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Fee Programs

Time for your job review, Mr. Marmot

Aspen Times Editorial - July 21, 2001

It has become politically popular to argue that government wastes too much money, that Big Government should be reduced in size - preferably through tax cuts - until it is forced to accept a more limited, more feasible, more economic mission. Those who make this point generally argue that "government should stick to what government does well," that there are certain tasks that are the true purpose of government.

While we might or might not agree with the major focus of this argument, we do feel compelled to point out that the tax-cutting governmental reduction has often resulted in government abandoning those very things that it really ought to be doing. One such neglected core function of government is managing our public lands.

In recent years, as budget deficits grew and then even as deficits shrank, the United States Congress cheerfully slashed the amount of money it allotted to the U.S. Forest Service. With cries of "Run it like a business," congressmen left the Forest Service without enough money to repair or even maintain facilities on our national lands.

In its desperation, the Forest Service has resorted to charging fees to those who want to use the land and bringing in "concessionaires" to run Forest Service facilities ... and charge their own fees.

This is, to put it simply, wrong - very, very wrong.

It is, to begin with, economically wrong. The citizens of this country have already paid for those lands once, when they bought them (or, as often happened, when they reserved the lands, making them "unproductive" for the national economy). Citizens pay for the lands again when they turn their tax dollars over to the government that has been entrusted with management of the land. It is outrageous for citizens to be asked to pay for the lands yet a third time, when they seek to use them.

Charging fees in national forests is also philosophically wrong. The call to "run it like a business" misses a very essential point. The national forests are - and ought to be - the very opposite of a business. They are not "commodities" to be bought and sold; they are meant to be sanctuaries, places to renew and fresh the human spirit. The very concept of "wilderness" is antithetical to that of a "business." Do we fire the marmots and the elk if they do not meet their production goals? Do we lay off remote valleys that are not providing adequate levels of user satisfaction? Do we level the mountains and replace them with another kind of attraction altogether - roller coasters, perhaps - if our marketing department decides that visitor interest in mountains is waning.

The very point of seeking the solace of wilderness is to escape some of the very pressures that result from our daily immersion in the world of business. We must preserve that escape.

And, finally, turning public lands over to private corporations (in the form of concessionaires) or ordering them to be managed like private lands (through direct Forest Service fee collection) is refusing to allow government to do something it ought to do well. It is taking part of government's core mission away from it.

These are our lands. These are public lands. The government - our government - should provide adequate money to run them well. Indeed, it should provide more than enough money, so that these treasures can be preserved and managed into the future without degradation, without destruction.

And without fees.