It, and several other embarassing documents were recently removed
from the Internet.
This information has been restored as a public service.
Jack Ward Thomas announced on October 10, 1996, that he will be stepping down from his position as Chief of the Forest Service in mid November. Mr. Thomas, who has led the agency through the past three years, will be retiring from Federal service.
During Chief Thomas’s tenure, he has guided the Forest Service through a painful reduction in employees and a wrenching change in direction. He was also one of the chief architects of the agency’s shift from timber sales to ecosystem management.
"I have accomplished the personal and professional goals that I set for myself when I became Chief - taking ecosystem management forward, integrating science into management decisions, bringing about a cultural change, setting the course to the future, diversifying agency leadership, and re-establishing a land and service ethic for the Forest Service," stated Thomas in his retirement announcement. "I look forward to returning to the West. That’s where my heart is. I’ve been gone too long. There are damn few elk here."
Mr. Thomas will be moving to Missoula, Montana, where he has accepted the Boone and Crockett Chair at the University of Montana.
For several years Congress has been trying to “give birth” to concessions reform legislation. In the final days of the 104th Congress, House Bill 2028 emerged as the most recent front-runner. The quality of the bill, however, deteriorated over the summer and HR 2028 died with adjournment. A similar Senate bill never came out of committee.
What happens next year will depend greatly on the political composition of the House and Senate after the November 8th election. Any changes in the control of the committees and subcommittees with jurisdiction over the National Parks and Forests will be particularly critical.
Will legislation actually be passed in the 105 Congress? There are two very good clues:
NFRA will be watching as the 105th Congress convenes, organizes and goes to work next January. The NFRA Report will continue to keep NFRA members advised as the next round in the concessions reform battle begins.
NFRA is currently accepting nominations for the 1997 Ranger of the Year Award. Selection criteria are described on the Nomination Form on page 11. For more detailed information, contact NFRA at 916-344-5050. The NFRA Ranger of the Year is selected by a Board of Judges consisting of the three NFRA Vice Presidents. 1997 will mark the 15th anniversary of this award.
Event to Launch NFRA’s 50th year!
The NFRA’s 49th annual conference is scheduled for February 26 - 28, 1997, at the Golden Nugget Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.
This year’s conference will mark the kick-off of NFRA’s golden anniversary year. To celebrate, this year’s meetings will include a retrospective on the issues confronted by concessioners on the public lands over the past fifty years and the role NFRA has played in shaping legislation and public policy relative to these problems. The conference will also look forward into the short and long term future of commercial recreation service providers. Presentations will focus on emerging trends in recreation activities, an update of recent Congressional attempts to reform concessions administration, a new look at the emerging Forest Service private/public ventures initiative, and a variety of other topics important to businesses operating on the public lands.
Special Early Bird registration information may be found on page 9. For additional information, contact the NFRA office’s at 916-344-5050. PLEASE PLAN TO ATTEND AND HELP LAUNCH NFRA’s 50th YEAR!
by Eric Mart, President, NFRA
The NFRA Board of Directors, at its October meeting in San Francisco, began setting the stage for the next step in the reinvention of the National Forest Recreation Association. The Board, in light of the negative direction concessions reform has taken in the Congress, has decided it is time for the Association to take the initiative in proposing its own legislation rather than continually reacting to outside attempts to “reform” our industry. This effort will be coupled with a refocusing of the Association’s organizational structure and membership so as to more effectively influence legislative and policy developments at the national level.
Towards these ends, the Board has launched an ambitious, three pronged effort to shape NFRA’s new course for the 21st century. Three new Board committees have been convened to begin working on each of the following objectives:
Each of these committees will be holding one or more workshops between now and the annual meeting next February. The goal for all three groups will be to present an “action plan” outlining NFRA’s proposed future at a special session of the 1997 conference.
The 1997 NFRA Conference marks the beginning of NFRA’s 50th year in existence. It is an especially appropriate time for each of us to look back not only to NFRA’s past, but to our own collective future. This new planning effort is just the beginning.
Are you interested in NFRA’s future? The meetings of all three groups are open to General Members. For information on dates and times of the initial workshops, please contact Jack Harrison at 916-344-5050. 1997 is already a special year in NFRA history. With your participation, and the leadership of the Board of Directors, it promises to be a truly “golden anniversary.”
Eric Mart has served as President of the National Forest Recreation Association since March of 1994.
