The USFS made it clear at the beginning of the meeting that the purpose is focused on Wheeled motor vehicle access, and that the meeting was not a place to argue or debate that fact.
Also, when this project is complete, the current court order affecting routes is terminated. Apparently the reason that court order made it was that the El Dorado forest did not develop the trails and rods in a legally defensible way via NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act of 1969).
The purpose of this project is to do that, so that in the future, if the USFA comes under scrutiny regarding Wheeled motor vehicle access, they have a solid defensible position to stand on.
The NEPA laws will dictate how they end up keeping Wheeled access open on roads and trails.
They have a team consisting of specialists in recreation, engineering, environmental analysis, law enforcement, heritage resources, and wildlife each overlay specific criteria based on the NEPA laws. Criteria’s range from endangered species to environmental indicators.
For example, the Terrestrial wildlife expert’s endangered species is the Bald Eagle, the indicator wildlife is the Deer.
Each specialist had similar examples.
The Botanist scared me the most. I got the feeling he thought no one should drive anywhere ….
As far as what we the public specifically participated in last night, it was a brainstorming session. We were able to blurt out sentences that fell in to 2 categories:
Need
Purpose
I don’t have the items that fall under those catogireis.
They are supposed to post the outcome of the meeting, and all the PowerPoint slides on the project website.
http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/eldorado/projects/route/index.shtml
There was one guy that I really liked, because he did an excellent job of voicing the fact that the National Forest is Public land, and that one of the purpose statements needs to reflect that fact.
Overall, I felt it was a poor turnout. I counted 53 people, and at least 8 to 10 were USFS. So, only 43 of the public out of an estimate 2.1 million visitors the El Dorado Forest gets each year.
I was very surprised that the only people I recognized were Derek and Scott Johnston. But I would say that most in attendance were OHV positive.
Anyway, check out the website to learn about the project plan and what the USFS plan is. They hope to complete the project before 12/2007