[greg]

Bought my $50 annual state parks pass today, sticks on my windshield not too far from the rearview hanger for my $70 super pass (Golden Eagle for natl parks, NW Forest Pass, BLM, USFWS, natl monuments, plus 20 state parks, all in one). They buddies. But they hates my Fish and Wildlife sticker (fish/shellfish combo I think was $30?) on the back of the truck. The "W" sticker back there (as in Washington, not Geroge), he don't like it either 'cause a 'Coug is a wildlife.

[gary]

I've also bought the all-in-one Golden Eagle type pass every since I moved here five years ago. Figured it was a way to get some funds into the managers hands (hoping that statement doesn't spiral down into the perpetual mismanagement argument...). But if the NPS bans all fish stocking in the NCP, I'm gonna quit spending any money, or time, on any of the national parks. Ruining a good thing...

[oosik]

Here is a pie chart with what the Forest Service claims is their expenses (what they pay out) with Fee Demo funds. The web page with the accounting is here (it is a goofy page that I was only able to read in Internet Explorer). First, right off the top they are wrong with what is shown as the cost of collection on this chart. As shown in the GAO report (GAO-03-470) which can be downloaded here, and explained here, in 2001 $10 million was spent of appropriations to administer collection of the fee in addition to the reported cost of $5 million. As the site explains, that means the cost of collection is over 56%. So if you can imagine starting with a pie that is 56% smaller, then taking slices out of it, there isn't much to go around. I can't get a precise breakdown of what the corrected percentages should be because I can't find a spreadsheet for 2001 online which is the year about which the GAO-03-470 report refers to. For the sake of discussion, imagine if that pie chart was correct. What would you count as funds going toward trail maintenance? It isn't completely obvious. The "Maintenance" line item and "Facility Enhancement" line item sound like they are in the general direction, but since outhouses are not broken out of those pieces, it is difficult to be sure. It may well be that the combination of "Facility Enhancement" and "Interpretation & Signing" deal with things adjacent to the road, which then might leave the general "Maintenance" line item to take up the slack for trails. No matter how you cut it, if the reason someone believes they are supporting Fee Demo is the belief that the money goes right to the trails, they are probably also candidates to sign this petition to ban the use of DiHydrogen Oxide. Hint: DiHydrogen Oxide, or H2O, in spite of sounding very threatening on that web page is actually water!

[Cougar]

[Eric]

One other thing that really irks is the regionalization of the Forest Passes. Maybe this doesn't come up for people who don't travel far afield. And maybe this will change with the America the Beautiful pass. But this year I would have had to buy four seperate forest passes to use USFS lands. I would have had to buy the NW Forest Pass but I also would have needed the equivalents for some hiking I did in Southern California and Arizona: The Adventure Pass and the Red Rocks Pass and the Santa Catalina Mtns Pass respectively. Btw, for those who think we have it bad, the latter two passes are both for AZ which has at least one additional pass that I know of so a total of at least 3 different passes for different national forests in the same state! Can you imagine if the Wenatchee, Okanogan, Mt. Baker/Snoqualmie, Olympic, Gifford Pinchot all had their own passes? Well that is roughly the system that AZ has right now. I have no idea how many passes there are nationally for FS land but that is at least 5 seperate passes just between the four states of WA, OR, CA and AZ and the Adventure Pass only applies to part of CA (although I think N. CA is still pass free, for now?). The only way to get around this AFAICT is with the golden Eagle sticker which only becomes a logical alternative if you use three or more regional passes or if you use the NPS system anyway. I assume that America the Beautiful will make you buy the whole ball of wax at once to maximize revenue. If not though then it would certainly be nice if there was a national forest pass on offer that was actually national but FS only. The NPS has the National Parks pass. The Fish and Wildlife service offers the Duck Stamp nationally. Even the Army Corp of Engineers has a standalone national pass. I don't think the BLM offers a national pass but recreation has never been their priority. Theres a reason for htat joke about BLM standing for the Bureau of Livestock and Mines. Why does the USFS not have a national pass like the other recreation oriented federal agencies?

[polarbear]

I've already expressed my opinion in threads like this and this so....here I get another chance! I think the fee discourages new hikers and spontaneous hiking, i.e. "the sun is finally out, let's do something today." The whole way the new bill was "passed" stinks, but it is quite in line with the way the fee "demo" was continually extended and extended, nearly requiring a new definition for "demo" in Websters.