Mr. Mart is President of the CLM Services Corporation of Palo Alto, California. CLM Services operates commercial recreation services businesses on nine National Forests in the west.
by Jack Harrison,
Executive Director, National Forest Recreation Association
Partnership is a word often used in describing what is involved in helping to make USFS permit operators successful. There needs to be an attitude of “partnership” between permittee and Forest Service personnel, suppliers, employees, and others who have a direct impact on the delivery of customer service.
The success of NFRA also depends on good partnerships. We begin with our members who have come together as partners collectively working for an improved business climate on the public lands. As an association, we have also established partnerships with other private entities that result in a variety of benefits for individual members. Our partnership agreements with the Jim Calfee Insurance Agency and National Sanitary Supply, for example, offer significant savings to NFRA members. On the national level, NFRA’s partnership with the American Recreation Coalition provides our association with access to legislative and policy information which we could not afford to generate on our own.
NFRA is currently discussing additional partnership affiliations with permittee groups operating on public lands administered by agencies other than the Forest Service as well as with other existing associations with interests similar to ours. A partnership with one or more of these groups would have many benefits for NFRA including increased legislative influence, greater revenue and buying power, and expanded industry data.
The value of partnerships is demonstrated each year at the annual NFRA conference. During this time, permit operators, Forest Service and other Federal agency officials, suppliers, and other interested individuals and organizations come together to share information and make new plans for improving their collective interests. The 1997 Conference will be held February 26 - 28 in Las Vegas, NV.
How are your partnerships and what can you do to make them better? For starters, be an advocate for the work of NFRA and challenge non members to “get on the team.” It is only with your help and support that NFRA will become a more effective “partner” in working on behalf of all commercial recreation service providers operating on the public lands.
The Forest Service has taken assertive steps to implement the Recreation Fee Demonstration Program authorized in PL 104-134, the Omnibus Consolidated Rescissions and Appropriations Act of 1996. The purpose of this program is to allow the agency to inaugurate new charges for services and facilities never before authorized. The program includes incentives for local managers that permit the return of fees collected directly back to the locations where they were generated for reinvestment in facilities.
The act initially approved up to 50 fee demonstration projects. As of this writing, the Forest Service has approved 48 locations. The projects selected are diverse in scope and activity, reflecting the breadth of the recreation portfolio. Representative projects include:
The Forest Service sees this demonstration project as a first step towards meeting the challenges of the future in meeting the customers expectations of quality services and facilities. The agency is highly interested in extending the demonstration program and in doubling the number of project sites by 1998.
NFRA President Eric Mart and NFRA Vice President Gaylord Staveley represented the association at the recent Western Summit on Tourism and the Public Lands. This conference, which was held at Lake Tahoe, Nevada, brought together tourism industry leaders and Federal land management officials in an effort to build a better understanding of the importance of the public lands to tourism in the West and to begin building a more collaborative working relationship between the public and private sectors.
Speakers included Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, Deputy Secretary of the Interior, John Garamendi, and William Miller, the Governor of Nevada. The sessions focused on such topics as the need to modernize infrastructure.
A Commentary by Gaylord Staveley,
NFRA Vice President for Long Range Planning
As 1996 winds down, the future does not look particularly bright for the 1,700 resorts, marinas, lodges, campgrounds, pack stations and other small concessionaires who have investments in structural improvements on the National Forests. This class of concessionaires - generaly small, family-owned businesses - is under attack from many different directions.
The Congress - The concession policy reform movement that began in Washington several years ago was originally aimed at changing the way the National Park Service managed a dozen or so of its very large concessions. In recent years, however, the driving purpose of this movement has changed from an effort to reform the Park Service’s management of concessions to a movement to reform how the concessionaires themselves are allowed to operate. In addition, this movement is now focused not only on National Parks, but on concessioners operating on all Federal lands.
The reformers have transformed concessions reform into proposed legislation that will “churn” the concessioner system - extracting more and more money for the government every time the ownership of a concession business changes hands. Because smaller permits expire more frequently, the brunt of this “churning” effect will fall on small businesses - particularly those on National Forest lands.
The Forest Service - In the past, small businesses generally had the support of the Forest Service. That is now changing.
