Off-Roaders Buzzing Over Navy Plan for ‘Land Grab’ in Desert

Juanita Severe made no effort to suppress a guffaw when a visitor to her Ocotillo Wells Market asked about the Navy’s plan to remove from public domain hundreds of thousands of acres of desert land smack in the middle of one of the favorite playgrounds for the burgeoning number of off-road vehicle riders in Southern California.

“I’ve lived here for 20 years and I’ve seen these scares come and go many times,” she said. “I managed to survive through the gas squeeze, and I just don’t think there’s anything to worry about this time. I appreciate the business from the off-roaders, but they’d still be around, anyway. The Navy isn’t going to put a fence up, and it’s a big desert out there.

“People out here are hot, and they’re ready for a shotgun revolution. But I tell ‘em, ‘Don’t pack yet, we’re not going anyplace.’ ”

Near Bombing Ranges

Indeed, people out here are as hot as the July desert sun about what they call the Navy’s land grab, even though the roughly 300,000 acres in question lie just across the Imperial County line, adjacent to the Navy’s flight paths and bombing ranges.

The Navy wants control of the land (it already owns more than 600,000 acres in the desert) to ensure that future development will not pose a safety hazard that would impede its military exercises.

Off-roaders see the Navy’s move as just another in a long line of government-ordered closures of lands where their sport, which has evolved into a popular family weekend getaway activity, can be practiced.

The handful of Ocotillo Wells business owners, whose fortunes depend on the dollars spent by the off-roaders, naturally fear as well for the future of the sport that supports them. But they carry the scenario a step farther and talk openly about the possibility that this first ‘takeover’ by the Navy will lead to additional actions, including the eventual government condemnation of their property.

Navy officials have been attempting to dispel those rumors. In an official policy statement, Capt. Emil G. Brown, commanding officer of the El Centro Naval Air Facility, said, “The Navy’s plans will not conflict with most of the recreational activities in the desert.”

But tensions and fears have been heightened by a shroud of secrecy that has surrounded negotiations between the Navy and the federal Bureau of Land Management, which will rule on the Navy’s proposal.

Decisions Made Elsewhere

Adding to the mistrust of the government expressed by desert visitors and residents alike is the fact that critical decisions are being made hundreds of miles away, in Northern California and San Bernardino County.

A tentative agreement on which lands should be closed is expected to be announced after a closed-door meeting between the bureau and Navy officials in the San Francisco suburb of San Bruno.

That agreement will be the subject of a bureau hearing Friday in San Bernardino to receive public comment on the land closure before its final approval. Many of the 100 or so permanent residents of Ocotillo Wells will be there to testify, as will hordes of the off-road enthusiasts who swell the population of this town to upwards of 10,000 on busy weekends.

“There are millions of dollars worth of business from people who come in here on the weekends,” said Al Williams, owner for 12 years of the Burro Bend restaurant across Highway 78 from the state off-road vehicles park in Ocotillo Wells and a leader in the movement to block the Navy’s land closure.

For Williams, business is strictly feast or famine. Hours can pass on a weekday before his wife, Bert, gets an order to grill a hamburger, but customers camped in the park line up three-deep at the counter for Sunday breakfast before heading to the off-road trails.

“There’s nothing going on out here on weekdays or in the summer, so we have to make our living from the off-roaders,” he said. “This has become one of the No. 1 recreation areas in all of Southern California. At night, you look out across that desert and you see nothing but lights from the off-roaders at their campsites.

“It’s a shame that the Navy wants to take all of this land. And there’s no reason for it. We’d back the Navy 100% if they needed the land because of some kind of national emergency.”

Williams has organized letter-writing campaigns to area legislators, and he remains confident that a show of strength at the San Bernardino meeting will convince the Navy to reconsider.

“If enough people show up and complain, the Navy will back up.”

Leonard Hoyt, who retired five years ago to Ocotillo Wells after a 30-year career in the Navy to buy the Desert Ironwood Motel, said, “I can’t believe the thousands of off-roaders are going to let the Navy get away with this. And the Navy might be surprised to find it’s not just a bunch of guys on bikes who do the off-roading, but families. That’s the big change in the last couple of years. Now 95% of our business comes from families who come out for off-roading.”

Hoping to capitalize on the off-road craze, Hoyt recently received approval from the county for construction of a recreational vehicle camping area adjacent to the hotel. “We turn hundreds of people away on the weekends. Doesn’t the Navy realize how important this recreation area is to all of these families?”

Like Williams, Hoyt said his business depends on the off-road trade. “We’d lose our shirts, that’s all there is to it, if the off-roaders were not able to come here,” he said.

Hoyt and Williams are angered by the Navy’s failure to consult local business owners before making the decision to attempt to condemn the land. “The Navy has not approached anyone out here to talk about the plans, and that makes you suspicious,” Hoyt said.

“When they act in secret, you wonder what they’re up to,” Williams said. “If this goes through, who knows what will be next? They could come out and take our land away from us.”

Camped on the desert floor in the Ocotillo Wells State Vehicular Recreation Area, Ron Stephenson, a Vista resident who has been off-road riding for 15 years here, said bitterly that he “would just stop paying the state my damn $35 if they keep taking the land away. What am I paying that money for, anyway?”

Stephenson referred to the annual state registration “green sticker” required on each off-road vehicle. Revenue from sale of the stickers is earmarked for development of off-road vehicle parks like the state-run area in Ocotillo Wells, but riders feel they are not receiving a good return on their vehicle registration investments. Ocotillo Wells is the only officially designated off-road area in San Diego County.

The Board of Supervisors last year rejected a proposal for an off-road park in Sycamore Canyon, a wide swath of open space separating Poway from Santee, after receiving complaints from residents of the two cities fearing massive traffic jams and noise pollution.

A county task force is considering alternative sites, with the Otay Mesa area leading the list of candidates, and the supervisors are on record supporting development of a park closer to the population centers of San Diego. But the long environmental review process necessary for developing a park dictates that it will be at least five years before a new park will open in the county.

Orange County Problems

Similar constraints frustrate off-road aficionados in Orange County, where Saddleback Park, an off-road park, recently was closed. Irvine Co., owner of the park, plans to develop the Saddleback Park land.

“We’re shut out at home now,” said Joe Catron, a Dana Point resident, as he waited for his breakfast at the Burro Bend. “It’s crazy--just when the sport becomes safe and popular for families, there’s no place left to ride. More and more bikes are being sold, but there’s less and less land where you can ride them.”

“This is the only place left to go, and the Navy deal would tighten up the land out here just when more and more riders are getting into off-roading,” said Stephenson, who had arrived in the desert on a Thursday night to avoid the weekend crowds.

“It used to be you could go off-roading near where you lived--we used to use the hills around Palomar Airport Road--but they keep pushing us farther and farther away. It’s already so packed that you have accidents and everything else on the weekends. And if this goes through, Ocotillo Wells will be even worse. I’ll have to look for somewhere else to go.”