Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire How many here would eliminate the National Park Service? (Or USFS)

Weyerhouser is annoying, and if privatizing means that lands will be managed like they do... it's "man the barricades!" time!

They restrict access to weekends only, no shooting, no camping, and they WILL prosecute. This might make sense from a distance- and hey, it's their land- but when you see the vastness of the areas they lock up like that, well, it sucks balls.

No question BLM is a western affair. I can't even imagine those size expanses.



For some reason I can't get the graphic to post and this one unfortunately includes DOD lands but you get the idea. There is literally no comparison west vs the rest.
Link to map showing all public lands in the U.S.

I will admit that I haven't had to deal with that sort of thing in the southern/central part of Idaho. May be a different situation up in the panhandle what with the amount of timber related industries there?

Weyco. has not always been that way, but over the years of people vandalizing THEIR land, timber & equipment, they had enough. I've personally seen the land damage, timber damage, equipment damage, and thefts of Weyco. property in one of their largest holdings, that being the 13 mil. acre Mt. St. Helen's Tree Farm.

I'd hate to see see all that land go to the highest bidder. The ability of any citizen to enjoy hundreds of thousand of acres is priceless. I realize there are management issues, but I'd rather see some tweaking vice a complete overhaul.

^

This.

I would add that there are currently seven Federal agencies and three Federal Depts. managing public lands. We have the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture with the U.S. Forest Service, the Dept. of Interior with the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (National Wildlife Refuges), and the Bureau of Reclaimation (various western irrigation projects), and the Dept. of Defence with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (eastern navigation systems & adjacent lands) and the various military bases around the country. You could also throw in the B.I.A. under the Dept. of Interior, as well, even though the Native reservations aren't public land per se, public dollars are used to manage them.

The U.S. Forest Service and BLM are both managing multiple use public lands, and could easily be combined (under the Dept. of Interior), thereby getting USDA out of the land management business.

National Parks are not multi-use, though a (very) few allow hunting. The NPS is more engaged in facilities management than land management.

Some National Wildlife Refuges are suitable for multiple use management, and some are not. The refuges suitable for multiple use could be turned over the the combined BLM /USFS, and the unsuitable ones could be turned over to the Park Service. The USF&WS would be relegated to an advisory role with significant cost savings.

There is probably not a practical solution for reducing Corps of Engineers involvement with land management. In many cases, large Corps land holdings are cooperatively managed with State wildlife departments. Probably about as good as it's going to get.

We could also do away with B.I.A. completely and turn full control of the natural resources of the Reservations over to the various tribes. It would be a significant cost savings to the taxpayer, and would also serve as a "canary in a mineshaft" of sorts for all those anarcho-capitalists out there. I imagine that after witnessing the plundering of the Rez's, there wouldn't be quite so many advocates of privatizing public lands.

Penguin is never wrong, that I can see.

Agree totally.

The only reason that a HUGE (millions of acres) amount of land in the United States HAS NOT been cut up into home sites, strip malls, casinos, etc, etc is that that land has been retained in public ownership. Although the administering agencies (Forest Service, Park Service, and BLM) restrict our use of these lands, the lands are still open for all of us to enjoy.

I WOULD NOT move the Forest Service to the Interior Department, and DEFINATELY WOUND NOT allow the Park Service to control our Wilderness Areas.

The Park Service is under the Interior Department. So is the US Fish & Wildlife Service. It is these two agencies that brought Canadian wolves into Yellowstone NP. How many MILLIONS of our sportsmens dollars have been wasted on that project? And how many elk, moose, bighorn sheep, and deer hunting opportunities have been lost to wolves?

How many National Parks allow hunting? How many National Parks allow mushroom picking, firewood cutting, horn hunting, or even allow you to walk the trails with your leashed dog?

The Forest Service needs to go back to "Multiple Use Management", which was the reason that they were created in the first place. Their management decisions should be made be QUALIFIED managers, NOT special interest environmental groups or court rulings from lawsuits by these groups. CUTTING TIMBER IS NOT BAD!!!

The Forest Service managers should be hired for their qualifications, NOT because of their sex or heritage. I also believe that the best wildlife biologists are also avid hunters.

All four of these agencies (Forest Service, Park Service, BLM, and F&WS) also need managers with more COMMON SENSE than political motivation.

Didn't our tax dollars already pay for those lands? Now we need to use more tax dollars to buy them again?

I am not actually against the idea of the government owning land to set it aside for public use and future generations. My problem with the system is that like all things the government touches, it is mismanaged and becomes a political football.

My chief issues are:

a) If the government owns 30% of the land in the U.S., than that is way to much. It is not wise use of my tax $$$, and there is no need to deny that much land from private individuals. Check out other countries and you will see how important private ownership of land is.

b) Like most things the government controls, the method of management reflects who is in control at that time. Hence the current restrictions on possission of firearms in national parks and the restrictions on hunting in national forests.

Quite simply, it is because the government has decided that they do not approve of hunting with dogs, and since the State of Louisiana will not ban it, the feds will at least ban it on THEIR (not our) property. And no, I am not a dog hunter, so I am not personally vested in this.

Wow. I guess if you live in Oregon and want to own your own land, you are SOL.

Public land ownership by state

http://www.nrcm.org/documents/publiclandownership.pdf

I'll also throw this out there for some of the westerners, and other folks that may not be aware:

The National Forests in the east (authorized by the Weeks Act and later, the Bankhead-Jones Act)used to be privately held. The Weeks lands were cut-over timberlands that no longer had any economic value for the timber companies, so they unloaded them on the Federal Government. Why did people want the economicly worthless cut-over and burned-over mountians put into public ownership? Because they realised that de-forestation, uncontrolled burning, and uncontrolled grazing were causing large scale flooding and erosion, which were destroying valuable farmland downstream and choking up the navigable waterways with silt.

Under public ownership, burning and grazing were regulated, natural regeneration and planting were used for re-forestation, and native wildlife species were re-inroduced.

The Bankhead-Jones lands were marginal farmlands that were sold to the government because the soil had been severely compromised and they were no longer profitable. Same story as above, the areas were re-forested, stabilizing the soil, creating wildlife habitat, and providing an a sustainable economic product.

So now that this throw away land has been rehabilitated and now has significant economic value, the public is suposed to give it back to the same ass-wipes that despoiled it in the first place? I don't think so!

I probably hate the modern USFS more than anyone on this board. Their arrogance, stupidity, and greed have undone a lot of the good that was accomplished by the agency in it's early years. But with that said, the land is still managed better under public ownership than it ever was when it was privately held. I can not see re-privatization being an improvement.

You would rather see it cut up into small tracts?

We may not like certain things, but from a big picture, the system works. National Parks are multi-use to a large extent. They are relatively small, and managed to be visitor intensive. BLM and USFS could potentially be combined, but do you really was to move the forest service out of the Dept. Of Agriculture? It's not that expensive for the gov't to "own" big chunks of wilderness or land; its not like they pay taxes on it, and any one of us can use it. The main bitch I see is that somebody isn't allowed full extractive use due to regulations. If some wants to do that, nothing is stopping them from buying or leasing available land. Someone pointed out what Weyerhauser does on its land, and justifiably so. Picture that same scenario on what is now public land.

Thanks, 700.
Great illustration.

I would like to see some moderation in what the government does. Keep in mind that it is all great for you guys now, but just because the feds give you free run of the land now does not mean it will always be so.

I have never lived more than 10 miles from public land, mostly much less. I can't imagine, and have no desire, to not have vast amounts space to roam in with encumbrance almost nonexistent.

True enough... but I've seen how much access I get on land the government doesn't own, so I'll take my chances.