Jetboaters Will Accept Some Limits

Hells Canyon jetboaters say they will accept limits on their numbers but not a ban that would keep them off the water.

“We want to make it absolutely clear that we do not believe in unrestricted powerboat use,” said boatbuilder Darell Bentz of Lewiston.

Members of the Hells Canyon Alliance will do everything they can, however, to torpedo a U.S. Forest Service plan to bar jet boats from a section of the Snake River during the summer recreation season.

Ric Bailey of the Hells Canyon Preservation Council is equally adamant as a supporter of the ban.

Jet boats pose both a safety hazard and an assault on the senses of floaters, he said.

“Floaters should be able to run at least part of the river in peace and quiet.”

Like the annual roar of spring runoff, the volume of the debate over Hells Canyon appears ready to rise again.

The Forest Service, which oversees the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area, is scheduled to issue another chapter in its controversial river plan. The new report will be an economic analysis of how the plan would affect outfitters who take visitors into Hells Canyon.

The report grew out of an appeal of the 1994 river plan by outfitting businesses, who object to the ban on powerboats from the uppermost 21 miles of the river for three days during eight weeks each summer.

Deputy Regional Forester Richard Ferraro at Portland ordered a delay in putting the plan into effect until 1997. Then the Hells Canyon Preservation Council and rafting outfitters took the Forest Service to court over the delay. The jetboat ban was originally scheduled to start next month.