Be a role model, not a whiner

[JpPassenger]

This started in the TDS thread, but it was going way off topic. The title is confrontational, but this thread is not an attack on anyone:

I am grateful to all who give their time and money to preserve off-highway access.

Off-highway recreation on public land is not a right, it is a privilege. Your off-highway recreation privilages are protected by the (too) few who participate in the process.

Public land does not belong to YOU, nor does it belong to ME. It belongs to US, which means we have to share.

The important things most of us already do include volunteering to maintain trails, being a good steward of the lands we play on, cleaning up after ourselves and others, and respecting closed areas regardless of how wrong we feel it is.

We all can and need to do more. We need to write our government representatives at all levels and tell them our concerns. We need to show up at the many hearings regarding land use and deliver our comments.

Be informed. Many members of this board routinely post announcements of hearing and open houses. Grab your freinds and attend. Fill out a speakers card and tell them how much off-highway recreation means to you and your freinds. Consider attending a local Toastmasters meeting or two or ten. This social group helps you develop public speaking skills.

Land managers tend to manage by closure if they don't have resources to patrol and enforce. Consider giving up a weekend a month to your local forest or BLM area's volunteer patrols.

Managing by lawsuit is a wasteful method which works well for the very organized anti-access groups. Consider giving to pro-access groups which fight for your access, such as Blue Ribbon Coalition, CORVA, CA4WDC. Membership dues just about cover newsletters and administrative expenses. Lawsuits are expensive. Give generously if you are able.

Don't be a jerk. Try to understand the concerns of the anti-access folks, instead of just demonizing them. As soon as we start slinging mud, our credibility sinks. By understanding their concerns, you can explain how we are taking steps to address them at hearings and in letters to your congress person. Channel your vitriol into constructive outlets.

If your club is hosting an off-road event, invite the media, and take pains to show them how we are using the land responsibly. Our story should be that we are environmentalists as well. As Jeri Lyn pointed out, being an offroader and an environmentalist is not an oxymoron.

Invite some of your non-wheeling freinds out and show them how responsible we really are. Bonus points if they are a Sierra Club member. Show them that it isn't really like the Jeep/Ford/Chevy/Nissan/Toyota/Hummer commercials.

Start others thinking about why an outdoor ethic is valuable. Just start the conversation. When you see another group spinning donuts in a meadow, ask them -- nicely -- if they understand that some anti-access group is going to turn a photo of that damage into a fundraiser and yet another item justifying the need to close the area.

Challenge others to help.

Respond or react. When you see newspaper articles playing up reckless off-highway recreation, write a letter pointing out that the larger group of us are much more responsible. If its a positive article, write to say how much you enjoyed it, and how it reflects that the larger group of us are responsible.

Whining is like rocking in a chair -- it's something to do, but it gets you nowhere.

Please chime in with your own suggestions.

[FishPOET]

Off-highway recreation on public land is not a right, it is a privilege. Your off-highway recreation privilages are protected by the (too) few who participate in the process.

The environmentalists are well organized, well funded and they have a 25 year head start on us. They have people in key government positions that make decisions everyday that adversely affect motorized recreation and our privileges to recreate on public land. How do you suggest we deal with the thousands of acres of motorized recreation that we have lost, and keep losing?

Public land does not belong to YOU, nor does it belong to ME. It belongs to US, which means we have to share.

The environmentalists need to share as well. Why is it that in the last 25 years we have lost motorized recreation areas and not gained a single acre of new motorized recreation area? Why is it that wilderness area acreage increases every year?

The important things most of us already do include volunteering to maintain trails, being a good steward of the lands we play on, cleaning up after ourselves and others, and respecting closed areas regardless of how wrong we feel it is.

I agree, although being a good steward does not include calling myself an environmentalist.

We all can and need to do more. We need to write our government representatives at all levels and tell them our concerns. We need to show up at the many hearings regarding land use and deliver our comments.

I agree

Be informed. Many members of this board routinely post announcements of hearing and open houses. Grab your freinds and attend. Fill out a speakers card and tell them how much off-highway recreation means to you and your freinds. Consider attending a local Toastmasters meeting or two or ten. This social group helps you develop public speaking skills.

