Law Enforcement on Public Lands

[Farmerj]

And please Don't think i'm Anti-LEO. My Childhood friend is the undersheriff for our county, my 1 mile neighbor a Deputy, Another Childhood friend is CA DW warden. As well as a number of acquaintances and friends Active duty and Retired city police forces.

I tend to agree with you, but until LEO and their departments decide to actively get rid of qualified immunity due to the bad eggs, they will continue to all be seen as bad eggs.

 

[TheTone]

I don't think that is necessarily tied to law enforcement as much as its tied to budget and priorities for the FS.

Correct, my local district cares about killing trees as it’s number 1 priority. Local LEO’s number 1 priority is signing up for details in other areas; especially the Caribbean. From past conversations he typically spends 50-75% of his time working elsewhere

 

[Farmerj]

Correct, my local district cares about killing trees as it’s number 1 priority. Local LEO’s number 1 priority is signing up for details in other areas; especially the Caribbean. From past conversations he typically spends 50-75% of his time working elsewhere

That’s just wrong right there.

 

[Moserkr]

Theres not enough law enforcement in the sticks and there never will be. Its a function of money, time, and vast distances to cover. Ive interacted with law enforcement all over the western US. From my experiences as a civilian, the out of state (not CA) law enforcement (wardens, forest service, sheriffs) seem to be much friendlier and more old school. As in they will bullshit a minute and see how you are doing.

In CA, all my interactions with forest service and wardens have been unpleasant to where Im assumed to be a criminal. Theres no interaction beyond rummaging through my shit and trying to find what minor infraction I didnt realize existed. They have a hard on for separating you from your guns and putting them all across the hoods of their cars like its some sort of expose. Meanwhile the real miscreants are obviously running all over the place in plain sight.

My local county sheriffs however, are great, the no non-sense type. Even got their own tv show cause they dont mess around. I happen to live across the street from one and told him dont ever expect a call from me for help - I can take care of my own. Told him if anything you can call on me or the like if you need help. Thats the wild west we live in up here and I dont mind it at all.

 

[atlas]

Last Saturday I found an E-bike/scooter stashed in the bushes miles down a logging road. It was clear the guy was out there commercial huckleberry picking as there were big tubs of berries filled up. I happened to have a trail camera 20 yards from where the E-bike was on the logging road so I pulled it.

Part of me wanted to pop his tires and move on but I thought I'd do the right thing and go a quarter mile to where I would have service because I knew the only access the guy could have rode an E-bike to this spot. I called the Forest Service dispatch and reported the current location and the access I assumed his car was.

I peddled my bike a few miles farther back pulled a trail camera SD and then headed back.

The E-bike was still there on my way out with more gathered huckleberries. When I got to my car, I drove down to where I thought the E-biker had come in from and found what was most likely their truck. So I snapped a photo of his plate.

When I got home and went through the photos I had many photos of this guy zipping past the camera on his E-bike on multiple days, all through August. Last year I had many photos of elk during the day in this spot and now every single photo of elk was at night.

On Monday I called the Forest Service back and told them I wanted an LEO to call me because I had a photo of this guy's Ebike, multiple trail camera pictures of him, and a picture of his license plate. I still haven't had a callback. You'd think this would be a slam dunk to give this guy a ticket for illegal OHV use but I can't even get a call back

 

[Farmerj]

Last Saturday I found an E-bike/scooter stashed in the bushes miles down a logging road. It was clear the guy was out there commercial huckleberry picking as there were big tubs of berries filled up. I happened to have a trail camera 20 yards from where the E-bike was on the logging road so I pulled it.

Part of me wanted to pop his tires and move on but I thought I'd do the right thing and go a quarter mile to where I would have service because I knew the only place where the guy could have ridden an E-bike to this spot. I called the Forest Service dispatch and reported the current location and where the access the guy came on.

I peddled my bike a few miles farther back pulled a trail camera SD and then headed back.

The E-bike was still there on my way out with more gathered huckleberries. When I got to my car, I drove down to where I thought the E-biker had come in from and found what was most likely their truck. So I snapped a photo of his plate.

When I got home and went through the photos I had many photos of this guy zipping past the camera on his E-bike on multiple days, all through August. Last year I had many photos of elk during the day in this spot and now every single photo of elk was at night.

On Monday I called the Forest Service back and told them I wanted an LEO to call me because I had a photo of this guy's Ebike, multiple trail camera pictures of him, and a picture of his license plate. I still haven't had a callback. You'd think this would be a slam dunk to give this guy a ticket for illegal OHV use but I can't even get a call back

What was the guy doing wrong? Public land?

