No-Fee group fights Regula's appointment

SUMMIT COUNTY - The Western Slope No-Fee Coalition is trying to prevent Congressman Ralph Regula, R-Ohio, from being appointed chairman of the House Appropriations Committee in January.

Regula attached a rider to the omnibus spending bill Congress passed last month, which made permanent the program that charges people to use certain public lands managed by the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Reclamation, Bureau of Land Management, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park Service.

Summit County is home to three pay-to-play areas. One is on Vail Pass, where recreational fees are charged in the winter. The other is at Cataract Lake where hikers who park at the trailhead are assessed a fee. The third requires people to pay for campsites and parking at Green Mountain Reservoir in the summer.

Funds gathered at the Cataract Lake and Green Mountain Reservoir sites amount to about $40,000 a year. They have gone toward trail and campground improvements and toilets.

The coalition is asking House leadership to bypass Regula and appoint either Congressman Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., or Congressman Hal Rogers, R-Ky., to lead the committee for the next six years.

Robert Funkhouser, president of the coalition, said the organization opposes Regula's appointment because he allegedly threatened the house Resources Committee to vote against funding for other projects if his fee program wasn't implemented and repeatedly used omnibus spending bills to enact legislation that involves major policy changes for federal agencies.

He said one of Regula's first actions was to cut up to 30 percent of funds for public land management agencies and instead proposed the fee-based funding program. It failed on the House floor in 1995, so Regula attached it to the 1996 omnibus spending bill the president must sign.

"That means the idea has never been subjected to public debate or a floor vote in either the House or Senate," Funkhouser said. "This is a despicable abuse of the legislative process. It's wrong to hide substantive legislation that includes criminal penalties and new taxes in a spending bill. Congressman Regula knew full well that this bill was unlikely to pass on its own merits. By forcing it through anyway, he's demonstrated a willingness to abuse power that should not be rewarded by being selected for one of the most powerful positions in the House."

The pay-to-play program was first implemented in 1996 on a trial basis, and has been extended every other year since. It provides the land agencies with money to help maintain infrastructure.



Jane Stebbins can be reached at (970) 668-3998, ext. 228, or at jstebbins@summitdaily.com.