Trump Rescinds Ban on OHV use on Public Lands

2025 was the year of the overflowing FS shitter. 2026 appears to be the year of ATV Thunderdome. Wonder what 2027 will be?
It’s going to be the year of some accountability despite your blind short sighted loyalty. I’m here for it

Edit to add this is coming from a conservative ranch kid( yeah one of gods annointed people)
 
It’s going to be the year of some accountability despite your blind short sighted loyalty. I’m here for it
I hope you are right. I think its great when folks are held accountable.

Just so I have an idea what you are talking about, who or what do I have short-sighted loyalty to?
 
2025 was the year of the overflowing FS shitter. 2026 appears to be the year of overflowing shitters and ATV Thunderdome.
"She also pointed to ongoing problems with bathroom facilities, saying that more than nine months after she first raised concerns about overflowing facilities, waste tanks remain full..."
 
I think its great when folks are held accountable.
This is a top down directive from people who won't be in office for that much longer, maybe a couple of years at best. How could they be held accountable for impacts in 5 years? The president has made the case that he's personally immune to prosecution while in office and from actions originating from his duties as president (help me if I misconstrue that).

Let's look at his own press release:
Executive Order 11644 and Executive Order 11989 direct agencies to promulgate regulations providing that, where off-road vehicle use is permitted on Federal lands, roads, and trails, such use designations must be made in accordance with ill-defined criteria purportedly intended to minimize resource impacts and conflicts between different users of Federal land. These criteria, which are not required by statute, are difficult for agencies to operationalize due to vagueness, and include “minimiz[ing] harassment of wildlife or significant disruption of wildlife habitats,” minimizing “conflicts between off-road vehicle use and other existing or proposed recreational uses . . . taking into account noise and other factors,” and ensuring that off-road vehicle use in given locations will not “adversely affect [the location’s] natural, aesthetic, or scenic values.” These vague, subjective criteria often result in barriers to energy and timber production and utility maintenance, permit delays, and de facto bans on hiking and other forms of recreation that require accessing remote areas, all while doing little to benefit multiple use of Federal lands.

1. Do we want to harass and disrupt wildlife? Do we want to make running over predators with snowmobiles legal?
2. As sportmen, and formerly conservationists, do we think that there should be barriers to extraction (note, it doesn't say recreation) when it impacts wildlife or other users? We laud our conservation forefathers and their efforts to protect wildlife and our hunting heritage, but I wonder if we've ever actually read what they said/wrote? Would Teddy agree with the repeal of these EO's?
3. Off-road restrictions are creating de facto hiking bans? What kind of drugs are they on? What kind of Kool-Aid enema do you need to believe that?
 
"She also pointed to ongoing problems with bathroom facilities, saying that more than nine months after she first raised concerns about overflowing facilities, waste tanks remain full..."
Yep, it happens. Not the first time someone has encountered a full vault toilet wont be the last. In my experience 2025 was not noticeably different than any other year. Maybe FS and BLM run different in WY and ID than in WA.
 
This is a top down directive from people who won't be in office for that much longer, maybe a couple of years at best. How could they be held accountable for impacts in 5 years? The president has made the case that he's personally immune to prosecution while in office and from actions originating from his duties as president (help me if I misconstrue that).

Let's look at his own press release:
Executive Order 11644 and Executive Order 11989 direct agencies to promulgate regulations providing that, where off-road vehicle use is permitted on Federal lands, roads, and trails, such use designations must be made in accordance with ill-defined criteria purportedly intended to minimize resource impacts and conflicts between different users of Federal land. These criteria, which are not required by statute, are difficult for agencies to operationalize due to vagueness, and include “minimiz[ing] harassment of wildlife or significant disruption of wildlife habitats,” minimizing “conflicts between off-road vehicle use and other existing or proposed recreational uses . . . taking into account noise and other factors,” and ensuring that off-road vehicle use in given locations will not “adversely affect [the location’s] natural, aesthetic, or scenic values.” These vague, subjective criteria often result in barriers to energy and timber production and utility maintenance, permit delays, and de facto bans on hiking and other forms of recreation that require accessing remote areas, all while doing little to benefit multiple use of Federal lands.

