State Park Director and CA OHMVR Commission Listen
to Public Input on the Transformation Team Process
August 11, 2016, Ontario Double Tree Hotel
Opinion
By Don Amador
Date: 8/14/16
Words: 374
*Permission to
reprint is hereby granted
Transformation of the Transformation Process
The terms “honest” and “genuine” have not been adjectives
normally associated with leadership at the California State Parks Department of
Parks and Recreation (DPR). This is
especially true when it comes to how DPR has treated the OHV community over the
last 30 years.
It has been my experience that self-proclaimed experts (often
with an anti-OHV bias) at DPR decided what was best for the OHV program and
then crafted a public process that would support a preordained outcome.
A chief concern of mine with the Transformation Team (TT)
over the last few months is that it was just another process where government
appointees with little substantive knowledge of the OHV program were following
the traditional decision-tree at DPR.
After attending the August 11, 2016, TT meeting with OHV
stakeholders in Ontario, California, my concerns about the future of the OHV
program have been somewhat allayed by the precedent setting substantive
engagement efforts of State Park Director, Lisa Mangat, and her management
team.
Most impressive has been their willingness to acknowledge
and address the institutional bias at DPR against OHV and other forms of active
recreation. There is a reason why
reference (photos, printed materials, etc.) to our nine State Off-Highway Motor
Vehicle Recreation Areas (SVRAs) and riding opportunities on federal and
non-state lands have been largely scrubbed or hidden from public view at the
main agency website.
Over the last six weeks, I have seen a rather marked
shift in the tone and direction of the TT’s narrative as it relates to
potential recommendations for the OHV program.
Because of their engagement with OHV leadership, partners, and other
stakeholders they are beginning to understand the complex size and scope of the
program and how it has become woven into the economic fabric of California.
Director Mangat said that no TT policy recommendations
have been written yet and that it is critically important for OHV stakeholders
to remain engaged with the process.
At this juncture, I believe the at-large OHV community
should give them the benefit-of-the-doubt and continue to readily embrace this
genuine effort by the agency to craft a plan that secures the future of our
world-class OHV program.
# # #
Don Amador writes on
land-use and recreation issues from his office in Oakley, CA. Don was Chairman of the CA OHMVR Commission
in the 1990s. Don is also a 2016
Inductee into the Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame. He may be reached via email at: damador@cwo.com
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