Washington State Trails Conference
November 14-15, 2003
Observations
By Chuck Cowman
This is a quick summary of my observations after
attending the 2003 Washington State Trails Conference, held at
Deception Pass State Park on 14-15 November, 2003. It was hosted by the
Washington State Trails Coalition and involved several breakout sessions meant
to share information from a variety of presenters. Each breakout session had 3
tracks, track 1 – Partnerships, track 2 – Funding, and track 3 – Trail Trends.
Since the three tracks occurred simultaneously, attendees could attend only
attend one of the three tracks offered
I attended the opening remarks by the Mayor of
Moses Lake, Lee Blackwell. The thrust of his talk was about the value of
internal hiking/jogging/walking trails within the community. The rationale was
to improve the health of city residents by giving them convenient access to a
healthy and enjoyable form of exercise. He never outline if the program was
successful in getting the people to exercise more but the program has succeeded
in making the community more attractive. He feels this will help in bring more
businesses and growth to the city.
The Plenary panel discussion which included Gail
Thorpe, USFS, Jan Wolcott, Pierce Co. Parks, Doug Sutherland,
Wash. St. DNR, and Rex Derr, Wash St. Parks was primarily opening remarks by
these key people. They all seemed to want to tell us how difficult it is to do
their jobs these days however, Doug Sutherland reiterated his intent to get a
chunk of land set aside to generate funds that could be used to manage
recreation programs. As he has stated in the past, DNR is severely restricted in
how they can spend their budgeted moneys. By establishing a source of funds that
can be used to manage recreation on trust lands, he will then be free to set up
a more meaningful recreation program. Rex Derr of the Washington St. Parks Dept.
introduced Joe Sobinovsky who was recently hired as the new Washington Statewide
Trails Coordinator. I asked Joe if his job entailed coordination of hiking trail
only or all trails including ORV trails. He said it was all trails but he
admitted that he knew little about the needs of the ORV community. I volunteered
to show him the types of trails that the ORV community likes and he was
enthusiastic about running some trails with us. We talked about the possibility
of including ORV’s in any future trails that were considered “multi-use” trails
and he concurred that they should be included when possible.
The first breakout session that I attended was
about “Trail Trends”. Guest speakers included Judith Nilan from “Forever Green”.
Her groups goal was to link the urban trails in Pierce Co. into a more
meaningful and efficient system. Next was Doug Schindler from the “Mountains to
Sound” greenway group. He outlined the history of the Mountains to Sound program
and how it got to where it is at today and some of what they want to do in the
future. They have had to overcome many of the same problems we are faced with in
terms of water runoff, mud etc. Their goal as it stands today is to extend the
trail from Cle Elum to Seattle in a continuous manner. The trail
is considered “multi-use” but right now that does not include mechanized
recreation. As the trail is constructed today, it is not something that we the
ORV community would be interested in running on as it is built to minimize
obstacles and has hardened surfaces. However, the concept of a continuous ORV
trail from Cle Elum to Seattle for ORV’s is interesting. Whether or not we could
access any of the Mountain to Sound routes to construct ORV trails may be
something worth pursuing. I plan to discuss the possibility with Joe Sobinovsky
while I have him in my Jeep.
The 2nd breakout session I attended
discussed the NOVA program and the changes it is going through. I found the
history of the program interesting. I seemed to answer many questions I’ve had
for some time. As I understand it based on what Scott Chapman and Greg Lovelady
discussed, the NOVA program was started in 1971 as a means of using the fuel tax
from ORV’s, primarily Quads and Bikes to enhance offroad trails and recreation.
A study was conducted and it was agreed the 1 percent of the $.19 per gallon
fuel taxes moneys would be set aside for the program. Over the years the program
has expanded until the most recent change that said included fuels used by other
recreationalists once they leave the state road system and enter onto logging
roads. This caused a reapportionment of the funds and a redistribution of the
representation on the IAC board. This gave the hiking community access to the
funds and a seat on the board. Under the new rules/definitions, I have no
problems with that. However, the issue I have based on what I heard was that the
original funding level was based on ATV usage in 1971 and that level of funding
is not changing. Since we are now qualifying more user groups for access to the
funds, it seems logical that the 1 percent figure and the $.19 tax rate ceiling
would be bumped up to include the greater demand on the funds. This is not the
case so the pie is now being divided into smaller pieces. Greg and Scott did say
that discussion were underway with the State Dept of Trans to get more of the
tax moneys moved to the pot. I’m not holding my breath on that one.
The final breakout session involved private
investments in trails. This included some history by John Spring
on the Spring Family Trust which was set up by John Spring’s father, Ira Spring.
Ira Spring was an avid hiker, author, and environmentalist. He has set up a
trust fund to pass out funds for the construction/maintenance of hiking trails.
Don’t get your hopes up. Ira Spring does not like ORV’s. Jerry Wilbour then gave
a presentation on construction of trails. He has a company that builds and
repairs hiking trails. Most of his work is in planned communities that
originally had to build a limited amount of “nature trails” to meet their permit
requirements. They found that the trails were a significant sales draw that
aided in the sale of the new homes, so the current trend is for these companies
to build many more miles of trail than is required. The types of trails that he
builds are hardened paths of gravel or asphalt. This had little to do with ORV
riding but was interesting in that it showed what is important to a hiker and
how different our expectations are for the structure of a recreational trail.
Obviously, we cannot use their trails but often an average 4x4 trail would make
a very suitable hiking trail.
I would think that the conference next year would
benefit by presenting a PowerPoint presentation on the type of trails enjoyed by
4x4 enthusiasts and by motorcyclists. I doubt that most of the hiking community
is really aware of what we want in a trail and that we are not that different
than the average hiker. We share a lot of common ground.
Chuck Cowman
4x4xNorthwest
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