I agree

Land managers tend to manage by closure if they don't have resources to patrol and enforce. Consider giving up a weekend a month to your local forest or BLM area's volunteer patrols.

And then what course of action do we take when land managers that are in charge of motorized recreation start forming partnerships with the Sierra Club and the CBD?

Managing by lawsuit is a wasteful method which works well for the very organized anti-access groups. Consider giving to pro-access groups which fight for your access, such as Blue Ribbon Coalition, CORVA, CA4WDC. Membership dues just about cover newsletters and administrative expenses. Lawsuits are expensive. Give generously if you are able.

I agree

Life memberships sound impressive, but they are really just 3-5 years of prepaid dues, after which they become just an load on the organization's finances.

You just wrote "Give generously if you are able" and then you whine about life memberships? Don't be a hypocrite. I'm sure CORVA, CA4WD and BRC appreciate the monies I have sent them.

Don't be a jerk. Try to understand the concerns of the anti-access folks, instead of just demonizing them. As soon as we start slinging mud, our credibility sinks. By understanding their concerns, you can explain how we are taking steps to address them at hearings and in letters to your congress person. Channel your vitriol into constructive outlets.

I disagree. In my many years of experience I can honestly say that the Sierra Club and the CBD are only interested in permanent closures of ALL motorized recreation in America. I do not want to understand their hypocrisy at all.

If your club is hosting an off-road event, invite the media, and take pains to show them how we are using the land responsibly.

I agree

Our story should be that we are environmentalists as well. As Jeri Lyn pointed out, being an offroader and an environmentalist is not an oxymoron.

I couldn't disagree more. Environmentalists stand for hypocrisy. They want to protect the land and animals only when it is convenient to them. I am proud to drive my Jeep while exploring this great country and if I happen to disturb wildlife in the process...so be it. It is the nature of Jeeping.

Who are you?
http://www.sharetrails.org/public_lands/

Doug Guimond aka FishPOET
Proud to be a life member of CA4WD, CORVA and now BRC

[JpPassenger]

Doug;

I'm a fellow OHV volunteer, still a Host Candidate, though events of the past year have prevented me from participatiing.

I ride dirt bikes, I ride with my wife as she hones her rock crawling skills, I go out with our club, the Roughwheelers IV-Wheel Drive club, and I love being outdoors. Someday I'd like to produce some videos focused on SoCal 4x4 clubs.

I worked my way through my first few years of college as a bicycle mechanic and salesman. I was an avid bicyclist, on and off road. At the time, we were facing enormous pressure to close trails to mountain bikes. Our riding group followed the virtual banning of mountain bikes from the SF Bay Area trails, and saw it was coming fast and hard to our favorite trails. My boss and I, as well as my coworkers embarked upon an awareness campaign, similar to what this topic is all about. We didn't have the answers. But we knew that all together, we could show our numbers, and that we were responsible.

We chatted up our customers, our freinds. We chatted up staff in other bike shops, and got a number of them in the same mindset. Most bike shop owners paid some degree of attention, as the growing sales were too hard to ignore. But mostly we tried to talk to the riders who couldn't be bothered. Some of these guys were the same guys running hikers off the narrow trails, and making the news in the process. And all the nodding about attending hearings, meeting officials, etc. But only a small slice of the mountain bike community showed up. And speaking to riders afterwards, they didn't have time, they forgot, they didn't know.

A handful of jerks can undo the best intentions of the larger group. That and apathy made us irrelavant. We lost three of our prime trails, leaving nothing very interesting to ride on. And the two new trails which were opened before I left the area were off-limits to mountain bikes as well.

I agree, organizations appreciate every penny we send them, including life memberships. I wrote that with a bit of spite that you don't fully deserve. My appologies.

I didn't have the answers then, and I certainly don't have them now. I hope to engage people and get them involved.

