If you’ve camped in any of our nearby national forests in the past few years, you probably paid for the right to do so. And when you wrote a check for your campsite, you almost certainly didn’t make it out to the National Forest Service. You probably made it out to Hoodoo, Chuck Shepard’s recreation and resort management company, or one of the other companies contracted to take care of campgrounds in the forests.
One of the most prominent concessionaires in the entire Northwest, Shepard owns Hoodoo ski resort and its accompanying campground management division. Hoodoo is the only private concessionaire in the Deschutes National Forest, managing all of the forests’ 81 privately run campgrounds. In all, Shepard’s company manages about 150 campgrounds in Oregon and Washington. That number was once larger, but his company recently lost a bid to continue managing almost 50 other locations in the Willamette National Forest to another Utah-based company, American Lands & Leisure.
Shepherd is part of a fast-growing group of entrepreneurs who are moving into the public lands management game as the Forest Service and other public agencies back out. While, it was once common for the forest service to manage its own campgrounds, the past 30-plus years have seen the federal agency continue to pass on campground and recreational site management to private companies. Currently, more than half of the campgrounds – and 80 percent of all campsites – in our national forests are managed by private concessionaires. Contracts, typically lasting between five and ten years, are awarded to these companies and in return, the company manages and maintains the campgrounds, collects fees, keeps an eye on campers and cleans toilets, among other responsibilities. Supporters, including public agencies like the BLM and Forest Service, say the concessionaire model is more fiscally efficient, but as more of the once publicly managed campgrounds and day-use areas move into private control, some users say that the private sector is operating with their bottom line in mind, marginalizing less-profitable spots and bumping up site fees, rather than looking after the interests of campers.
That’s a problem, critics say, especially considering that 81 of the 93 campgrounds in the Deschutes National Forest and more than 100 of the 169 locations in the Mount Hood National Forest are currently operated by concessionaires. The campgrounds in the Willamette National Forest are also largely managed by private companies and just last year the Ochoco forest awarded contracts to a Utah-based company to manage several of the spots their agency had previously maintained.
One of those sites is the Skull Hollow campground just east of Smith Rock State Park, a popular site among rock climbers from throughout the region. Skull Hollow, which the Source covered in April of 2009 when the Forest Service decided to implement a $5-per-night fee at the once-free location, has been closed all winter by way of a decision by Aud & Di Campground Services, the company that now manages the campsite.
Ian Caldwell and other members of the volunteer Smith Rock Group, say that this seasonal closure is a disservice to the campers, many of whom had previously used Skull Hollow throughout the year.
“One of the problems with the whole issue with Skull Hollow is that the Forest Service wrote a contract with the private concessionaire that says they only need to keep it open for seven months,” says Caldwell, a longtime rock climber who now lives in Redmond, but used to camp at Skull Hollow when he lived in the valley. The Smith Rock Group used to pump the toilets and provide other maintenance at Skull Hollow, but discontinued those volunteer services when the campground began charging the $5 fee.
In a letter to Caldwell, Slater Turner, the District Ranger for the Ochoco National Forest and the Crooked River Grasslands, stated that the contract with Aud & Di requires the campground to remain open between May 1 and October 31. Any operation outside of that time frame is up to the company. Also in the letter, Turner said that the decision to turn Skull Hollow’s management over to a concessionaire was a result of “declining budgets and staff limitations,” which made it difficult to keep the campground open during the winter months when many forest service employees are laid off.
This fall, Aud & Di closed Skull Hollow at the end of October, then soon reopened it until the end of November. But to keep the campground open, it must remain profitable for Aud & Di, says company owner, Steve Hunn.
“We look to see that we can make enough off it to at least cover the cost of [operating] the campground,” says Hunn, whose company has been managing campgrounds since 1996 and is now overseeing some 60 spots in Oregon, Idaho and Wyoming. Hunn says that given the previous vandalism at Skull Hollow, his company decided, like at many of its campgrounds, to have a camp host on site whenever it’s open, which creates an additional operating cost. The Forest Service never had a host at Skull Hollow when it was under their management, but said in a letter to Caldwell that vandalism, theft and other problems were part of the reason they chose to turn Skull Hollow over to a concessionaire. The Forest Service also stated that Aud & Di were using this year to assess the occupancy at the campground to determine the cost of maintaining the site against the revenue it generated. Also, the letter points to other nearby campgrounds that could be used as an alternative to Skull Hollow.
