The following editorial appeared in the Denver Post on April 24, 2002.
Wednesday, April 24, 2002 - The state legislature should support House Joint Resolution 1051 opposing the federal recreation fee demonstration program. HJR 1051 correctly observes that "the concept of paying fees to use public lands is contrary to the idea that public lands belong to the American people and are places where everyone is granted access and is welcomed." The resolution's sponsor, Rep. Kay Alexander, is a Republican from southwest Colorado, where the unpopular fees have provoked citizens' protests.
If Colorado lawmakers approve the resolution, they will join Oregon, California and New Hampshire, as well as commissioners in San Juan, San Miguel and Hinsdale counties, in opposing the fees.
Such resolutions help Congress, which will decide the issue, gauge public opinion. Indeed, citizen comments recently persuaded U.S. Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, Colorado's senior Republican senator, to oppose the fees.
Supporters of the recreation fee program may fight Alexander's resolution because the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management are notoriously underfunded. While true, the claim ignores how the federal government's own budgetary silliness has compounded the financial problems.
Even as the Forest Service imposed a recreation fee at the main entrance to the Maroon Bells near Aspen, it spent $1.7 million building a fancy privy at the site. The excuse: The pot of federal money available to construct outhouses can't be used to maintain trails.
Even as national forests in the intermountain region begged for money, the agency's higher-ups gave forests on the West Coast $2 per acre for every $1 per acre for forests in the Rocky Mountains.
And even after federal courts told the Forest Service to stop environmentally harmful timber sales, Congress never recalculated the agency's budget to show the decrease in timber revenue, so the agency found itself short on cash.
Bart Simpson might tell Congress: Well, duh.
The recreation-fee program was imposed six years ago without even a single congressional hearing. Instead, it was initially - and has since been repeatedly - inserted into larger appropriations bills, leaving congressional critics unable to kill the program without depriving BLM and the Forest Service of all money.
Since there was no specific legislation that created the program, there's been no meaningful opportunity for the public to comment. That's a lousy way to set public policy.
Colorado lawmakers should endorse HJR 1051 as a reasonable objection to federal-fee fever run amok.
Congress ought to listen.