It's no secret that we off-road recreationalists are exploding in population. The swelling ranks are increasingly squeezed into fewer places to play. My friend teaches off-highway training courses up in Gorman, and it is amazing to see the number of first timers in brand new Hummers, Toyotas, Jeeps, Rovers and so on show up monthly. Maybe our representative aren't aware of just how many of their constituates are interested in preserving off-highway access. Some of these folks will have no clue about any access battle going on until someone like you or I tell them.

I won't argue about the hypocrisy you see in the notion of an environmentalist-wheeler. From my experiences talking with people on the trail and on various forums, I'd propose most agree there is no conflict in the notion. There are shades of grey.

Try to understand the concerns of the anti-access folks, instead of just demonizing them. As soon as we start slinging mud, our credibility sinks. By understanding their concerns, you can explain how we are taking steps to address them at hearings and in letters to your congress person. Channel your vitriol into constructive outlets.

I disagree. In my many years of experience I can honestly say that the Sierra Club and the CBD are only interested in permanent closures of ALL motorized recreation in America. I do not want to understand their hypocrisy at all.

We are not trying to win over the anti-acess folks. We are trying to persuade our congressperson/representative/assemblyperson/District manager/forrest supervisor to see that we need access as well and are aware of and addressing issues raised.

I'll tell you, If I did have a good answer or two, my name would be as common as Del Albright or Ed Waldheim, because I would beat people over the head with it every chance I got. But the best I got is giving money, attending hearings, and speaking/writing letters with a reasoned argument.

I did not submit the post or link to the BRC site. I was surprised to see it as well. I've kept my preaching here and at our club meetings.

Regards,
Greg Allen

[FishPOET]

We are not trying to win over the anti-acess folks. We are trying to persuade our congressperson/representative/assemblyperson/District manager/forrest supervisor to see that we need access as well and are aware of and addressing issues raised.

In the last few months I have spent a lot of time in the Angeles and Cleveland National Forests and to be honest their OHV trail systems are a mess. More dead end spurs than through routes along with seasonal and environmental closures that make it difficult for even the most experienced and well intentioned OHVer to understand or follow the rules. It gave me a whole new level of respect for the amazing job that Gene Zimmerman and Greg Hoffman did in building and maintaining the OHV infrastructure that we all enjoy in the San Bernardino National Forest.

How do we get more leaders like Gene Zimmerman and Greg Hoffman in place in not only the Cleveland and Angeles National Forests, but the BLM as well? How do we get some of the gates and routes re-opened? How do we get more black diamond routes built or opened? How do we get the government to improve their communication with the recreating public?

How do we stop the leadership of the SBNFA from forming partnerships with the Sierra Club and the CBD which threatens the OHV infrastructure that is already in place in the San Bernardino National Forest?

I wish I had more answers than questions. I do know that I will be at the meetings concerning the concerning the expanded wilderness area closing the talus slope (3N69A) on Gold Mountain to motorized recreation. I hope everyone understands that the wilderness expansion is a done deal and there is nothing we can do about it. Our only hope is that we can persuade the powers to be to keep a motorized corridor through the wilderness, but from previous experience and many conversations with Greg I am not optimistic about or chances.



Executive Order 11644, signed in 1972 and amended in 1978 and 1987.

An estimated 5 million off-road recreational vehicles--motorcycles, minibikes, trial bikes, snowmobiles, dune-buggies, all-terrain vehicles, and others--are in use in the United States today, and their popularity continues to increase rapidly. The widespread use of such vehicles on the public lands--often for legitimate purposes but also in frequent conflict with wise land and resource management practices, environmental values, and other types of recreational activity--has demonstrated the need for a unified Federal policy toward the use of such vehicles on the public lands.

http://www.archives.gov/federal-regi...der/11644.html

In a February 2004 speech, Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth said “In the United States the number of off-road vehicles users has just exploded. Ninety-nine percent of the users are responsible”.

Logic dictates that if we have an executive order mandating managed OHV use on public lands and 99% of OHV users are responsible recreationists, then we should not be losing trails to closures.

[JpPassenger]

Yes, these are people who single-handedly made a difference from the inside. FishPoet indirectly points out another way to help: go to work for the land managment agencies. The job can be frustrating, and the pay is low, but you are in a very good position to influence people, as Greg Hoffman has done.

