PUBLIC LANDS: Outdoor enthusiasts trumpet collaboration, urge caution on Antiquities Act
Michelle Merlin, E&E reporter
Published: Friday, June 28, 2013
Outdoor recreation boosters shared their ideas for maintaining trails yesterday with a House Natural Resources subcommittee.
The Subcommittee on Public Lands and Environmental Regulation's hearing coincided with a Government Accountability Office report on a significant maintenance backlog at the Forest Service. The agency was short about $314 million in 2012 for trail maintenance, GAO found.
Witnesses told lawmakers it's worth improving trails developed over time without proper construction techniques and materials.
"Significant quantities of the trails currently in use on [federal] or public lands were not designed or constructed to be sustainable recreational trails," said Greg Martin, Wood River trails coordinator and cycling advocate from Idaho.
"They were developed as temporary extraction roads, fire breaks, hunting routes or game trails. No others that have been repurposed as long-term public access trails. A purposefully designed trail system is light on the land, showcases the landscape, steers visitors away from sensitive areas and provides a broad range of experiences."
Martin has been working with the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management and other agencies to create opportunities for cyclists on public land. This collaboration is key going forward, he said.
Other witnesses also extolled the value of cooperation and collaboration among public and private entities.
"I think the bottom line is working together and collaborating with people. I think that's the key," said Lynn Jackson, a county councilman in Utah who worked for the BLM for more than 30 years. "There's a mighty big landscape in our part of the world. [Land designations] have to be an all or nothing."
Jackson and Ashley Korenblat, the managing director of the nonprofit Public Lands Solutions and president of outfitter Western Spirit Cycling, criticized the Antiquities Act of 1906 -- which empowers the president to restrict the use of federal land -- because it excludes local input. The law has been used more than 100 times.
Korenblat didn't say the law should be abolished, just used infrequently.
"The legislative process is much, much to be preferred," she said.
The Antiquities Act has been the focus of Republican ire in recent months, with lawmakers offering proposals aimed at stifling the president's ability to designate national monuments.
