- By Scott Silver

Authorized in 1996 as a rider to the Interior Appropriations Bill, the Recreation Fee Demonstration program was to have been a three-year test. Seven years and many extensions later, fee-demo still festers, threatening public lands and wild places with a sepsis Ed Abbey called ‘Industrial Tourism’ and ‘Wreckreation’.

The good news is, this issue may be resolved before the end of the year. The bad news is, it may not be resolved to your liking. For better or worse, fee-demo is in political play with legislators hoping to resolve the issue before they adjourn. Toward this goal, Congress held three fee-demo hearings. The Senate passed legislation that would make recreation fees permanent for the National Park Service only (S.1107), while a wide-ranging and more harmful bill (H.R.3283) received minimal support in the House.

Meanwhile, the Bush Administration is applying maximal pressure to ensure that permanent interagency fee authority is granted to six federal agencies. Likewise, the recreation industry, lead by the American Recreation Coalition, is pressuring Congress to authorize an entirely new ‘Phase Two’ demonstration program: a program of 6-year duration intended to maximally commercialize, privatize and motorize the Great Outdoors.

To complicate the situation, several powerful Western legislators emerged in strong opposition to charging basic access fees for use of the public lands while several Eastern legislators are lobbying for enhanced fee authority to support evermore Disneyfied outdoor recreation and tourism. Some legislators are concerned that fee-demo discriminates against low-income persons and creates a barrier separating the public from their lands. Others look favorably upon the possibility of selling recreation products as an alternative to resource extraction. Some are eager to see fee-demo bring increased recreational development and public-private partnerships. Others are insisting upon solid guarantees that fee-demo will not be used to perpetuate the “build it and they will come” attitude which pervades the land management agencies.

The motorized recreation community speaks with many voices. While a growing number of users and user groups oppose the pay-to-play concept, most industry associations actively support fee-demo, believing that the more economic value that can be attributed to their sports, the more access motorized recreation will be granted.

The non-motorized recreation community is no less conflicted. Those who enjoy the public lands have witnessed the failure of fee-demo to produce meaningful benefits. They have seen congressionally allocated funding disappear only to be replaced with revenues generated by fees. On the other hand, organizations which benefit from Congressional largess or look upon themselves as ‘agency partners’ passively accept fee-demo, fearing that to oppose the program might cost them a seat at the table or a share of the spoils.

The environmental community is more cohesive on this issue. Over 200 grassroots organizations are opposed to fee-demo, though many of the big greens have failed to weigh in one way or the other. The Sierra Club and American Lands Alliance are among those national organizations that have opposed fee-demo from the earliest days.

In spite of this confused and confusing situation, the fate of recreation user fees may soon be settled. Whether it is settled to your satisfaction could depend upon whether you have made your desires known.

As I write these words, House and Senate staffers work to draft compromise language to appease all parties. Chances are low that their bill will be as bad as H.R.3283 or as good as S.1107. Chances are low that the Administration or the commercial recreation industry will get all they want. Chances are low that the wilderness community will get exactly what it wants or that the non-motorized recreation community will do any better. But the chances are high that some fee legislation will be passed this year and the chance of that legislation being something you can live with increases with your participation in the political process.

Every person who cares about wildness should contact their Congressman and Senators to urge them to oppose fee-demo. But please show some sensitivity and restraint. Telling your conservative official that you oppose fee-demo because it confers advantage to high-impact recreational uses may not be the right tack. Calling the program “double taxation” and saying how the federal agencies have mismanaged the fee-monies they’ve collected and how the costs of overhead, collection and administration have negated the value of the program may prove more effective.

The fee-demo program is not the beauty-spot its ideological and profit-motivated promoters claim it to be. It is a blight upon the face of public land management. The longer this program is allowed to fester, the greater are the risks of its infection spreading. And where it is true that in polite circles you do not point to such blemishes, in political circles the rules of engagement require that you do. In politics, decisions are made by those who show up and no-shows suffer the consequences.