Change in Forest Policy Creates Unhappy Campers

On April Fools’ Day the Inyo National Forest switched to a new system for dispensing permits to enter two popular Sierra wilderness areas. But local back-country enthusiasts and mountain guides were not laughing.

They say the new reservation system will virtually lock locals out of the Ansel Adams and John Muir wilderness areas by letting distant city dwellers sign up for permits at prime times.

Under the new system, the permits needed to camp overnight in the 333,000 acres of wilderness within the Inyo National Forest can be reserved in advance for any day of the season by phone, fax, mail or walk-in. With the old system, half of the permits could be reserved in advance while the rest were held for release on a daily basis throughout the season at Forest Service offices or entrance stations.

The critics say permits for the two wilderness areas, which include the Mt. Whitney trail and are among the most popular in the country, will disappear quickly for the entire summer. They also complain that the new system was disorganized and difficult to access.

A quota system in use since the 1970s restricts access to hiking trails to as few as eight people a day. Those who travel into a wilderness area without one of the $3 permits risk a fine ranging from $50 to $5,000, according to an Inyo forest representative.

Forest officials acknowledged some drawbacks but said they were forced to go to the new, privately run system because they lacked the personnel to dispense the permits themselves. They began the new program now, rather than next year as planned, because of unanticipated deep cuts in their 1996 budget, they said.

For some Eastern Sierra residents, the idea of planning trips into the nearby mountains long in advance--just like someone in Los Angeles, for instance, might have to--goes against the grain. Since they live here, they want to be able to get a wilderness permit on short notice.

Mountain guides from here and other areas said their businesses would suffer.

“This is bad news, especially for locals but also for people from Los Angeles,” said Mammoth Lakes lawyer Tim Sanford, an outspoken critic of the new system. “When Thursday rolls around and they have a day off they can take, they’ll call some friends and they’ll roll up here. And they’re going to be sorely disappointed.” One of the most heavily criticized parts of the new system is that it includes no provision for reissuing permits abandoned by no-shows--those who reserve permits far in advance but never show up to use them. That amounts to a de facto cutback in the wilderness area use quotas, critics complained.

“This system is not going to work,” said Mono County Supervisor Andrea Mead Lawrence. “If people know they want to go up in the back country but aren’t ready to firm up a date, they’ll just book thirteen different dates and only use three or four of them. And the Forest Service doesn’t have any no-show policy.” Added Sanford: “If they’re not rereleasing no-shows, it’s like the Forest Service has unilaterally, without public input, decided to cut the quotas in half.”

Inyo National Forest Deputy Supervisor Bill Bramlette said the critics have a legitimate complaint about no-shows. “If somebody decides they’re not going to go, we don’t have a system of figuring out the no-shows,” he said. “We’re trying to address that issue now.”

Some hopeful campers trying to obtain permits have complained that they could not reach the company contracted to dispense permits, the Inyo National Forest Reservation Service. Many showed up in person when the company began operating April 1, including some from as far away as San Diego and Carson City, Nev., trying to get permits.

*

Jeff Cooper, wilderness outings director for Adventure 16 in San Diego, was among those reserving permits here the first day they came available

“The new system doesn’t seem like it makes any sense at all,” he said. “It seems like a free-for-all. If you’re lucky enough to get your fax in before someone else or you get your phone call in before someone else, you get a permit.”

Noting that budget cuts have also led to a shortage of wilderness rangers patrolling the back country, critics said that many wanting to use the wilderness but unable to get permits would inevitably take a chance and go in without them. That defeats the permit system’s main purpose of preventing overuse of the areas, they said.

“Now there is just going to be anarchy in the wilderness,” Sanford said. “Everyone is just going to do whatever they want. I think it’s going to be a serious problem.”

Among those hit hardest by the change in distribution systems are mountain guides, who need the permits to legally take their clients into the back country. “I have thousands of dollars in deposits for trips into the Sierra,” longtime Sierra mountaineering guide John Fischer said. “I’ve gotten permits for all the dates I have booked so far, but for any new dates, I’ll definitely lose business.”

Mono County officials were concerned that the Forest Service failed to seek public input before making the change. “If they had sat down with the guides and people who want to go backpacking and just involved them in the discussion,” said Lawrence, “this probably wouldn’t have gotten to this kind of anger.”

Mono County Supervisor Tom Farnetti said he was concerned about the new policy’s economic effect on the area because the Inyo National Forest has switched to the new system while other national forests have not.

“It’s a possibility that people might come here and find that they can’t get a back-country permit, and go someplace else,” he said.

Mountain guides also complained that the Inyo’s permit system is discriminatory, because they have to compete with the general public for permits while commercial horse packers operate in the Sierra under a separate system that allows them to write wilderness permits themselves.