With support from the Bureau of Land Management and the Saratoga/Platte Valley Chamber of Commerce, Platte Valley residents will have another chance to learn and give input to the proposed changes that could affect future use of the North Platte River.
The meeting was the idea of Mitch Bangert, owner of Harrison’s Guest House and Guide Service, who decided to take it upon himself to educate the community on how residents and businesses rely on the North Platte River. The BLM will give a 20-minute presentation on the proposed Recreation Area Management Plan (RAMP) for the North Platte River, followed by a question and answer session.
“The main thing is nobody knows exactly what is going on, and this is a fairly significant deal,” Bangert said. “They would be allocating commercial outfitting permits, basically fishing and guiding companies, and they’ll start off next year with six and keep adding them until they hit the middle country limit. The BLM has all these different designations, and the middle country limit is that no more than 22 boats be encountered per day on any one section of the North Platte River. That’s a lot of boats.”
Bangert said the chamber wrote a letter to the BLM asking for one more meeting to receive public input.
“When they (BLM) say they’re going to hand out commercial permits, that’s going to up the traffic, but does that take into consideration the more traffic that’s going to be created by recreational users because of easier access?” Bangert said. “For instance, at Bennett Peak, they want a larger boat ramp two or three trailers wide, and they want to enlarge the whole parking and camping area. They want to provide an overflow parking lot north of the Bennett Peak boat, and expand the existing boat ramp to two or three trailers wide.”
Bangert said also that the available public land may continue to be taken advantage of for expansion purposes.
“They’re taking what public land we have and just expanding, and they keep on wanting to expand us to unsustainable levels, in my opinion,” he said. “With the gas interest, the opening of access and more outfitters, it’s almost like the whole Valley is up for sale. I’ve heard this and seen it before, and it has ruined some pretty neat areas. People say they’re going to make things better and access easier, and then all of the sudden the fishery gets overfished and people say five or seven years later, ‘How did we get here or to this point?’”
“It can happen so quietly, and then all of the sudden the gas wells are up there and there’s 100 boats on the river,” he said. “It’s insidious what happens, and at first they say ‘Oh, it’s not that big of a deal.’”
When looking back on what he’s witnessed in other states, Bangert said there’s no reason why the same thing couldn’t happen in the Platte Valley.
“I’ve been fishing in the Rocky Mountain West since the late 70s and seen stuff in Colorado and Montana, and it all started just like this,” he said. “They said they were going to make the ramps bigger to make it easier, so access becomes easier and more people come to the special place. They think 22 boat encounters a day is okay, so then they’ll keep on adding outfitters until they hit that limit. They want to make all these accesses easier.”
Although the chamber is sponsoring the meeting, Bangert has been in charge of paying for the venue and the newspaper and radio advertising.
“I requested the meeting in my email to the BLM and said I’d pay for everything including the venue and advertising,” Bangert said. “I let them know that I just wanted them to show up one more time, and the BLM suggested that the chamber sponsor it. I am on the board of directors for the chamber and was the guy who got it all going, but I wanted to make sure it’s clear that the chamber is not spending an ounce of membership money on any of this. I don’t want chamber members to think that they’re dues are going toward a fight they may or may not agree with; I just want people to know about this and that’s why I’m doing it.”
Bangert’s goal is to educate people about the plan and actions proposed for the North Platte River, and he said he would like to see those whose lives and businesses are affected by the river attend the meeting if they can. He also emphasized the importance of preserving of nature along the river, based on his past experiences.
“I want to run into 22 elk, not 22 other boats that will scare all the animals off the banks,” Bangert said. “I’ve floated down Bennett Peak with clients during fall time and been surrounded by elk crossing the river back and forth. I’ve also had great fishing on a beautiful fall September day, and back at Treasure Island I’ve been right across from a moose feeding on some willows.”
Bangert said the peace and quiet is a primary reason why people travel from far off places to visit the North Platter River.
“I’ve had clients come up here from all over the world, and that’s why we come to this place, for the peace and quiet,” he said. “I don’t want to have a degraded fishery and degraded experience, and with too many people around, what’s fun about that?”
The Environmental Assessment of the RAMP lays the groundwork for the BLM to start developing a site-specific plan. Construction on the projects would begin this summer after the plan is signed. Bangert said he is glad that the meeting is happening to possibly give the BLM a second thought.
