoing industry-backed congressional efforts to motorize, commercialize, and privatize America's public lands, contact:

Scott Silver, Executive Director,
Wild Wilderness
248 NW Wilmington Avenue,  Bend  OR 97701
Phone (541) 385-5261    E-mail: ssilver@wildwilderness.org