Case Summary
Public lands should be for public use, right? According to environmentalists, that’s wrong.
For many disabled Americans, including many veterans like the Trail Preservation Alliance’s Don Riggle, motorized recreation is the only form of access available to enjoy our National Forests. Motorized recreation can include things like riding dirt bikes, ATVs, snowmobiles, and more. Both the law and common decency say that trail riders are entitled to enjoy National Forests by riding their vehicles on trails designated and maintained for that purpose. But radical environmentalists want to end this longstanding right, ultimately limiting recreational forest access to those who are privileged enough to enjoy the mobility to hike or the wealth to ride animals.
In 2014, Rio Grande National Forest was among the first National Forests in the country to initiate a forest plan revision process under newly promulgated 2012 forest planning rules. After years of meetings, assessments, analysis, and public comment, the Forest Service approved a Revised Forest Plan in 2020 in a decision spanning over a thousand pages of data and analysis.
The San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council, San Juan Citizens Alliance, Defenders of Wildlife, The Wilderness Society and the Western Environmental Law Center filed a lawsuit against the United States Forest Service over the newly revised land management plan. They argue that the plan is legally deficient, primarily because it contains inadequate components to ensure the survival of the Canada lynx and the Uncompahgre fritillary butterfly, and because it considers sustainable recreational use of the forest generally, instead of containing distinct plans for summer and winter sustainable recreation. Their real complaint about the plan, though, is ultimately that it is too friendly to motorized recreational users of the forest.
The Forest Service manages National Forests pursuant to a “multiple use mandate,” which requires the Forest Service to ensure that National Forests are used for conservation, for public recreation, and for productive uses like grazing and oil and gas development, among other things. After all, public land is held in trust for the public.
Rio Grande National Forest is already relatively inaccessible to motorized recreational users because of its vast Congressional Wilderness Designations (huge areas of the forest that are off-limits to all development, including the development of trails suitable for recreational riding). But environmentalists seek to make it even less accessible, designating even currently-existing motorized recreational areas as off-limits to public enjoyment of this public land.
Mountain States Legal Foundation has moved to intervene in the case on behalf of Rio Grande National Forest’s trail riders, represented by the Trails Preservations Alliance and other public interest organizations, and defend the Forest Service’s decision to approve the Revised Plan for Rio Grande National Forest, which fairly and reasonably balances the many interests at issue. We have an interest in defending the Forest Service’s multiple-use mandate, which protects our agricultural and energy industry clients seeking to use these lands to benefit the public to whom they belong. We also have an interest in defending the principle that if property is to be publicly owned, it belongs to the public.
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Case History
Petitioners’ (environmentalists’) suit alleges violations of the National Forest Management Act (“NFMA”), Forest Service regulations, (2012 forest planning rules) (Travel Management Rule); the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”),; the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”), and any implementing regulations for these statutes.
In 2014, the Rio Grande National Forest was amongst the first National Forests in the country to initiate a forest plan revision process under newly promulgated 2012 forest planning rules. The Forest Service approved a Revised Forest Management Plan in 2020.
Petitioners filed a Petition for Review of Agency Action on November 8, 2021, asking the court to set aside the plan.
MSLF filed a Motion to Intervene on behalf of motorized recreational forest users on May 12, 2022.
Merits briefs are currently scheduled to be filed in July, August, and September 2022, but that schedule is subject to change.
In January of 2023, the San Luis Valley Ecosystem Council and other petitioners agreed to dismiss several of their challenges to the revised forest plan for the Rio Grande National Forest. They abandoned their winter recreation claims in exchange for a promise from the Forest Service to do exactly what Mountain States’ clients said the Forest Service should do: conduct a separate travel management planning process that doesn’t hold up the entire plan.