When I last checked about 8 months ago, the federal jobs listing had a number of announcements for recreational specialists to run regional OHV programs for the FS and BLM. Mike Aherns of the Barstow BLM office got the El Centro position. Many of the top positions may have been filled from within, leaving more lower level vacancies. With our encouragement and assistance, some of these folks can become movers and shakers as well.

The state was (still is, perhaps?) recruiting Park Ranger Cadets. I completed the interveiw and exam process and am now on the list for a position. My desire is to become very involved in OHV issues if my number comes up.

The following announcement about an opening in the Cleveland Natl Forest was posted Jan 17 on the SBNFA-OHV yahoo group. The poster followed up after speaking with the the hiring department that they were looking for someone with a strong OHV background. This person could become the Greg Hoffman for the CNF:

Forestry Technician (Recreation), GS-0462-06/07

POSITION NUMBER: AR5026

INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT: Serves as an assistant to the District Recreation Officer on a Ranger District performing a variety of project plans in support of the District's recreation program. Manages intensive use recreation areas with campgrounds, day use sites, trails and wilderness.

Forest Recreation Support 100%
Applies conventional technical and administrative solutions to a variety of recreation-related problems, such as site care and maintenance, policing, and recreation resource protection.
Coordinates with wilderness and other forest personnel, such as the Recreation/Lands Staff Officer, to develop an overall Recreation Plan for developed and dispersed recreation sites. For example, participates in the development of plans for recreation or wilderness area maintenance, rehabilitation, reconstruction, and construction projects in accordance with program management objectives and policies. Recommends settings for a variety of proposed recreation facilities and provides information about the characteristics of each area. Participates in the implementation of recreation operation and maintenance plans for developed and dispersed recreation sites. Takes independent action to correct items within the scope of the approved operating plans. Recommends measures to improve the administration of recreation programs. Gathers data for project proposals, reports, surveys, and other needs by making on-the-ground field inventories, use counts, time studies, etc. Compiles
data and recommends a course of action or placement of facilities. Defines data needed to monitor and assess recreation conditions.
Provides input to the budget planning by assisting with the overall estimation of materials, personnel, and supplies needed for work accomplishment. Prepares budget requests and adjusts program priorities to reflect the actual funding levels appropriated.
Conducts Limits of Acceptable Change (LAC) studies, interpreting findings, making recommendations, and suggesting alternative methods for meeting objectives and complying with policies.
Provides public information and interpretive services. Provides liaison with community organizations and interest groups to stimulate interest in and utilization of forest recreation facilities. Determines and recommends opportunities for community members to participate in programs and activities. Coordinates group visits with operational personnel and communicates schedules and requirements for logistical support. Recruits and trains volunteers.
Approves recreation area and special-use applications and permits. Assists with performing compliance checks and inspections on existing permits under Special-Use authorization. Assists with the enforcement of Off-Road-Vehicle (ORV) restrictions, including maintenance and posting of regulatory signs and enforcement of restrictions. Monitors, inspects, and reports on contracted operations for compliance with contract provisions. Assures that recreation fees are collected for all fee areas, and that the funds are accounted for and transmitted to the appropriate unit. Enforces Title 36 CFR requirements, or comparable and related regulations, including the issuing of violation and warning notices. Insures transmittal of violation notices to the United States Magistrate. Appears as necessary at hearings before the U.S. Magistrate.