 

[Nameless Range]

Last Saturday I found an E-bike/scooter stashed in the bushes miles down a logging road. It was clear the guy was out there commercial huckleberry picking as there were big tubs of berries filled up. I happened to have a trail camera 20 yards from where the E-bike was on the logging road so I pulled it.

Part of me wanted to pop his tires and move on but I thought I'd do the right thing and go a quarter mile to where I would have service because I knew the only place where the guy could have ridden an E-bike to this spot. I called the Forest Service dispatch and reported the current location and where the access the guy came on.

I peddled my bike a few miles farther back pulled a trail camera SD and then headed back.

The E-bike was still there on my way out with more gathered huckleberries. When I got to my car, I drove down to where I thought the E-biker had come in from and found what was most likely their truck. So I snapped a photo of his plate.

When I got home and went through the photos I had many photos of this guy zipping past the camera on his E-bike on multiple days, all through August. Last year I had many photos of elk during the day in this spot and now every single photo of elk was at night.

On Monday I called the Forest Service back and told them I wanted an LEO to call me because I had a photo of this guy's Ebike, multiple trail camera pictures of him, and a picture of his license plate. I still haven't had a callback. You'd think this would be a slam dunk to give this guy a ticket for illegal OHV use but I can't even get a call back

Stay on it, Atlas.

 

[atlas]

What was the guy doing wrong? Public land?

He was riding a motorized vehicle miles behind a closed gate. The rule on the forest here is that E bikes are considered motorized and there is signage at the trailhead.

His bike..

 

[Farmerj]

I wish you luck…

Be fear it’s not going to amount to much.

 

[atlas]

Yeah, I know. Like I said a ticket is probably the most I could hope for. The guy is probably making an absolute killing selling huckleberries so that might not even matter.

 

[elkduds]

Yeah, I know. Like I said a ticket is probably the most I could hope for. The guy is probably making an absolute killing selling huckleberries so that might not even matter.

Still, you are doing it the legal way, good call. What if his berries all vanished?

 

[el unit]

During High School, USFS LEO's John Benshoof and Lenora Arevellos (sp?) in Northern Colorado kept our crew in pretty good check. Thankfully, Benshoof's daughter was always with us and he'd let a few things slide.
Lenora was brutal.
I'm sure they will never forget Rocky Mountain High School class of 1998.

 

[squirrel]

Well it depends on the day:

When I go past a work crew of sweaty "friends of xyzzy wilderness" cutting Beatle kill deadfall off the trail (using a two man buck saw and an axe) with a prim little green uniformed lady (smelling of hair spray and channel #5) chewing their ass for not putting the branches far enough off the trail and scattering the sawdust in an adequately random manner, I tend to think there is too much enforcement. (As I drape a coat over the exposed bar cover on the Husky sticking up out of the panniers.)

When a group of her clones wearing packs crawls over those dead trees ignoring them and gets to a lake and start throwing rocks into the lake because they are black from soot... same.

Then: after doing my best "D day" infantry crawl for 200 yards in the mud to get down into a gully to avoid ricocheting semi-auto lead a few feet over head and proceeding down said gulley to where they are pulverising TV and other household trash with no backstop behind, My viewpoint changes just a bit.

But I had no issue with explaining in loud and graphic detail what I thought of their actions either. The wisdom of doing this to 6 armed idiots while carrying nothing but antlers could be second guessed (in hindsight) but I was highly motivated.

Sometimes when encountering a "showstopper" where a 24" tree takes out 5 more and effectively closes the trail and I reach back to the first pannier and pull out the Husky, whack and roll, the porridge is "just right" and there is not much wrong with the world, those days make up for the others, many times over.

 

[MonsterElk]

He was riding a motorized vehicle miles behind a closed gate. The rule on the forest here is that E bikes are considered motorized and there is signage at the trailhead.

His bike..View attachment 290245

They are considered motorized and you can hike / hunt behind no motorized vehicles signs and you'll find tracks everywhere and bigger track than a regular mountain bike. That person doesn't get caught by any officials because of lack of officials so he tells his buddy's one or two can ruin it for everyone.

 

[Johnny Bravo]

He was riding a motorized vehicle miles behind a closed gate. The rule on the forest here is that E bikes are considered motorized and there is signage at the trailhead.