There is widespread evidence of a growing movement within the agency to drop its traditional commitment to small, family-owned businesses as the primary delivery system of recreational services on the National Forests. Some within the agency are openly stating that the small concessioners have “had their day” and that it’s time to get rid of them. Many in the agency believe that “big business” is the answer to their current funding woes - suggesting that large corporations might take on all the concessions on a single Forest, much like the National Parks model.
While this shift towards big business is gaining momentum, there are others in the agency talking about taking concessioned sites back into government ownership and/or operation in order to make up for budget shortfalls. This is especially true in agency discussions of concessioned campgrounds, but the idea of the Forest Service running its own resorts and marinas has also been brought up for serious discussion - and at the highest levels of the agency.
None of this new thinking is good news for the families and small businesses who currently own and/or operate resorts, marina, campgrounds, pack stations, and other visitor services on the National Forests. Clearly the brief era of “partnership” is giving way to newer ways of thinking within the Forest Service - ways of thinking that are openly hostile to the agency’s current concessionaires.
Industry Support Groups - Industry associations, their support groups, and their lobbyists are generally grouped at the ends of the concessioner spectrum. The big business “heavy hitters” lie at one end while the more “romantic” outfitters and guides are at the other. All of the reform legislation that has been proposed to date has been drafted to reflect the needs of these tow extremes - the very big or the very small. There is very little “para-political” support for the needs of those in the middle - small to mid-sized businesses with capital investments on the Federal lands.
During this past half century, NFRA has focused on protecting its members from external threats: defending the interests of Forest-based concessioners against harmful and/or unfair legislation, agency policies and regulations, and administrative procedures. NFRA has never really turned its focus inward - on concessioner performance. Given the lack of “para-political” support for our types of businesses, perhaps it is time we do so.
I know from my own 14 year involvement with NFRA that there are some concessioners that neither the Forest Service nor NFRA are very proud of. Many operations are under-capitalized and some concessioners are “cutting corners” that shouldn’t be cut. Although I realize that some of this activity is the result of concessioner responses to antiquated Forest Service policies and adversarial attitudes regarding concession operations, this type of behavior still gives concessioners - and NFRA - a negative image. Perhaps its is time to re-constitute NFRA as the representative of a select group of “quality” concessioners - operators who give our industry a positive image.
In the current environment, an excellent operation may not insure your survival, but a bad operation plays right into the hands of everyone who wants you out. I believe that the first step to building effective political support for NFRA is to make NFRA membership mean something special. In my opinion, it should stand for quality operators who provide excellent customer service according to high ethical standards.
I firmly believe that the need for small businesses on the National Forests will not go away - despite the efforts of Congress or the wishes of the agency. As the politicians and the Forest Service may learn the hard way, big business will pick up only the choice operations and will ultimately close or throw away the small, marginal, or remote concessions - regardless of the service they provide. We need to hang on and we need a new NFRA strategy to do so.
Our February 1997 Conference will provide a forum to discuss these issues and an opportunity to devise new strategies for a viable future. I urge all of you to attend and ask that you try and bring other concessioners into our discussions. Our futures really are at stake!
Focus on National Scenic Byways
U.S. Representatives James Oberstar (D-MN) and Sam Farr (D-CA) and Deputy Secretary of Transportation Mort Downey addressed a group of recreation leaders late in September at a special Congressional event focused on the National Scenic Byways program and the newly organized Congressional Task Force on Scenic Byways.
Mr. Oberstar, currently the Ranking Minority Member on the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and considered by many the “godfather” of the National Scenic Byways Program, outlined some of the factors leading to the program’s development. He explained how he had seen the program as an effective way to capitalize on two major social trends: the growing interest among Americans in leisure driving and the great appreciation for scenic beauty demonstrated by Americans and visitors alike. “People want to see vast open spaces uncrowded with people,” he stated.
Mr. Oberstar also commented on the upcoming reauthorization of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) - which includes the National Scenic Byways Program. He stressed that ISTEA, with its focus on connecting all modes of transportation and enhancing overall transportation efficiency, represents a significant departure from previous highway legislation.
Representative Farr, who is organizing the Congressional Task Force on Scenic Byways in the House of Representatives, followed up on this comment by stating that, like the earlier Highway Beautification Act, ISTEA was particularly significant because it focused on the whole picture of how people travel. He also stressed the underlying, tourism related economic values of the Scenic Byways program noting, “There is a correlation between beauty and bucks.”
