Fees gone, but so is route

Snowmobilers will find access to Inland Empire Paper Company lands to be cheaper this winter, but slightly less convenient.

IEP will not charge registered snowmobilers displaying Sno-Park permits an additional fee this winter for entering the company’s timber lands from Mount Spokane State Park. The company also has announced the closure of a snowmobile access route.

Dennis Parent, IEP forest operations manager, said the Washington State Parks and Recreation Department once again has paid a general fee for public winter access to company lands adjoining the park.

Fees for entering the lands in other areas will still be collected, he said.

Last year, with the backing of the Winter Knights Snowmobile Club, the company began charging access fees from Mount Spokane to fund patrols and educate riders about the problems with illegal off-trail riding that breaks the tops off young trees and curbs timber production, said Steve Christensen, state park manager.

“This year, the state went back to the old system of paying the company $3,000 to allow snowmobilers and cross-country skiers to enter their lands,” he said. “This is much simpler.”

Because of new forest practice laws, IEP has closed a logging road that had been groomed and used for winter snowmobiling in previous years, Parent said.

The 50-year-old road accessed from the Selkirk Lodge area had sub-standard culverts that impaired fish passage in Brickel Creek, he said. New laws required the company to remove the barriers.

“The road will no longer be groomed and we’ll have a sign in the middle of the road,” Parent said. “If snowmobilers go down there anyway they’ll have to turn around when they come to the ditch that’s 30 feet deep.”

The old culverts could be replaced with bottomless arches or bridges, but the high costs preclude keeping the road open, Parent said.

Snowmobilers have used this road as a short cut across Brickel Creek to the north part of the drainage, accessing about half of the 20 miles of groomed snowmobile trails provided to the public by IEP, he said.

“There will still be access to this area, but it will require snowmobilers to go around the west side of Mt. Spokane, about six miles farther,” the company said in a press release.

“We understand the importance of this road to the snowmobilers,” Parent said. “This is not a decision we would have made ourselves. However, we respect the public’s desire to enhance fish habitat.”