What is California’s Sustainable Outdoor Recreation Collaborative?
Camping in the Sierra National Forest, on the ancestral lands of the Miwok. Photo credit: Cameron Vaughan.
Public lands in California—and across the nation, for that matter—are being put to the test. Without many options to travel or take a vacation, millions of people are packing the car and driving to nearby forests up and down the state. From the Tahoe to the Angeles, the impacts of increased visitation are showing up in overflowing trash cans, lines of traffic, and crowded trails. A lot of people who see these impacts want to know how they can help.
Enter the Sustainable Outdoor Recreation Collaborative in California. To put it simply, the group is a round-table of a couple dozen organizations who represent California’s diverse mix of recreation. The list of stakeholders includes climbers, paddlers, skiers, mountain bikers, and hikers. Outdoor Alliance and many of our partners are participating, as are off-road vehicle and snowmobile coalitions, and conservation groups like the Pacific Crest Trail Association and the Wilderness Society.
Their mission? To provide feedback to the Forest Service that will help the agency anticipate the needs of all types of recreation on California’s forests and to start a conversation about recreation well ahead of the curve in light of upcoming Forest Plan revisions.
“We’re trying to create a forum for people to talk honestly about these challenges and to hopefully figure out how we can work together, knowing the reality of what we’re facing and it’s not easy,” said Austin McInerny, who is the group’s moderator. Austin is the former president of the National Interscholastic Cycling Association or NICA, and while he comes from a mountain biking background, he emphasizes that his role in this collaborative is a neutral one.
“I am here to push the process,” he said.
Too often, complex land-use planning decisions wind up pitting different recreation groups against each other. There’s the tireless tension of motorized versus non-motorized land use, or another long-standing conversation that centers on land protections and mountain bike access. By the time the Forest Service puts out a draft environmental impact statement for a big land-use decision, these groups are already at opposite ends of the table. The point of the collaborative, with Austin’s expertise in mediation, is to intercept the process before it reaches those points of contention. Austin wants to create a safe space for people to talk honestly and respectfully about their ideas and thoughts. He hopes the collaborative will lead to brainstorming and problem-solving with a mentality of “we’re all in this together.”
In California, these types of conversations are relevant right now to connect the Forest Service with volunteers and advocates who want to help them address the impacts of visitation. But this group will be even more useful in the coming years as California’s Region V forests begin to update their Forest Plans. Already, the Sierra and Sequoia National Forests are in the midst of updating these massive guiding documents. Many of the other forests in the state are scheduled to begin this process as soon as next year.
The collaborative has already met twice. A third meeting is scheduled for later in the fall. Because of the pandemic, their round-table conversations are held virtually. The Forest Service has also attended the meetings, but they are mostly there to listen to the conversation and collect feedback, Austin said.
In their first meetings, the group began working on a charter that will help them guide goals, processes and roles in the group. Equity rose to the top of their priority list.
“Certain parts of the state don’t have the same access to public lands, and we need to do more as a society to help those who have been underserved become environmentalists or become recreationalists,” Austin said.
For now, the collaborative is staying away from digging into specific issues that are pinned to a specific location or could derail the conversation. Instead, they’re focused on high-level concepts—like defining “sustainable recreation,” or brainstorming how to bring more equity to public lands, or thinking of ways to better connect volunteers with the Forest Service to get trails built and projects completed. If Austin can get people on the same page about these big concepts, then he hopes those more specific conversations will be more productive.
“Collaborative dialogue is a way to bring everyone together,” he said. “It creates a starting point.”
To get more involved in land-use planning, reach out to organizations like Outdoor Alliance or one of our partners. Together, we’ll help keep you informed about upcoming land-use planning decisions and ways to get involved in the conversation.