His bike..View attachment 290245

Hop on it and ride it out so he gets to walk out....lol...OR take the seat....better yet....take a pizz in their berries...

 

[Idahoarcheryhunter]

In many years I’ve only been checked by idaho fish and game once. While I was pheasant hunting on a wma. Makes you wonder how much stuff people get away with that nobody will ever know about.

 

[MonsterElk]

In many years I’ve only been checked by idaho fish and game once. While I was pheasant hunting on a wma. Makes you wonder how much stuff people get away with that nobody will ever know about.

People get away with it they'll keep at it. Was on a late season cow hunt pulled up to a gate. You could still hunt there G&F post, closed for big game management foot traffic only. Found the post 8" had been cut off with a chain saw and the gate was wide open. Some people's kids

 

[Nicoli7153]

Vest are a lot easier on the back compared to wearing everything on a duty belt and still wearing some type of vest.

And hip, especially for women. By the time you get the belt, gun, holster, ammo, handcuffs, pepper spray, radio, baton it's pushing 30 pounds.

 

[sccritterkiller]

USFS, BLM, local F&G are all under funded , they don't have the reasources available for management or enforcement...but we can send billions to Ukraine...smh
Hell the closest Forest Service station next to the property I own hasn't even had anybody to answer the phone for 6 months..can't fill the ranger vacancies they have. The VM instructs you to call the range station 2 hrs north if you have an issue.

 

[Don Fischer]

When it comes to the public lands experience and stewardship of our public lands, we more than often talk about forest/range health – the projects going on out there, the conifer encroachment, the fuels reductions. We’ll discuss road densities, travel plans, trails, etc. Often times, it is those features that physically exist (or don’t exist) on the landscape that we think drives our experiences out there. As a member of a county committee, as a local working group member, as first responder, and as citizen, a theme I have noticed over the last decade, and one I feel is actually reaching the point of a critical issue, is lack of law enforcement on public lands. It affects landowners adjacent , the public land user/lessee, and the resource . Tons of examples exist and I won’t expound on all I can think of.

The Law Enforcement Officers I have interacted with on public lands are doing mostly sacred work, so this isn’t me complaining about them. It is a concern that certain expenses of public lands are woefully under-patrolled. I have experienced a few camping trips with my family over the last few years where a bad actor or group of bad actors in our proximity gave a sense of lawlessness to the experience – an uncomfortableness. I see folks camped wayyyy more than their 2 week allotment (and have notified the authorities), I see frequent drug use, and I see folks ripping the country up with a seeming impunity.

I don’t know the exact stats, but when I think of the Forest I play in most – the Beaverhead-Deerlodge – there are something like 3 USFS LEOs covering over 3 million acres. They've basically each got their own Rhode Island, and don't work 24/7. Now, counties may have MOUs in place to patrol certain campgrounds at certain intervals, and MT FWP LEOs and even MHP might come to the aid of a situation if they can, but generally, there is a lack of enforcement presence and a damn-long response time if one is needed. Whether it is camping in one spot too long, drug use, violence, or just general lack of rule-following (closed roads, trails, shooting, trash, etc) – I believe as our public land use continues to drastically rise, the experience of users will diminish more than it has to if we don't get ahead of this.

Specifically, and why I write this post - 5 years ago, our local sheriff told a group I am a member of that he would never take his family camping at a local high mountain lake campground. It’s become a hotspot for certain denizens, the incident response time up there is closer to an hour than anything, and that that situation wasn’t going to change anytime soon. A member of the USFS said it was too dangerous for a campground host. Just a week ago, 5 years later, I heard the same thing from our new sheriff.

That there be beautiful and precious chunks of public land out there, and that they could be deemed unsafe or inappropriate places for families, is a failure I do not believe we should accept.

There are a couple current openings for LEO positions in this neck of the woods, but even if they were filled, there should be more positions. From what I have heard, I really don’t think it looks like more positions are on the horizon, but I feel like there should be, and for what it is worth, I will likely write my congressman. The USFS spends a fair bit of funds in other places, and I think prioritizing this is important, and I specifically mean incentivizing folks via higher pay and creating more FTEs.

I am curious – in your neck of the woods, do you feel like the amount of law enforcement on public lands is sufficient? Yes, or No, I'd be interested in where you see it working or don't, and why you think that is.

View attachment 277190

Seeing all the stuff you see is simply seeing human beings being human beings. I see it and don't care for it either but how you gonna change it? There are a lot of multiple time offenders out there doing these things! It's a human trait I believe! Not found in all of them for sure!