“If they get enough feedback contrary to their preferred alternative, they could stash it and open it back up again and do further study,” he said. “I think they should and that’s what I’m going for. My main focus in this is to get this reopened.”
Bangert said that he did, however, understand the positive side to the plan.
“With more business in town you get more people in town, and if access opens up more you get more people, more restaurants and things like that,” he said. “The only problem is that the experience can become degraded and people will start to say it wasn’t that much fun. For example, the fishing could become bad because of too many people throwing lures and flies out there, and people could stop coming. I’ve seen it happen before.”
Going back to the issue of space, Bangert said he thinks the river is just not big enough to handle so much traffic.
On the other side, Michael Patterson, owner of Hack’s Tackle and Outfitters in Saratoga, thinks that the issue of what the BLM is trying to do on the river has been blown out of proportion, but agrees that everyone has a say on what happens on public lands. He said also that there has been a communication problem with what is being proposed.
“The BLM is just trying to make things more convenient for the people who use the river,” said Patterson.
He added that the BLM is doing necessary maintenance and minimal upgrades to the Bennett Peak campground and launch site, as well as the Corral Creek campground, and road improvements at Prospect Creek.
Patterson noted the public meetings in the past, and that the BLM has accepted questions and comments.
“This is not West Virginia, Washington state, Colorado or Montana. It’s a whole different little world here,” Patterson said. “That’s how we need to treat this place, like someplace unlike anywhere else.”
In the comments the BLM received to its proposal, there appeared to be a conflict on certain high use weekends and holidays, and people complained about no parking and long wait times at the launch sites. Patterson said the BLM has planned to address those concerns.
“They want to set up an additional (or extended to two launch sites) boat ramp and additional (or overflow) parking,” he said. “It’s not like we see huge numbers from June to September all year round. It’s only certain times that the river is heavily used, like the Fourth of July weekend and Memorial Day weekend.”
Patterson said water availability on the river plays a big part, and that once the water is gone certain areas see very little use, creating minimal impact. A preferred alternative noted would be to set up an educational kiosk, because other comments note the lack of information available to those using the campgrounds. The BLM-proposed alternative also includes a provision for increasing the number of outfitters permitted by the BLM to launch at its sites, and Patterson thinks this has been one of the biggest areas of concern from the general public.
“People are worried about the crowding situation,” he said.
He added that the general public doesn’t realize that the BLM will allocate user days to special recreation permit (SRP) holders based on the number of actual user days they report, averaged over a three year period, in the preferred alternative that increases the number of SRP holders. The BLM proposal states that “six Special Recreation Permits requests on the current waiting list will be considered for permit approvals every other year until the limit (of no more than 22 craft encountered per day on any one section) has been reached.”
However, there is a provision for modifying the release schedule “if monitoring data indicates that SRMA (special recreation management area) objectives are not being met (i.e. resource conditions).”
“Nothing is absolutely set in stone, and they’re going to try things and see if they work or if they don’t work,” Patterson said, adding that the BLM plan would be adjusted accordingly. “People from Denver call me all the time and ask if it’s too crowded. By my standards it’s crowded, but to them it might not be crowded.”
Patterson said he thinks this has been blown out of proportion because people who haven’t been to the public meetings don’t understand what the BLM is trying to do.
“They’re not trying to necessarily increase river traffic, but the people say they’re going to ruin the river,” he said. “People also come here, find their slice of heaven and then they want to slam the door, but you can’t just slam the door on everyone. These are public lands, they’re not just Wyoming resident public lands.”
Because the lands are public, Patterson said they should be open to everyone and also properly treated.
“We have to maintain them and take care of them, and the BLM is not proposing things that are so drastically going to alter our lifestyle,” he said. “They’re trying to make things more convenient for us. Being born and raised in this county, this issue is tremendously important to me. Everything I love is here.”
Patterson said he and the other outfitters who serve the general public by taking them on guided trips down the river don’t want to see the area “ruined,” as some people are claiming this proposal will do. Contrary to what is being said, Patterson doesn’t think these proposals by the BLM will ruin the area.
“What’s happening here is they’re just trying to make things a little better and more convenient,” for everyone. “They’re not trying to hurt the general public.”
For after he retires as an outfitter, Patterson added that he’s going to be part of “the public” sometime, and is therefore looking out for the general public’s best interests.
The meeting on the North Platte River RAMP, hosted by the Saratoga/Platte Valley Chamber of Commerce, starts at 6 p.m., this Thursday, at the Platte Valley Community Center.
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