Off roaders back in the drivers seat?

[Whoodatt]

From the front page of the San Diego union trib.

Clicky

[Mr. Edgy]

Let's see where that money goes after 1/1/08. This smells a little south of cheese. And I don't mean RC.

[SailAway]

Yeah, there are some gray areas that aren't mentioned in this propaganda piece, which appears to have been put out to boost the morale of the OHV community... but there are some holes.

Like restoration money. Any time someone wants to "restore" a trail you can be certain it will be "closed." There is a good percentage of our gas tax money and green sticker fees going directly to restoration grants. The argument in favor of such a high percentage going to these 'projects' is that the money will be available for everyone to use, not just the anti-access groups. So, what we're being told is yeah, there's a lot of money available for restoration so why not apply for that money and do the restoration ourselves? Whether we close it or they close it, closed is still closed, unless I'm missing something. Now, I will say that if closure is inevitable, it would be better to have off-roaders decide how to least effect the surrounding areas. Maybe that's what we're supposed to hang on to through this.

Oh, and there are other ways to get to green sticker and gas tax money, several avenues with which restoration/closure can also take place above and beyond percentage specifically set aside for restoration. Quite the opposite though, is the percentage now mandated for operations and maintenance of off-road opportunities... once that's used up there isn't any other way to obtain grants from the green sticker fund... restoration though, does have other ways to get to it.

One of my major problems with this legislation is that only 5% was mandated for education. It's lopsided to me... unless we get ahead of the game we will always be paying someone to clean up our messes and without real money to use for education, how can we ever get ahead of the game? It's a vicious cycle... more money will be needed to restore trails because the users weren't educated properly but because all the money is going to restoration there isn't anything left for education (or signage -- more on that later). *sigh*

There's also the little matter of California's gas tax and green sticker money going to pay for the federally-mandated route designation taking place within the forest system. I don't know about anyone else, but our sandrail doesn't cruise any of the national forests... yet some of the money I pay to gas it up and keep it registered will end up in a national forest. And even if it did, that is still federal land and it should not be up to California off-roaders to bear the burden.

Oh, and I don't know if anyone's got more than one off-road toy in their household but in our house we have eight. Eight. That means it will now cost us $400 to be able to legally ride them on public land within California. But look on the bright side... with fewer and fewer places to ride here in California, that may not be such a big deal much longer.

There's more... we can talk about the new plates that are required and the harsher punishments for riding in prohibited areas (whether they are signed or not) and other things.

But this article does have a nice little spin to it though, so maybe it's just better to take the blue pill and forget all the rest.

Vicki

[Mr. Edgy]

Here Here!!!