1. Do we want to harass and disrupt wildlife? Do we want to make running over predators with snowmobiles legal?
2. As sportmen, and formerly conservationists, do we think that there should be barriers to extraction (note, it doesn't say recreation) when it impacts wildlife or other users? We laud our conservation forefathers and their efforts to protect wildlife and our hunting heritage, but I wonder if we've ever actually read what they said/wrote? Would Teddy agree with the repeal of these EO's?
3. Off-road restrictions are creating de facto hiking bans? What kind of drugs are they on? What kind of Kool-Aid enema do you need to believe that?
1) I think the issue, just spit balling here as I didn't write the EO, is with the wording "minimize". The EO points to vagueness as the issue with the prior EO's. How to define minimize seems like it might be the sticking point. Kind of a leap to get that this EO will make running over critters with a snowmobile legal but that's exactly the type of hyperbole I'm talking about.
2) Absolutely there should be barriers to extraction. And there are. Many. Regardless of the status of the prior two EO's. To think that the latest EO is the removal of the last hurdle and from here on out its "mine/log it all" is ridiculous. Don't know how Teddy would feel. After he got done shooting the shit out of every critter he saw as he worked his way across the West he may very well be pissed off about the removal of those two EO's.
3) This one confused me as well. No idea what they are getting at with that line.
 
Im not choosing any sides here, but i dont see this changing anything. Every year for the last 10 years I watch people drive on prohibited land while im hunting. Never seen anything enforced. Those people will continue to do that the same as before. The people who obeyed the "law" will continue to not do it because they dont think we should drive in those places whether law says we can or not.

Rage on!
 
And in 3 years it will be rescinded back the other way. And 30 years from now we can all tell our grandchildren we lived thru the OHV assault of the 2020s. Let's just hope the PTSD that will follow isnt to bad.
 
Im not choosing any sides here, but i dont see this changing anything. Every year for the last 10 years I watch people drive on prohibited land while im hunting. Never seen anything enforced. Those people will continue to do that the same as before. The people who obeyed the "law" will continue to not do it because they dont think we should drive in those places whether law says we can or not.

Rage on!
I disagree that people that don’t think we should drive in those places will continue not to if it becomes legal. People don’t want to miss out or be at a disadvantage. “That person drove right up to their elk or deer, why should I pack mine out a mile on my back?”
 

"The next phase of treatment, currently underway and continuing through 2028, will target approximately 12,000 additional acres within the burn scar. Importantly, the U.S. Forest Service approved a wilderness exemption request allowing helicopter application of herbicide treatments within designated wilderness areas — a significant milestone in large-scale wilderness habitat restoration efforts."

Good project on public land funded by Wild Sheep NGO’S. Removing some of the red tape helps these restoration efforts move forward, and the dollars go a lot farther, getting positive work done.
 
I disagree that people that don’t think we should drive in those places will continue not to if it becomes legal. People don’t want to miss out or be at a disadvantage. “That person drove right up to their elk or deer, why should I pack mine out a mile on my back?”
Yea, probably a little naive of me to think others wont take advantage.
 
Holy hell! Has anyone actually read the EO? The EO has done absolutly nothing to change current road or trail status. It changed nothing on what types of vehicles are allowed where and on what roads/trails. It rescinded two prior EO's issued in the 70"s that had language on the criteria to be used to determine where, when and what roads and trails where to be allowed and what types of vehicles would be allowed to travel on those roads. This Admin felt that the language in those EO's had vague and subjective language and that the aganecies already had the statutory authority and guidance needed to manage road and vehicle use without these EO's.

The Congress has enacted or amended a comprehensive set of statutory authorities to establish Federal land policy, including the National Historic Preservation Act, Public Law 89‑665, 80 Stat. 915 (1966) (codified as amended at 54 U.S.C. 300101 et seq.), the National Environmental Policy Act, Public Law 91-190, 83 Stat. 852 (1970) (codified as amended at 42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.), the Endangered Species Act, Public Law 93-205, 87 Stat. 884 (1973) (codified as amended at 16 U.S.C. 1531 et seq.), and the Federal Land Policy and Management Act, Public Law 94-579, 90 Stat. 2743 (1976) (codified as amended at 43 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.). I have determined that those statutory authorities, together with executive department and agency (agency) specific land management authorities, provide the appropriate framework for managing off-road vehicle use on Federal lands without retaining the additional specific designation criteria imposed by Executive Order 11644 and Executive Order 11989. I have further determined that technological, operational, and land-management developments since the issuance of Executive Order 11644 and Executive Order 11989 support replacing those specific criteria with a framework grounded in applicable statutory authorities.

