{"id":46151,"date":"2021-06-23T18:17:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-24T00:17:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/overrun-national-forests-prompt-action-from-u-s-congress\/"},"modified":"2021-06-24T00:17:00","modified_gmt":"2021-06-24T00:17:00","slug":"overrun-national-forests-prompt-action-from-u-s-congress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/overrun-national-forests-prompt-action-from-u-s-congress\/","title":{"rendered":"Overrun national forests prompt action from U.S. Congress"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The
The waterfall at Spotting Rock at Hanging Lake in Glenwood Canyon. For the high country mayors, commissioners and county managers who have felt required to spend their constituents\u2019 tax dollars maintaining federal forests, the SHRED Act is a welcome alternative to the strange arrangement they\u2019ve put up with for several years. (Hyoung Chang\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Hyoung Chang<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

DENVER (AP) \u2013 A few years ago, the U.S. Forest Service sat down with Eagle County officials and delivered some bad news: The federal agency was short-staffed and would be closing campgrounds in the mountainous county that includes Vail, where outdoor recreation is king.<\/p>\n

Eagle County responded by spending its own tax dollars to pay Forest Service employees, an unusual arrangement that has become commonplace in Colorado\u2019s high country, where waves of tourists have poured into some of the most-visited forests in the nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has rubbed some within the community the wrong way because it\u2019s a federal property and they should manage it with federal money,\u201d Eagle County Commissioner Jeanne McQueeney said. \u201cBut if that money is not allocated then they manage it by closing. They don\u2019t have the people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colorado\u2019s ski areas send about $25 million a year in fees to the federal treasury in exchange for being on federal land, and only a small fraction returns to those forests for management. That is a frustrating contrast for ski companies that can\u2019t get expansions and upgrades approved in a timely way and for local governments that must maintain the forests or lose their economies\u2019 golden goose.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is that money being generated here and then taken to Washington and thrown into the treasury,\u201d Breckenridge Mayor Eric Mamula said, \u201cinstead of being allocated for things that are needed in the forests?\u201d<\/p>\n

Coloradans in Congress from both political parties have sought a solution for several years but nothing has made its way to a president\u2019s desk yet. The latest bill has the support of Colorado\u2019s two U.S. senators, as well as Democratic Rep. Joe Neguse and Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert, who together represent all of the high country.<\/p>\n

Neguse calls the current arrangement \u201coutrageous,\u201d saying the Forest Service \u201chas been unable or unwilling to invest the necessary resources to do the work they are obligated to do under federal law.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018A lot to handle\u2019<\/div>\n

White River National Forest, which spans nine counties and a dozen ski areas across northwest Colorado, is the most popular forest in the U.S. In 2008, its Eagle-Holy Cross Ranger District in Eagle County had seven full-time employees on front country management \u2013 permitting, interacting with visitors, maintaining facilities.<\/p>\n

A decade later, in 2018, it had one, according to the Northwest Colorado Council of Governments.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a lot of forest for one guy,\u201d said Jon Stavney, the council\u2019s executive director, \u201cYou wouldn\u2019t run a sheriff\u2019s department that way.\u201d His organization sent a letter to Congress in 2018 warning of the shortage and urging action.<\/p>\n

Ski areas saw the problem first. For those 122 nationwide that reside on federal land, changes to slopes must be approved by the U.S. Forest Service, which studies their environmental impact. But the yearslong delays mean \u201cski areas are slow to upgrade critical infrastructure,\u201d Alan Henceroth, chief operating officer at Arapahoe Basin, recently told a congressional panel.<\/p>\n

By 2018, mountain counties realized the problem was beyond the ski areas: Rangers were tasked with overseeing massive stretches of land, making it difficult for them to put out all the campfires left burning.<\/p>\n

