I know this is not going to be a popular viewpoint, and it is really ok that we disagree on this -- but speaking as an avid user of public lands, I would favor some sort of a program in which everyone who uses public lands has to buy and display a hang-tag on their primary vehicle, as long as the revenue generated by this user fee/tax (let's call it what it is) gets used for maintaining and policing the public lands, rather than getting dumped into a general fund.
Here is why I favor this -- especially in California, I see hordes of folks who have no skin in the game ruining the public lands: grafitti, trash, fires, cutting brush and timber, vandalism, etc. And the rangers do not have the resources to police this behavior -- they are already overstretched. You can't catch the bad guys every time they dump a dirty diaper in a river.
But if all vehicles were required to display a tag, it would be very easy for rangers to check for those tags. Folks without tags would be cited -- the tickets could be processed through each state's motor vehicle department. The scofflaws could not renew their licenses or their vehicle registrations without paying the tickets.
This would not be a perfect solution. But it would cut down on some abuse by some people, who currently think of the forest as a "free for all," literally. Maybe there could be a special low rate for seniors, like the National Parks.
But unless we (the law abiding people) do something to curb the abusers, the good people will not only suffer the effects of the abuse. We will see the fences continue to shrink inward, as Calisdad said, as the government tries ineffectually to protect the forests from being trashed.
If anyone has a better idea for raising revenue to increase the ranger force to discourage bad behavior, I would sure like to hear it. And please don't say "raise taxes in general:" -- why should city folk who never go to the woods pay for my recreation??
By the way, we just got back from a month in the state of Washington, mostly in the national forests -- no grafitti, no trash, no vandalism. Amazing and refreshing, but so depressing to return to Southern California.
