'Water, wilderness and wildlife'

Forest looks at changes in recreation sites

The Daily Inter Lake

The Flathead National Forest has been sizing up changes for its recreation program, including fee increases and cost reductions.

But the forest is proposing mostly minor changes during a five-year period, compared to site closures and fee increases that have been proposed on other national forests across the country.

The forest's proposals will be the focus of an open house from 4 to 7 p.m. Tuesday at the WestCoast Outlaw Hotel in Kalispell.

The proposals are the product of a recreation-site facility master-planning analysis conducted during the past year and a half, said Bruce Johnson, the forest's recreation program manager.

Every forest in the country must carry out a similar analysis, Johnson said.

"It's a national program to help us realign our money with our facilities," he said.

Many campgrounds, cabins, and other recreation sites were developed decades ago, often with maintenance requirements that no longer match current budgets, Johnson said.

The Flathead's budget for maintaining recreation sites has roughly remained static for the past few years, a period in which demand for some facilities has increased.

The forest's analysis involved an assessment of 94 developed recreation sites, along with defining the forest's "niche" or priority recreation resources. Boiled down, that descriptive niche is "water, wilderness and wildlife."

"We went through all these sites and gave them a numerical ranking" and prioritized them with the forest's niche priority considered, Johnson said.

Based on that review, the forest is not proposing to close any of its facilities, as other forests have, but it is proposing to turn seven "developed" sites into "dispersed" sites still open to public use. That could include removing bathroom facilities, picnic tables, running water and other amenities that require regular maintenance.

Those sites include the Beardance Picnic area on the Swan Lake Ranger District; the Upper Big Bill trailhead and the Upper Twin Trailhead on the Spotted Bear Ranger District; the Handkerchief Lake Campground, the Wounded Buck Observation area and the Lakeview Campground on the Hungry Horse Ranger District; and the Holbrook Overlook on the Tally Lake Ranger District.

For about a third of the 94 sites, the forest also is proposing to either open them later in the spring or close them earlier in the fall to save on budgeted maintenance costs. All facilities would be open for the core summer season, considered to be Memorial Day through Labor Day.

To enhance revenue, the forest mainly is eyeing a series of fee increases for its popular cabin rental program during the next five years.

Proposed increases include raising nightly fees from $50 to $65 at Schnaus Cabin; from $50 to $65 at Ben Rover cabin; from $50 to $55 at Zip's Cabin; from $30 to $40 at Challenge Cabin; from $20 to $25 at Hornet Lookout; from $35 to $45 at Ford Cabin.

But those fee proposals must be approved by a Bureau of Land Management Resource Advisory Committee based in Butte.

The fee increases will not be proposed this year. Instead, the proposal this year is to introduce three cabins to the rental program: the Swan Guard Station near Swan Lake; the Silvertip Cabin on the Spotted Bear Ranger District; and the Old Condon Ranger Station on the east side of the Swan Highway near Condon.

Last year, the forest handed over reservations management of the cabin rental program to a contractor that takes online reservations (at www.ReserveUSA.com). That change lowered some management overhead costs for maintaining the program, but it resulted in a $9 surcharge for each reservation.

Reporter Jim Mann may be reached at 758-4407 or by e-mail at jmann@dailyinterlake.com