Secretary Downey closed the presentation with a commitment to recommend the continued inclusion of the Scenic Byways Program in the new transportation legislation. He also indicated the administration’s willingness to work with the Congress in supporting reauthorization.
A Guest Column by Derrick Crandell,
President, American Recreation Coalition
As the 104th Congress neared adjournment in early October, recreation and parks matters were a major focus. Funding levels for federal recreation programs during Fiscal Year 1997 were determined and provisions ranging from recreation fee reform to creation of a national lakes study commission were actively debated. When the dust finally settled, those of us in the recreation community were able to celebrate several important accomplishments.
On the funding front, appropriations for Fiscal Year 1997 will be higher for nearly every federal recreation program than the previous year, although most increases are small. The appropriations measure did strengthen the recreation fee demonstration program now under way at four agencies, reinforcing the belief among most recreation leaders that increases in funding for federal programs will come chiefly through additional recreation fees charged for specific services and facilities. The Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service may now designate up to 100 sites each as fee demonstration sites, up from the previous limit of 50. Moreover, the fee demonstration program was extended one fiscal year to cover FY 99. Under the demonstration program, all collected fees are available immediately to the agencies, with at least 80% of the collections remaining at the collection site.
More than a score of parks and recreation issues were under discussion in the waning days of the Congress through an “omnibus” bill built around changes affecting the President of San Francisco. Provisions considered at some point in the debate included: concession reform; permanent recreation fee reform; simplifying revisions to the fee formula used for ski areas on national forests; several land exchanges, including one that is key to the 2002 Winter Olympics; creation of a national commission to study recreational enhancements at federally-managed lakes and reservoirs; and new authorization for the National Park Foundation to recruit “corporate sponsors” to boost park budgets.
Several of these provisions were not included in the final bill. Specifically, attempts to negotiate a consensus measure on concessions failed while the fees provision made a surprising appearance on a White House list of provisions which would prompt a veto of the entire bill - despite earlier, clear indications from the Department of the Interior that the revised fee program had that department’s support. And “Doonesbury” cartoons ridiculing the corporate sponsorship of parks made the issue far too controversial for action less than five weeks before national elections. All three provisions were therefore dropped prior to House passage of the legislation on September 28. The remaining provisions - ski fee reform, the Olympics land trade, and the study of federally-managed lakes and reservoirs - were included in the measure passed by the Senate on its final day, October 3, and sent to the President for his signature.
Although most of the good news for the recreation community is related to actions taken at the very end of the legislative session, we can also point to significant successes earlier in the 104th Congress. For example, the National Recreation Fee Demonstration Program - additionally enhanced in the session’s final days, as described above - was actually initiated less than a year ago. This is truly a breakthrough program because it allows the public to show the types of services it wants on public lands and provides federal agencies with new resources to deliver those services. In addition, we straightened out the funding impasse that had prevented the flow of grant monies to the states for the National Recreational Trails Fund. Now we’re seeing state trail programs undertaking a variety of needed projects as those federal funds are matched with additional funds and in-kind services from the state agencies and trail organizations. Even where we did not get final action - on permanent recreation fee reform, for example - we made dramatic progress which should translate into bipartisan legislation in the 105th Congress.
These are exciting days for the recreation community - and the reason is clear. Our ability to achieve such success in the midst of fierce partisan wrangling simply underscores the power of our message: recreation is very important to all of the American people.
The American Recreation Coalition is a federation of more than 100 of the country’s leading recreation-related associations and companies.
The next regular meeting of the NFRA Board of Directors will be at 9:00 am on February 26, 1997. The Board will also be conducting workshops regarding NFRA’s future direction and organization on the preceding afternoon. Both sessions will be held at the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas, NV.
The NFRA annual member’s meeting will be held on February 28, 1997, in conjunction with the annual conference. Board elections will be held at that time. A meeting of the new NFRA Board of Directors will follow the annual meeting.
by Scootch Pankonin,
NFRA Washington Representative
If there is a point of consistency from one session of the U.S. Senate to the next, it is the certainty that a handful of minority party members will shut down the works well before the gavel goes down.
The 104th Congress has been no exception. What was exceptional is the extensive menu of recreation-related issues that were losers when Congress reached gridlock in the weeks prior to the final adjournment.
A final version of HR 2028, concessioner reform, was pulled off the calendar of the House Committee on Resources by its chairman, Don Young of Alaska. In ending further action on concession reform, the chairman was responding to calls from other Republicans on the committee.