Hunn says that Skull Hollow saw very few campers in November, which proved to be not enough to justify keeping it open. But Caldwell points out that while November and December were cold, temperatures remained in the 50s at Smith Rock in January, attracting plenty of climbers from all over the region, but none of these people were able to camp at Skull Hollow.
Caldwell and others have met with Jeff Walter, the forest supervisor for the Ochoco forest and the Crooked River Grasslands to work on some of his group’s concerns, but an easy solution is unlikely given that the ink on the contract with Aud & Di has long been dry.
“I wish there could be a win-win outcome here, but the only thing we could do is renegotiate with [the concessionaire]. That’s pretty tough to do,” says Walter, adding that his forest has very few concessionaires managing campgrounds.
At the end of the day, Skull Hollow is just a microcosm when it comes to the larger picture of concessionaires in Oregon. There’s another case study in the Mt. Hood National Forest where the Forest Service is proposing that the management of Bagby Hot Springs, a somewhat remote but nonetheless popular spot east of Estacada, be turned over to a private contractor.
The Northwest Forest Conservancy, an Oregon-based nonprofit that advocates for responsible management and usage, released a long list of concerns last month in response to the proposal for Bagby and several other sites on the Mt. Hood forest to be turned over to concessionaires. Included in that list was an assertion that concessionaires don’t hire the sort of well-trained and thoroughly vetted employees that the Forest Service employs. Perhaps most importantly, NWFC also stated in the document that volunteer maintenance efforts by groups such as theirs may not continue after the site is turned over to a private company.
Rick Acosta, the spokesman for the Mt. Hood National Forest, says that the interaction between the Forest Service and concessionaires is often misconstrued and that private companies are integral to providing recreation in our forests.
“Some people characterize it as privatizing it, we see it as a partnership. We have a lot of success serving the public this way,” says Acosta, “We’ve had diminishing capacity and the number of [employees] we have is diminishing. Meanwhile, the cost of services continues to go up.”
During the 2000s, the Forest Service saw widespread cuts in funding and staffing. Some programs, like fire suppression, remained amply funded, but recreation budgets took several hits, including an 11 percent decrease in 2007 alone.
This is the sentiment echoed by national forest managers across the country and one of the reasons that an increasing amount of campgrounds and recreation sites are being turned over to concessionaires nationwide.
Hoodoo’s Shepard sees the concessionaire program as the most efficient and logical way to manage national forest campgrounds.
“[Critics] would rather have the tax payer foot part of the bill, but that’s not the reality anymore,” says Shepard, “The forest service was never meant to be in the recreation business. They were meant to manage the trees, but not get into the private practice that goes into using the trees. I mean, you don’t see any government-run ski resorts, do you?”
Not everyone agrees with Shepard’s assertion and one the most outspoken critics of privatization is Scott Silver of Wild Wilderness, a Bend-based nonprofit that advocates against forest access fees and commercialization of national forests.
“The forest service is moving toward being a manager of partnerships and contracts,” says Silver. “I see no reason in the world that a campground built on public lands with public funds be operated by the private sector.”
But even Silver, one of the harshest critics of forest privatization you’re likely to find, doesn’t see the concessionaire program disappearing anytime soon, even if he disagrees with the program’s underlying principle.
“The commercialization of our forests is straight forward and obvious. Unfortunately, it’s probably going to stay that way,” says Silver.
This article appears in Mar 3-9, 2011.
