The comment made by the director of the California State
Parks Foundation, Elizabeth Goldstein, about off-road recreationists being her
“Children” is really one of the most astounding and arrogant comments I have
heard in the last 25 years during my work in the land-use arena.
July 27, 2012 LA Times Article on State Park Budget
Scandal with Goldstein’s Comment
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-state-parks-20120727,0,3856220.story
Karen Schambach’s comment in the same article about the
OHV program having large reserves is equally insulting and disingenuous. What Karen does not tell you is that her
group and other anti-OHV organizations and their local counterparts have
successfully blocked efforts by the OHV Program and OHV Commission to site new
OHV parks throughout the state to meet their legislative mandate to provide high
quality motorized recreation for the users.
During the 1990s when I was on the OHV Commission, we
worked hard on finding locations in various parts of the state. New SVRAs were proposed in Humboldt and San
Diego Counties and everywhere in between.
However, green NIMBY groups blocked us every step of the way. Greens
continued their blocking efforts during the 2000s.
Riders should not be fooled by the faux outrage being articulated
by Elizabeth Goldstein, Karen Schambach and other anti-OHV groups and their
supporters in the legislature. The
Sustainable Parks Initiative was a not so cleverly disguised direct attack on
the OHV Program with a particularly sharp hit on the grants program… all
designed to degrade management of OHV recreation to a point where Karen and
PEER could then sue to have the area shut down.
(e.g. Carnegie SVRA, Eldorado NF,
etc.)
Although OHV recreation continues to grow and prosper in
other states and regions of the country, motorized recreationists have a very
tough fight ahead of us in CA. The good
news is that I believe anti-OHV groups, on a national basis, have already
reached their zenith (circa 1990s) and are on the way downhill in their ability
to kill motorized recreational activity.
The battle in CA will require OHV leadership to think and
act outside of the box and to focus sharply on more effective ways of defeating
our political opponents.
Thanks for your continued diligence and support!
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