They complained that a new version of HR 2028 released in mid-September was the “worst ever” iteration of this long-negotiated piece of legislation. At the end, virtually all industry support for HR 2028 eroded away, leaving only one trade association and a handful of companies that want new entry into the National Parks concession system supporting the bill.
Its author, Representative Jim Hansen of Utah, apparently got last minute election jitters about his inability to move forward such a visible piece of reform legislation. Staff from the parks subcommittee, which Hansen chairs, therefore began negotiations with the National Parks and Conservation Association (NPCA) during the August recess. Ultimately, Hansen reached his compromise with Representative Jan Meyers of Kansas, the House sponsor of the NPCA-supported Bennett-Bumpers legislation brought forward from the previous Congress.
Their compromise was scheduled for immediate mark-up before the full committee with the intention of attaching concession reform to the Presidio parks package. But as industry leaders and Republican colleagues reached Chairman Young, he became increasingly skeptical. He was outspoken in his opposition to burdening the parks package further with such a controversial bill.
Hansen’s last version of concession reform was a Parks-only bill containing straight fee-bidding for all concessionaires. Standardized fees and other provisions for outfitters and guides were stripped. “Excellent” ratings were required on performance evaluations to earn minimal performance-based credit in the competitive bidding process. All aspects of each competitive offer being equal, the incumbent who had earned “excellent” on at least 50% of the annual evaluations over the term of the permit would be able to use such credit as a “tie breaker.”
This performance-based tie breaker couldn’t be used against any “superior offer”, however. It seemed unlikely to current concessionaires that a batch of new offers would be some homogeneous - especially given that offers from prospective new competitors would often be based on promises and an untested ability to perform.
The compromise provided existing concessionaires a five-year transition into the system. New performance evaluation criteria and ratings would go into effect immediately, and the permit put up for bid, once five annual evaluations had occurred. As a practical matter, this meant that the incumbent concessioner would need to earn “excellent” ratings in 3 out of 5 ratings - or 60% of the term of transition - to be eligible for the tie breaker benefit when his or her permit was put out to bid.
Chairman Hansen’s effort on fee legislation proved to be far less controversial, but was nonetheless stripped by House members in the last weekend of negotiations over the cumbersome, omnibus parks package. Through no fault of the chairman’s, congressional budget rules had steadily whittled away at how much of the fees generated would be allowed to be retained at the point of collection.
The fee bill ultimately failed along with more than 100 other bills related to recreation, conservation, and other aspects of parks management.
Needless to say - we are looking forward to the 105th Congress - and the next round of concessions reform - with more than a little interest.
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Updated membership rosters, lists of Board members and officers, and past issues of the
NFRA Report may all be accessed. Pay us a visit in cyberspace!
Americans’ Views of Recreation Opportunities Remain Upbeat
Although the election season may highlight the many disagreements among Americans, one set of polling numbers shows overwhelming public agreement on one point - outdoor recreation in the United States has a bright future. The reasons behind this optimistic outlook can be found in the 1996 Recreation Quality Index (RQI).
The RQI is based upon three years of national surveys conducted by Roper Starch Worldwide and sponsored by the Recreation Roundtable. In 1996, the Roundtable was joined by an additional sponsor - the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).
Each year, 2000 Americans are asked to share views on changes in recreation opportunities, in plans for participation and their satisfaction with recent outings. Data from the initial 1994 survey was used to establish the RQI baseline of 100, and the index has shown increases in each of its first two years of use. In 1995, the overall RQI rose to 107, while this year it reached 109.
The overall RQI is broken down into separate readings for each of the survey’s three components - opportunities, participation, and experiences. For the second year in a row, the hottest component of the index is public satisfaction with the quality of recent recreation experiences, which rose to 120. After a small decline in 1995, the public’s evaluation of the recreation opportunities available to them rose to 101, while the participation element showed an increase to 105.
In 1995, the survey demonstrated a significant climb in recreation participation at the highest levels - those who participate once per month or even more frequently. In 1996, more than half of all Americans again reported engaging in recreation at least monthly - but the percentage did not grow further from the 1995 levels. In fact, Americans reported in participating in fewer activities: on average 3.3 activities in 1996 versus 4.0 activities in 1995. Roper noted that this “mainstreaming” - focusing more time and resources on a smaller number of activities - is also appearing in other uses of time.