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Shepard’s comment “The forest service was never meant to be in the recreation business. They were meant to manage the trees, but not get into the private practice that goes into using the trees. I mean, you don't see any government-run ski resorts, do you?” is disingenuous. While the founding principle of the USFS follow his assertion, ca. 1901, the Multiple Use Sustained Yield act of 1960, and many other acts and regulations since, have directed the USFS to manage many other aspects besides trees, including but not limited to recreation, watersheds and water, endangered species, etc. Many other management aspects of the USFS have changed, including wilderness areas, etc., so relating the present situation to a very long-ago approach is mis-direction at best.
Ski resorts were left to private entrepreneurs based on the capital costs and related management, but mostly because it was such a specific recreational activity. Even then the USFS has substantial say in how they are managed and operated.
Concessionaires contractual agreements regarding campgrounds with the USFS are similar in nature to the ski resorts, but are focused on less-elitist activities (e.g. family camping)that should remain available seasonally and financially to a broader group of people.
“[Critics] would rather have the tax payer foot part of the bill, but that's not the reality anymore,” says Shepard, “The forest service was never meant to be in the recreation business.”
Mr. Shepard needs to look beyond his bottomline thinking by first understanding he is corporate beneficiary of a totally taxpayer funded national forest system. Secondly, he needs to recall those forests, by law, are to be managed for multiple uses. His flippant points are not only way off base — they ooze arrogance.
Lastly, the public needs to wake up and realize privatization does not work out so well when corporate interests are allowed to trump the greater good of the public interest.
That’s the whole point of governmental agencies– to operate in the public’s best interests — and not the interests of corporate shareholders looking to make the next killing for a few quick bucks.
The incremental yet steady privatization of publicly owned forests will devolve just as our government is being devolved unless we the people remind our representatives in Congress our government is Of, For, and By, The People.
There is no excuse for an agency to allow Corporate Profiteers to parasitize taxpayers who’ve already funded the management of public lands.
I must disagree. There are plenty of places to camp with your backpack and tent which are NOT run by an “evil corporation.” Get off your butt and walk in a few miles.
I know, insensitive to people who can’t walk…look, when people go to an established campground, like those managed by Hoodoo, they (rightly or wrongly) expect a certain level of cleanliness. To be blunt, some of the un-managed spots I’ve been to are filthy, trash pits with cat holes all-round. Frankly, car campers and rv people seem to miss the whole leave no trace ethos, so I’m happy to pay a few bucks per night to keep the place clean, trash emptied and outhouses clean. I’m trying to figure out just who Mr. Beebe thinks will clean up after the last slob? Go out to Mill Creek past Prineville and you’ll see what I mean. That beautiful place is a garbage dump – and it is all FREE for the camping.
I still prefer to hike into the woods with my tent on my back. But, when I’m with my elderly parents, I join them at Hoodoo campsites (Suttle Lake?) and enjoy the place. To generalize – hikers SEEM to be more attuned to leave no trace, even in heavy traffic areas like the PCT or 3 Sisters areas.
JC… Have you ever been to Skull Hollow? I love backpacking too but that is a different conversation. We are talking about car camping in a giant open space that has 2 pit toilets with NO other amenities. These 2 bathrooms were once volunteer managed. They basically painted the bathrooms, put a gate up, and started charging 5 bucks…. and now, close the access because they dont want to pay someone to live there and take people’s money. I use to stay at Skull Hollow frequently until they started charging. Now, I camp elsewhere.
There are 2 plain issues with the arguments between citizens groups and the USFS .
People don’t want to pay fees to access their forest. If you buy a vacation property, like was done for the public lands, do your expenses end when you close on that property?
Of course not. You have to pay for water treatment, sanitation, eclectic, landscaping, safety, and access. These things cost real world money. Just like if you owned it by yourself.
Now we address those who feel that they may do whatever they choose on public lands. You may NOT do as you please. We all own public lands. As such we have middle of the road rules to ATTEMPT to please everyone.
If you want to do whatever you want on land, buy your own land and recreate as you desire.
The opposite side of the issue requires Congress to adequately fund the agencies to complete the mission that the people desire.
We have amazing public lands that have enough variety to please just about everyone.
It’s just a matter of how we fund it.
Just like your home, public agencies worry about how the light bill gets paid. Contrary to public opinion, you can’t just take the funds and make it happen.