Forest Service & BLM up to no good

Forest Service Whistleblower warns of increased fees and decreased facilities.

http://www.wildwilderness.org/blog/artley-alert.html



Letter from former Forest Service Employee warning of coming trouble.

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/100606EB.shtml

Letter about charging fees for Recreation sites and closing thousands
of others.

http://www.westernslopenofee.org/NoFee/RSMFP.pdf

Gee whiz, for such a super-secret government plan, it sure is hiding in plain sight.

Google is your friend: http://www.fs.fed.us/r3/measures/Prioritize/RS-FMP.htm

If you read through much of this, you'll realize that, surprise of surprises, the sky is not falling.

Brenden,
Your obviously new here! We have had none photography topics posted before. So far I have not read the above mentioned links but if it mentions like Art states closings of areas of where we take are great photographs it definitley qualifies.

Changes in visitation fees, access to areas, as well as general environmental issues relevent to Colorado probably do affect my photography. I though the articles were interesting and hope that this will continue as a part of the forum.

Not quite sure where Art said he hated Bush . And national forests issues are perfectly well related to photography. That being said, removal of some toilets, fire rings, and picnic tables doesn't seem like such a bad thing to me ... it would only make the wilderness more wild...kind of ironic that wildwilderness.org is the one complaining about this . And realistically, those who use the existing facilities should probably be the ones paying for them, not the taxpayers.

When the government takes away public facilities it usually is the first step to opening up the area for new logging operations, or in the case of colorado, natural gas drilling.

At least one thing I took issue with from the articles is from this quote, " He also explains that the FS will analyze more developed sites such as campgrounds and determine how much it costs to maintain each site. Then, the FS will compare these costs to "the drastically reduced funding" each national forest receives for recreation. "If there isn't enough money in the budget to operate the developed recreation site to standards, then it will either be converted to a fee site and still be managed by the Forest Service, be obliterated, or be turned over to a private concessionaire who will also charge a fee."

I think it would actually be nice to allow some of the designated public camping areas to become primative camping without the high cost maintenance for trash removal, water, and other maintenance. Might encourage a little lighter impact camping, a better outdoor experience for most, and less of a RV motel environment

One of my friends works for the Department of Interior and works with some of the developement issues with National Parks access and campling. Their budget reductions over the next five years seemed very drastic.

We do have a "Hot Topics" forum for this type of discussions, which are important. Perhaps the moderators will consider relocating the thread rather than deleting it.

Keep in mind that both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Livestock and Mining.. I mean Land Mismanagement... I mean Management... geez... are really just carrying out the policies of the administration. I know of very good rangers, scientists, and administrators working there who at any given time may have great personal conflicts with what their agencies do.

The right course of action is to lobby your elected representatives rather than take it out on the foot soldiers.

Guy

The topic is relevant to our photogaphy interests, but let's make sure we keep the dialogue constructive and on-point.