Letter to the editor

Dear HCN, In the article, “Wet summer a bust for firefighters,” Thomas Power, an economist with the University of Montana, said, “These are some of the best-paying jobs for unskilled labor in Montana” (HCN, 9/15/97). Calling forest firefighting an unskilled job is condescending as well as untrue. Anyone who has worked on a hot-shot crew […]

Dear HCN, In your article, “The land is still public, but it’s no longer FREE,” you quote Randal O’Toole, a forest economist, as saying, “… the government has been managing land for ranchers and loggers, and collecting fees from them (HCN, 10/13/97). The result … is that the agencies have leaned toward the interests of […]

Dear HCN, Your story about setting user fees on public lands presented the irony of duplicitous standards. For years the environmental movement has been harping at industries to pay for their use of the land; now, when recreationists are asked to pay for their own abuse of the land (any use is abuse, by definition), […]

Dear HCN, I’ve just finished reading the articles about usage fees for hiking, camping, climbing, etc., and I must admit, it’s one of those peculiar times when I feel strongly both ways. My initial emotion is resentment. I despise unnecessary regulation – signs, signs, everywhere a sign, or a fee or a form. But I […]

Dear HCN, The current “recreation funding crisis’ has less to do with trail fees than with management direction. Congress and top federal agency managers are rapidly shifting their focus from one commercial forest “product” to another: from timber production to industrial recreation. The “Demonstration Recreation Fee Program” is but a small part of a larger […]

Dear HCN, I’m afraid we are missing the boat when it comes to the issue of user fees on our parks and public lands. Many who support the idea would have us believe it’s primarily an economic issue. While that is true in part, it is also an issue which raises profound moral questions. Our […]

Dear HCN, I’d like to comment on your article about user fees for mountain bikers, campers and hikers in the Sand Flats/Slickrock Trail area of Moab. It has been a few years since I’ve been there, but what I clearly remember is the grazing damage was far worse and much more pervasive than any recreational […]

Dear HCN, I’m writing to compliment High Country News on its coverage of the Quincy Library Group (QLG) and bill (HCN, 9/29/97). It was as calm, complete, unbiased, and delightfully wry an overview of the situation as I have seen to date. My response is enhanced by my being a rural county supervisor in the […]

Dear HCN, In your story on the Quincy Library Group (HCN, 9/29/97), I read the comments of Kent Connaughton, shaking my head in agreement, until I got to his statement, “When you work through the Congress, you get the validation of the American people. It says that these are a valid set of priorities that […]

Dear HCN, As I am accustomed to seeing my name on bathroom walls and bulletin boards in certain public buildings, the implication (from developer Milo McCowan) that I support the dozing of Utah’s Rockville Bench merely adds another zit to an already blemished reputation (HCN, 9/29/97). It is not OK, however, to drop the name […]

Dear HCN, One thing you failed to mention in your feature article on user fees was the Park Service’s perpetual con game about being short of money (HCN, 10/13/97). To get their point across, they defer road maintenance and close campgrounds, items highly visible to the public. What the public does not see is any […]

Dear HCN, Finally, the press has opened the glossy wrapper on the Quincy package and peeked inside. Your article, “The timber wars evolve into a divisive attempt at peace” (HCN, 9/29/97), exposed some of the problems with the Quincy Library Group legislation pending in the Senate (S. 1028). While we are eager to see people […]

Dear HCN, Regarding the Quincy Library Group’s involvement in the management of national forests, the American national forests belong to all Americans, and the opinions of those who live in or near a national forest should have no more influence than that of any other American (HCN, 9/29/97). Maybe things need to be left alone. […]

Dear HCN, The recent article (HCN, 9/29/97) on the Quincy Library Group bill (S.1028) once again implies that this is a divisive issue caused by friction between the national environmental groups and the grass roots. That’s just not accurate. The vast majority of the environmental community is opposed to S.1028. Rather than dividing, this legislation […]

Dear HCN, Thanks for the meaningful comparison of land areas in the Quincy Library Group article (HCN, 10/13/97). I am tired of HCN writers’ comparisons of land areas in the West to small states in the East. They only serve to remind us that there are some dinky states which are similar in size to […]

Dear HCN, Michael Reynolds, the Taos, N.M., acclaimed visionary of the concept of using discarded tires and aluminum cans to create environmentally responsible homes called Earthships (HCN, 9/1/97), may be sailing a sinking ship. And he may be taking naive people with him. I moved from the East Coast three years ago and signed an […]

Dear HCN, There is something fundamentally wrong when citizens are required to pay a fee to walk on land they already own (HCN, 10/13/97). Whatever happened to the concept of public domain? The bureaucrats have taken the easy low road by going after recreational users instead of doing the right thing and lobbying politicians and […]

Dear HCN, Montana Sen. Conrad Burns and ecologist Richard Keigley seem to share a common discontent: Both criticize land-management policy in Yellowstone National Park (HCN, 9/15/97). Burns recently chastised Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt for park policy that let bison die in the park last winter. Burns said the deaths were proof that “natural regulation” is […]

Dear HCN, Thank you for an outstanding Yellowstone issue (HCN, 9/15/97). Ecologist Charles Kay’s opinion alone was worth the price of a year’s subscription. I’m an ex-park ranger with years of sad experience with the fundamentalism that has taken over the environmental movement. Kay is justified in stating that “Environmentalists believe that North America was […]

Dear HCN, The Great Plains Restorative Council seems to have a worthy goal of letting the bison go free, but I’ve got some questions for letter-writer J. Manos (HCN, 9/15/97). To what degree is his organization influenced by political correctness? How will the farmers be compensated for the loss of their land? When herds of […]