\"Vail
Vail Pass Recreation Area covers 85 square miles of the White River National Forest. Colorado\u2019s ski areas send about $25 million a year in fees to the federal treasury in exchange for being on federal land, and only a small fraction returns to those forests for management. (John Meyer\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>John Meyer<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Summit County voters created a fund in 2018 that is used for wildfire mitigation and ranger work. Summit and Eagle counties also created front country ranger programs \u2013 partnerships between the counties and the Forest Service to add patrols in the White River National Forest at the expense of county taxpayers.<\/p>\n

Since 2019, Eagle County and its towns have spent $387,000 on front country rangers, according to a county spokeswoman. In 2020, when the coronavirus had many people seeking outdoor fun, those rangers extinguished 32 fires and hauled out 5,000 pounds of garbage, along with human and dog waste, abandoned RVs and illegal campsites.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople come here, want to access our trails and Fourteeners, and they\u2019re overrun with people. They need management. The parking needs management. The trails need management. It\u2019s a lot to handle,\u201d McQueeney said. \u201cWe\u2019re happy to do it, but we do hear pushback: \u2018Is that really our role?\u2019 So far, every year, we\u2019ve managed to say, \u2018Yes, it is\u2019 and our constituents are agreeing with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Summit County Commissioner Elisabeth Lawrence calls the unusual arrangement an \u201cinsurance policy\u201d for her tourism-dependent county, which includes Breckenridge, \u201cbecause if some huge wildfire takes out Summit County, the economic impact would be devastating for generations to come.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pitkin County also spends money maintaining national forest land and Garfield County pays for staff members at Hanging Lake in White River National Forest, according to the Northwest Colorado Council of Governments. Several mayors and county commissioners told the Post<\/em> they felt their hands were tied; the threat of fires and closed campgrounds forced them to act.<\/p>\n

\u2018A little more perfect\u2019<\/div>\n

Earlier this month, the Ski Hill Resources for Economic Development Act, or SHRED Act, debuted in Congress. Forests that account for more than $15 million in ski fees \u2013 such as White River \u2013 could spend 60% of it on staffing, trail improvements and other ranger work. Those that take in less than $15 million per year, including Colorado\u2019s nine other national forests, would keep 75%.<\/p>\n

The bill\u2019s odds appear good: It has bipartisan support in both the House, where two Democrats and two Republicans introduced it, as well as in the Senate, where it\u2019s sponsored by Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado and Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming.<\/p>\n

\"A
A view from Hanging Lake Trail in Glenwood Canyon. \u201cPeople come here, want to access our trails and Fourteeners, and they\u2019re overrun with people. They need management. The parking needs management. The trails need management. It\u2019s a lot to handle,\u201d Eagle County Commissioner Jeanne McQueeney said. (Hyoung Chang\/The Denver Post via AP)<\/span>Hyoung Chang<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, will support the bill with a few technical changes, said Jennifer Eberlien, associate deputy chief of the National Forest System. And no opposition was voiced during a recent two-hour House hearing.<\/p>\n

(The hearing briefly attracted national attention when Texas GOP Rep. Louie Gohmert asked Eberlein whether the Forest Service can shift the moon\u2019s orbit and the Earth\u2019s orbit to combat climate change. Eberlein said she would have to get back to Gohmert.)<\/p>\n

Neguse, who led the hearing, expects the bill will be amended sometime this summer before going to the full House for a vote.<\/p>\n

When asked why the Forest Service is underfunded, Neguse said \u201cadministration after administration in Washington, on both sides of the aisle, (have been) neglecting the agency.\u201d Because the vast majority of national forests are in the West, \u201cit can be a bit difficult for the appropriators in Washington \u2026 to fully appreciate the scope of the need,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For the high country mayors, commissioners and county managers who have felt required to spend their constituents\u2019 tax dollars maintaining federal forests, the SHRED Act is a welcome alternative to the strange arrangement they\u2019ve put up with for several years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a perfect world, this wouldn\u2019t be happening,\u201d McQueeney said, \u201cand maybe this bill will make it a little more perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Counties help fund U.S. Forest Service work in White River National Forest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46152,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[1362],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-46151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-southwest-life"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46151"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=46151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}