It's entirely possible that rescinding these EO's may result in changes to road, trail and vehicle use restrictions from the agencies and those are actual things to be concerned about but this EO isn't that. You still can't drive that rzr 7 miles further for your mnt goat hunt.
Yeah, I've read the EO and the prior EOs. Those saying it does nothing, which in its wording, I agree with you, it does nothing. Yet, what it allows for is significant. That is what "does something" and should get people paying attention, given the track record of how the Congressional Review Act has been used to repeal BLM RMPs, to over ride other policy, to rescind the Public Land Rule, to lower wildlife concerns when permitting, and the list goes on.

For those telling me this is "much ado about nothing" reminds me of those who told me that I was overly concerned about the public land provisions of Project 2025. My concerns turned out to be well-founded.

If these travel management plans end up being pulled, which is the long-term interest of those pushing for this, it will be a terrible outcome for public land elk hunting. Shorter seasons, limited entry units over general units, choose your weapon, and displacement of elk from public lands to private lands. None of that is good for public land elk hunters.

So yeah, I agree, this EO does not repeal the travel management plans as some who have not read the document have decried. But it causes the reasonable person to ask, "Why would they do this if not for the intent to repeal a lot of travel management restrictions?" Surely not for the hell of it.
 
Yeah, I've read the EO and the prior EOs. Those saying it does nothing, which in its wording, I agree with you, it does nothing. Yet, what it allows for is significant. That is what "does something" and should get people paying attention, given the track record of how the Congressional Review Act has been used to repeal BLM RMPs, to over ride other policy, to rescind the Public Land Rule, to lower wildlife concerns when permitting, and the list goes on.

For those telling me this is "much ado about nothing" reminds me of those who told me that I was overly concerned about the public land provisions of Project 2025. My concerns turned out to be well-founded.

If these travel management plans end up being pulled, which is the long-term interest of those pushing for this, it will be a terrible outcome for public land elk hunting. Shorter seasons, limited entry units over general units, choose your weapon, and displacement of elk from public lands to private lands. None of that is good for public land elk hunters.

So yeah, I agree, this EO does not repeal the travel management plans as some who have not read the document have decried. But it causes the reasonable person to ask, "Why would they do this if not for the intent to repeal a lot of travel management restrictions?" Surely not for the hell of it.
Like I said in my post, a change to travel management plans would be something that could cause concern, but my post was in response to those equating this EO with a lift of current travel restrictions.

I'm not sure why this Admin has decided this EO was necessary but I'm not ready to grab my pitchfork just yet. Perhaps someday that will be needed but IMO this EO isn't that trigger. To be honest many of the responses I read to anything this Admin does in regard to wildlife, conservation, public lands, wild places, etc. sounds a whole lot like how one big group of folks react anytime a politician says anything in regard to gun legislation. Some things are significant but not every slope is as slippery as many make it out to be.
 
Some things are significant but not every slope is as slippery as many make it out to be.

I think it may be fair, given the track record of the current admin and those put in positions of power in this admin, to say that we're already on the slippery slope, and every little EO and decision, which each in and of itself may indeed be fairly insignificant, are all adding to the speed on that slope. At least, in regards to the threats to public lands and wildlife.

There is certainly rarely good reason for hyperbolic outrage, but there is also great risk in shrugging off each little thing as no big deal, then you wake up one day and wonder what the hell happened.
 
Like I said in my post, a change to travel management plans would be something that could cause concern, but my post was in response to those equating this EO with a lift of current travel restrictions.

I'm not sure why this Admin has decided this EO was necessary but I'm not ready to grab my pitchfork just yet. Perhaps someday that will be needed but IMO this EO isn't that trigger. To be honest many of the responses I read to anything this Admin does in regard to wildlife, conservation, public lands, wild places, etc. sounds a whole lot like how one big group of folks react anytime a politician says anything in regard to gun legislation. Some things are significant but not every slope is as slippery as many make it out to be.
By the time you will grab your pitch fork coalminer it will be far too late. Thank goodness for proactive guys like Big Fin and Buzz who don’t have their heads buried into the coalbanks like you, who see this for what it is. I know you know the wheels of govt turn slow and once that snowball starts rolling down hill there’s no stopping it. That’s a fact. Seen it a thousand times and that’s one thing about govt that’s not going to change.
 

Latest posts

Forum statistics

Threads
119,230
Messages
2,220,670
Members
38,827
Latest member
allenmario
Back
Top