Factor 1-5
Knowledge Required by the Position
A thorough technical knowledge of Forest Service recreation management policies and procedures for care and policing, compliance checks and equipment use to attain recreation management objectives.
Knowledge of budget preparation to develop operating plans, estimate costs and schedule recreation management work projects.
Knowledge of data collection techniques for use in INFRA/MM documents.
Knowledge of recreation inventory/planning systems; i.e., ROS, RIM, VMS, INFRA, MM and CRM to summarize data and complete reports for review of supervisor.
Ability to effectively meet and deal with Human Resource enrollees, volunteers, contractors, coworkers, and Forest visitors; and demonstrate Good Host principles.
Knowledge of health and safety hazards, water quality standards, and accepted safety practices to prevent disease, injury or loss of life.
Knowledge of Federal, State and local laws and regulations to perform basic law enforcement duties. Ability to prepare written notices and statements.
Factor 2-3
Supervisory Controls
The supervisor initially provides direction on the priorities, objectives, and/or deadline for types of work previously performed by the unit and therefore covered by precedent.
The incumbent carries out, coordinates, and gives assignments in terms of yearly management objectives and general instructions regarding priorities and potential problems. Incumbent independently develops and implements action plans to carry out the work to accomplish program objectives. The incumbent reviews work for technical adequacy, adherence to schedules, and conformance with established politices and is expected to resolve most problems independently. Unusually complex problems and/or questions of policy are discussed with the supervisor.
Completed work is reviewed for compliance with policy and technical requirements.
Factor 3-2
Guidelines
Procedures for doing the work have been established and a number of specific guidelines are applicable. Guidelines include Cleaning Recreation Sites Publication, Collection Officer's handbook, Forest Plan and all other Forest Service recreation related handbooks and manuals; and oral and written instructions which are specific to the action to be taken.
The incumbent must use judgment in selecting and interpreting from a variety of available guidelines to accomplish recreation management objectives.
Factor 4-3
Complexity
Recreation assignments involve the performance of a variety of related tasks requiring the use of judgment and skill in selecting proper techniques and adapting to situations at hand.
The incumbent must be able to organize personnel, volunteers, equipment, and obtain supplies to carry out recreation program objectives in a complex environment with a strong interface to resource management guidelines. The incumbent must be able to make frequent changes in priorities and develop alternatives in order to accomplish objectives and to effectively explain complex situations involving possible conflicts and multiple objectives of recreational programs to the visiting public and various volunteer and non-profit groups.
Factor 5-3
Scope and Effect
The work involves providing technical management to carry out a variety of operations or project plans in support of the District recreation program. The incumbent executes specific rules, regulations, methods and procedures which typically comprise carrying out program objectives for recreation and completing projects such as campground rehabilitation or coordination of operations on heavy use weekends and holidays.
The work performed by the incumbent will directly effect the District's recreation program and the recreation experience for forest users.
Factor 6-2
Personal Contacts
Personal contacts are with employees in the agency, inside and outside of the immediate organizations, (e.g., personnel from higher level organizational units, or, occasionally, resource persons from State or local government units, or other Federal agencies). In other work situations, personal contacts may be with the general public, contractor personnel, or special users, (e.g., private landowners, cooperators, or business persons). The contacts are usually established on a routine basis, though the employee's authority maynot be initially clear to the person contacted.
Factor 7-2
Purpose of Contacts
The purpose of personal contacts is to: plan and coordinate work efforts; explain the need to adhere to laws, rules, contract, or lease provisions; discuss inspected work and contract requirements when monitoring activity of contractors and resolve problems concerning the work or the peculiar needs of the organization; interpret data obtained and explain its purpose and significance; or reach agreement on operating problems such as recurring submission of inaccurate, untimely, incomplete or irrelevant data. The persons contacted are usually working toward a common goal and generally are reasonably cooperative
Factor 8-2
Physical Demands
The work requires regular and recurring physical exertion related to conservation work requiring walking on rough terrain, climbing steep banks, and jumping ditches and furrows.
Factor 9-2
Work Environment
The work is performed in a forest environment where the terrain may be steep, uneven, rocky, and covered with thick and tangled vegetation. Temperatures may range from very hot and dry to cool and extremely wet. Rain, snow, wind, or dust may be encountered.

There are still new trail opportunities. Just last year, The Freinds of El Mirage and BLM invited our club to create a new 4x4 trail in El Mirage. Mike Ahern was our BLM representative, and great to work with. They said they wanted something challenging. We gave them Fearless' Folly, a brand new black diamond in the north hills.

I don't know much about the SBNFA situation. I gathered that they felt the need to grow and be bigger, make a name for theirselves. Unfortunately, many organizations reach too far beyond their core competancies and subsequently fail at everything. As I said, I know little of the situation, but are there any alternative growth oppotunities we can present them?