[Allison]

[Eric]

Interesting to note that one of polarbear's links goes to a thread which links a Seattle Times article (now archived which means you need to register to view it) which includes the following selected quotes:

[Slugman]

All of the constant fee-bashing and complaining serves a purpose but also tends to miss an important point: get the pass, or get a ticket. Tickets can now morph into criminal charges. Or you could stop hiking. Given those three choices, I'll choose the least odious, and get the pass. It stinks that I must get it, but at least by getting it through trail maintenance, my efforts will be 100% efficient at helping our trails, with zero waste, overhead and enforcement. I'd like to see them take some of the trails I'll work on and turn that into pass enforcement! I will be smug in the knowledge that my pass didn't support one penny of any use I don't agree with, since they will have gotten not one penny of my money. If you hate the fee so much, vote out of office the politicians who support it. What, you can't? Then live with it, and make the best of a bad situation. Stop blaming the USFS for it. Ask anyone there, they will say they wish congress would just give them the money they need in the first place and be done with the whole pass thing. If the pass system makes people pay money that is then wasted, it is bad. But if instead it motivates people to do trail maintenance, then it is good. So, do trail maintenance for your pass, and you will have turned something bad into something good. I have in the past just purchased my pass, since it was easier for me to do so. But as I live I also learn, and now I see that there is a better way. Not easier or quicker, just better. So, thanks for all the fee-bashing, because without it I would have just continued on my path of least resistance, and missed a chance to actually help myself and others and also "stick it to the man". Use the logical tool known as "What if everybody did the thing in question, would things be better or worse?" If everyone got their passes by trail maintenance as I am going to do next time, our trails would be vastly improved and congress would be forced to fund enforcement and overhead itself, because there would be no fee money to pay for those things. Another advantage to using trail work to get your pass: you get to choose not just the region that gets the benefit, but the actual trail. For example, I oppose improving trails that are already hikeable when some trails are virtually unhikeable. So, when I choose which project to join, I will avoid ones like the Mt Si improvement, and instead work on something that I might use and enjoy someday. If they ever need anybody to help with prepping the way for a new bridge over the Suiattle at Milk creek, I'm there for sure!

[Malachai Constant]

I couldn't have said it better. Only thing to remember is that WTA is pretty limited on what they can do. The bureauacurcy limits them from making "structures" unless they are approved in advance. The Milk Creek Bridge will have to be done by a contractor for example, the days of felling connivent tree and smoothing the top and a wire rail are long gone I feel

[Quark]

[Slugman]

(Response to Mal): True, but they will still need abutments for that bridge, and logs cleared, and other trail impovements, due to recent neglect because of the bridge being out. And remember, if every pass-buyer instead did two day's trail work, the WTA would have to expand ten-fold at least just to keep all those people busy, and new organizations would also need to form. I'm sure that's a "problem" they'd love to have! I think I'll even send them $30 to join up, just to prove it's the principle of the pass, not the money per se. I really don't care about the $30, that works out to less than 50 cents per wilderness day for me, but I hate to be forced to waste my money and still hike on poorly-maintained trails.

[Malachai Constant]

[Chief Paulina]

It all adds up now. The Feds are squeezing money out of us any way they can. The FS is a victim just like us. Perhaps we could really push this volunteer thing and reverse this trend. Alas, the Fed would dream up something else. Did I understand that Regula does not even have Fee Demos, et al in his own state?

[Eric]

There are federal lands in Ohio of course but Regula is in the House not the Senate so just within his district there are no USFS lands. As you would expect, Eastern congressman were much more supportive of Fee Demo than the Westerners. There are some forests in Appalachia and the Great Lakes but a simple map reinforces why Easterners are willing to pass the buck to the West: Most of the land is in the Western 11 states plus Alaska. I don't have the map handy but if you look at a map with NPS and BLM land thrown in then it gets even much more skewed towards with federal lands in the West. From the Fee Demo supporters' point of view, a nationally funded USFS means funded by their local taxpayers for something "used" more often by Westerners. So fee demo makes sense from that perspective, save your district some money and make others elsewhere pay (even though it is small peanuts overall). Only Stevens really sold out AFAICR among the Western committee chairman and that applies to both parties during both the original Fee Demo and the RAT.