If you care about wheeling in Texas...please attend this meeting:

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Subject: [TX4X4] Texas River/Your Rights

On Thursday, April 11, the River Task Force will meet with the Texas
Parks & Wildlife, probably for the last time before reporting to the
Natural Resources Commissions with their findings/recommendations.

At the last few meetings, the landowners outnumbered us (off-roading
group) 10 to 1, so I am asking those that can, please come. It will be
at the TPWD Headquarters on Smith School Road in Austin, in the main
Commission room. It starts at 9 am till about 4-4:30. I am also going
to ask that those that do come, please be at your best behavior.
Sometimes the meetings get heated and you are allowed to have input, but
we're needing support more than anything else.

Here is an updated report I received from Carol Smith who heads up AMA.

"Because I sit on the TPWD Rivers Task Force (RTF) with Rick and Ingrid
and I've testified before the Senate Natural Resources Interim Committee
(SNR IC), I guess I have a pretty unique perspective. I think we all owe
Rick and Ingrid and everybody that had a hand in stopping SB 1334, a
great deal of gratitude, otherwise, it would have been a done deal and
we wouldn't even be discussing it. KUDOS to ya'll !

My take on the situation is thus... The RTF was formed after the SNR
IC, and I believe it was formed to help the Senate in an advisory
position. That is why the RTF meets about 10 days to two weeks prior to
every SNR IC meeting. That is why our director, Larry McKinney, reports
all our findings to them. I also believe that the TPWD is more concerned
with SCIENCE and ISSUES, not so much with political posturing. They have
no scientific evidence to go by, the landowners are claiming
degradation, but they're "proof" consists of 2 one hour "surveys" done
by locals. I believe that they will ask for a study to be done. In the
mean time, as those who have heard/viewed at the capitol website, I have
gathered numerous studies that have already been done by different
states concerning the degradation issues and I'm writing a position
paper quoting them. My point is.. and think everybody who writes/speaks
out/discusses this.. should try to say this....THEY (the landowners)
HAVE NO PROOF! They do have accusations, opinions,negative comments, but
no solution, other than closure. I agree (very rarely, albeit) with
Carmody that this will probably be our last RTF meeting. It will be held
in Austin, April 11th, at the TPWD Headquarters on Smith School Road,
in the main Commission room. It starts at 9 am. Be there or be square.
If your not a part of the solution , your a part of the problem. Butts
in the chair. Stand up for what you believe in, fight for what is
already yours! Use it or lose it.

There are two extremes to this arguement. The extreme landowner position
is, "we don't want you here, there are too many of you, you make messes,
drive in the water every chance you get, your Hispanic, you see us
dumping and taking out gravel and water that don't belong to us. It's
been quiet and private forever, now its' not. We are rich and have
friends in high places and customers that don't want to see you. We
don't want to see you." They are telling the powers that be -"make them
go away". It's a very exclusive and selfish prospective.

The extreme OHV position is " If you don't like it - too bad - it's our
public property, we'll do with it what we want. If we want to do
doughnuts in the middle of the river at midnite, we will. We want to
drink beer, play loud music and crawl through your backyard and your
neighbors backyard, for miles on end. We'll snub our noses at you, and
curse you every chance we get. Don't buy property near the airport and
then complain about the noise!" It's a very selfish and exclusive
prospective. Beamer says:

Most folks, both landowner and trailrider, are not as hard headed as the
extremists on either side.....
"As long as you treat the private property around you with respect and
act like a good neighbor, the neighbors don't have a problem with you
folks enjoying the scenary and the trails."

The point is.. we have to find a middle ground. If we don't, the powers
that be will find it for us, or completely deny us access. My solution
is this. Not all rivers in Texas can be utilized for OHV's, so let's
take the ones that can, that have been historically utilized for this
and put Rec. trails in them. Management of the resource.

I think that after this meeting, the TPWD will gather all it's
evidence, summarize it, and give a reccommendation to the SNR IC in
June. Then, we have only through Aug/Sept to make our presence and
position known to the politicians, because I really think they'll move
on this in 2003.
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Since alot of us live outside of Texas, is there ANY WAY that we can cast a vote for you?
I feel that we all have to start participating in meetings, clubs, votes, what ever it takes to get our voices heard. If we do not participate, we may lose our open lands, and our rights to such lands, way too soon. Those precious few who HAVE done their deal are I'm sure getting exhausted by now, but still maintain their ground. My hat is off to you.
Let me give you an example on how the BIG BROTHERS abuse their power.
Here in Colo. around a couple of years ago, we had a bill, called SB34,(or it was SB36) which prohibited ANY MODIFIED 4X4 access onto Hwy. 34,(36) But thanks to the wonderful people of the local clubs, that bill got shot down hard, but unfortunately, not forgotten.
The Big Brothers are ALWAYS trying to get their way, so if we can help in anyway, anywhere, anytime, wee'll be there. I feel that we can win this war in our own backyard.

LIke I asked, Is there a way that we can cast our vote, get our distant voices heard. Some of us do have families and friends in Texas. You have 100 percent of my vote.
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