Water wrote: ↑May 27th, 2019, 8:57 pm
Now that they're severely limiting access, the 'new' funds will go for trail maintenance, and what money they were previously using for that.. will go somewhere else. And 'clean the routes'? Wtf does that even mean?
Please, the FS has previously been using zero funds for trail maintenance. Hence the reliance on volunteer contracts with orgs like TKO. The FS's budget is so diminished due to Congressional underfunding ("austerity!") and having to spend their money fighting fires during the season we used to call "summer" that it's not surprising they would have nothing left over to do their actual job (see: trail closures rather than trail maintenance) That said, it's sad to see laid bare how blatant of a cash grab this permit system is meant to be. Ostensibly it's about preserving "solitude" and "wilderness character" and other abstract nonsense, but as you note, they'd previously said the "extra" funds would be for "enforcement," and now they're already counting the extra dollars for doing normal FS business like maintaining the trail system. That does seem likely to backfire, since noncompliance and reduced demand/usage due to the permits seem like they'll take a bite out of whatever extra money the FS thought they were going to get. I can't imagine there'll be much left over for trails, per usual.
Re "clean the routes," I think that's a quote from the article, rather than from the FS? I'm guessing the journalist made that up, so I wouldn't read too much into it - journalists are generally terrible at describing hiking, trails, the outdoors, etc using words that actually make sense. The FS seems to think it will get enough revenue from these permits to pay someone to go pick up trash - and they'll have to hire a new ranger to do that, since presumably all the existing rangers will now be spending 100% of their days "guarding" the THs to ensure permit compliance...
So these permits will fund enforcement and trail maintenance.. but won't be too expensive?