Blame ATV activists for problems, not the vehicles

All-terrain vehicles and other off-road rigs have a useful place on this ever-more-crowded planet.

I joined a Montana landowner on ATVs last fall for a five-hour job of maintaining a remote spring for cattle on the vast ranch he allows me to hunt. The same job by horseback would have taken all day.

I cheered in appreciation to a neighbor who used the plow on his ATV on Sunday to help me clear the heavy, wet snow from my driveway.

ATVs are useful for search and rescue and a wide range of recreational pursuits, from picking huckleberries to packing out moose quarters.

These machines are not the problem plaguing public and private lands in this region and much of the West.

The problem is the selfishness and defiance ingrained in a wide range of users.

Legislation introduced in the Washington Legislature is a case in point.

In 2007, state lawmakers gave local governments the authority to allow ATVs on public roadways that lead to approved off-road vehicle destinations, such as ORV parks. The special dispensation is needed because most ORVs do not meet highway-legal vehicle standards, such as displaying license plates that help authorities clamp down on violators.

Ferry, Pend Oreille and Stevens counties jumped on this opportunity and likely went beyond the legal limits of this legislation. Spurred by local ATV activists with an agenda to open ATV routes through public lands, they have made long lists of roads to be opened to ATVs – even though many of the roads do not lead to designated off-roading areas.

ATV activists engineered another bill this year, HB3016, which would give local governments broader authority for opening city and county roads to recreational ATV use. Apparently, this is an attempt to bail out counties that may already have overstepped their authority.

The safety issues of unleashing ATVs on public roads are worth a separate debate.

But every citizen has a stake in the larger controversy: ORV access to public roads would exacerbate problems that are already impacting private and public lands.

In a Wednesday newspaper story about the proposed legislation, Ken Barker, a leader of the Colville-based Tri-County Motorized Recreation Association, defended the proposal, saying, “There’s a huge part of the population that are very responsible people. There’s always that 1 or 2 percent that get out of hand. … It isn’t all that bad like these greenies are saying.”

Those last two remarks are propaganda that plays well in the exclusive meetings motorized vehicle activists like to organize.

But these are the facts: Off-road vehicle abuses are rampant, and it’s not just a handful of environmentalists who are concerned.

•Private timber company officials probably would wince at being called “greenies,” but they are fed up with damaging off-road vehicle use. Inland Empire Paper, Potlatch and Forest Capital are spending a small fortune on gates and signs and, more and more, they are restricting what used to be free access to their lands, largely because of motorized abuse.

•Hunters – a group that desperately needs to stand united against the pressures on their sport – are being polarized by ATV use.

•Idaho biologists are already hinting that mule deer hunting may go permit-only in areas where ATV access can’t be reined in.

•Washington biologists are reporting motorized vehicle disturbance is impacting a range of wildlife. For example, shed antler gatherers, who are covering more ground these days on ATVs – often illegally – are impacting elk productivity, especially in late winter when pregnant cows need to be left alone to recover from winter and bear their young.

•The handful of federal enforcement agents that enforces off-roading rules on millions of acres of public lands say they are overwhelmed with violators who rarely can be brought to justice.

In 2003, the Bush administration’s Forest Service Chief, Dale Bosworth, highlighted the four major threats facing national forests and grasslands. Up there with “fire and fuels” and “invasive species” he ranked “unmanaged recreation,” primarily off-road vehicle travel.

Bosworth’s litany of adverse impacts caused by uncontrolled off-road vehicle travel included soil erosion, habitat destruction, damage to cultural sites and conflicts with other visitors.

Scientists also have documented how off-highway vehicles spread noxious weeds and fragment and disturb critical wildlife habitat.

Tens of thousands of miles of illegal trails have been tracked on public lands by ORVers, according to Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management reports.

Now, just as the region’s national forests are trying to comply with a nationwide rule that bans off-road vehicles on all routes that are not specifically designated for motorized use, some Washington counties, spurred by ATV activists, are kicking dirt in the general public’s face.

The explosion of off-road vehicles seeking room to roam on America’s wild lands could end up fizzling in the face of an industry slow to perceive the inevitable backlash.