Satisfaction with recreation experiences also tell an interesting tale. In general, satisfaction with recreation experiences locally is declining, including perceptions of availability of activities and instruction, quality of service provided by park staff and the value for fees paid. In contrast, satisfaction with vacation experiences has climbed. For the first time, more than half of the survey respondents rated the amount of activities and instruction available at vacation sites as either excellent or very good, and quality and value assessments rose even more sharply. The survey does not differentiate among recreation providers, so it is unclear whether the increased satisfaction should be credited to public agencies or private companies in the recreation field.
For the first time in 1996, the Roundtable study asked questions regarding awareness and use of recreational facilities managed by Federal agencies. 72% of all respondents know of National Park Service-managed areas while 62% know of specific U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service areas and 59% know of Forest Service sites. For the Bureau of Land Management, recognition within the west was dramatically higher than nationally - 54% in the region versus 33% nationally. When asked about visits to these lands, 21% report visits to National Park Service sites and an equal 9% report visits to Forest Service and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sites. Overall, seven in ten Americans reported no visits to Federal recreation areas during the last year. Thus, the large number of estimated visits to Federal sites - some two billion in 1995 - represents a large number of visits by a relatively small group of Americans.
The 1996 survey was also designed to help the recreation industry and government officials understand public attitudes towards higher recreation fees, asking how much more recreationists would have been willing to pay on their last visit to a Federal recreation site. Four out of five reported a willingness to pay more while one in five were unwilling. Not surprisingly, those who were extremely satisfied with their most recent experiences at Federal sites were far more likely to pay higher fees.
Recreationists who were least willing to pay higher fees were fisherman, RV’ers, and motorcyclists/snowmobilers. Campground users and off-road bicyclists reported the highest willingness to pay more.
The three surveys conducted since 1994 have all shown that the American public sees outdoor recreation in a very positive light. Overwhelming majorities of the public regard recreation as an important means to gain fun, fitness, family togetherness, and familiarity with the environment.
The Recreation Roundtable is comprised of chief executives from more than twenty of America’s leading recreation companies, including Coleman, REI, Walt Disney Attractions, Times Mirror Magazines, L.L. Bean, and KOA.
The Association’s Nominating Committee is currently seeking candidates to serve on the NFRA Board of Directors. A total of eight Board positions are up for election. Board members will serve a three year term expiring in 2000.
If you are interested in serving, or wish to nominate someone else to serve, please submit your suggestions in writing to Mr. Cliff Cheney, Vice President for Membership Services, NFRA, P.O. Box 191455, Sacramento, CA 95819. Mr. Cheney may be reached by telephone at 209-965-4355.
Support Your NFRA Vendor Members |
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Advanced Composting
Animal Pest Management
Jim Calfee Insurance Agencies, Inc.
Call Home, Inc.
Fluid Manufacturing
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JWH Distributing
National Sanitary Supply
Outdoor Creations
Startronics Solar Lighting, Inc
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In an October address to recreation industry leaders, Dr. Michael Dombeck, the Acting Director of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), pointed out the importance of recreation as an “industry” on the public lands of the West - an importance, he noted, that is not widely appreciated by the public.
Dr. Dombeck pointed out that land managers currently have the opportunity to prepare properly for the future by looking at both the economic and demographic factors that will affect the use of public lands and the ecological condition of the land itself. Managers need to ask themselves questions like: Why are people moving into these regions? What are they looking for in their environment? What will be the impact of such growth on the local economy? What effect will there be on the demand for public lands?
Dr. Dombeck then noted that public land managers and the recreation community have a common problem: a lack of public appreciation for their importance. He pointed out that the public land agencies are the fourth largest revenue generator for the United States (after the Internal Revenue Service, the Customs Service, and the Minerals Management Service), pumping millions of dollars back into local economies for essential items like roads and schools, and yet, “we aren’t loved.” Similarly, he noted, the recreation industry, the biggest single industry sector on the public lands, is frequently treated as an “afterthought” in public land policy decisions. Why is there such a gap between perception and reality? “We don’t tell our stories,” he concluded simply.
In Dr. Dombeck’s view, the recreation industry needs to find a way to get its economic story told in a believable fashion. Despite the common view of recreation as less significant than other uses of the public lands, Dr. Dombeck asserted his belief that “the long-term future of public lands will be associated with recreation.”