Yoopers Kicked out of Cabins by Feds

[Northwoods Labs]

Or at least that is the picture this story is trying to tell

http://www.jsonline.com/story/news/columnists/john-carlisle/2017/04/29/michigan-upper-peninsula-cabins/100594194/


Lands in the Ottawa National Forest were once owned by a power company, then sold to the Trust For Public Land, later coming under control of the Forest Service. Before the lands became federally managed, locals were given 25 year leases for 1 acre lots along the Onotonagon River. The feds honored those leases and now the time is up. Looks like the cabins that are not moved will be destroyed.

I thought it was an interesting article. I can see both sides. The cabins have a lot of traditions, were not really hurting anything, and seemed to be open to allow for public to use them. On the other hand, it is squatting on public land. If one wants a cabin in the woods you need to buy some property like most everyone else. If these folks are allowed to maintain cabins in the National Forest it can set a bad precedent, as what would stop more people from building cabins.

Had to shake my head at this quote from Tom Casperson R-Escanaba: “They say it’s for all of us so we can enjoy it, and then they turn around and block things off, which means you and I can’t go out there.” I can't even begin to explain how false this statement is.

 

[VAspeedgoat]

Reading that honestly breaks my heart. I can only imagine how I would feel. They are so much more than a cabin in the woods to these people. Unfortunately I don't think there was any other way to resolve this without stirring up a chit storm somewhere else. I hate that it had to be this way but such is life.

 

[Big Fin]

In Montana we had the same thing in the late 1990's around Canyon Ferry Reservoir. The land was owned by the BLM and Bureau of Reclamation (BOR). They did cabin leases and they were all about to expire and the same fate would have been in store for them.

Here is what we did and it might be a solution to any creative Michigan folks. We met with Senator Max Baucus to explain this could be an opportunity for more public access. He introduced legislation that established the Canyon Ferry Trust that would receive the proceeds from the sale of these lands to the cabin owners and would use those proceeds to purchase other public access. The cabin sites were appraised with each cabin owner having first right to pay the appraised price. I'm not aware of any cabin owners who did not pay the appraised price.

End result, the cabin owners did not have to move and we now have a multi-million dollar public endowment for public access acquisition. The Board of Trustees is appointed, with some BLM/BOR/State folks also on the Board. Only the earnings are used for acquisition. Since inception that Trust has been used to fund some critical gaps in public land projects that otherwise would not have been possible.

Since it required an Act of Congress, it was not easy to do, but surely was worth the headache and challenge to get it done. Happy cabin owners, happy public; problem solved.


As a side note, most thought the appraisals were on the low side, except the cabin owners who had the chance to buy them. Subsequent sales of those sites and the cabins has shown that the appraised price was a screaming deal for the cabin owner. Oh well, we all benefited in the end.

 

[Hunting Wife]

There are still many active leases of cabin sites on National Forest in Montana. My husband's grandfather built a cabin in 1935 on a 99 year Forest Service lease. There are hundreds, perhaps thousands of similar leases in place. We are all worried about what is going to happen when that lease is up. So much of their family identity and history revolves around that cabin. The entire extended family (aunts, uncles, siblings, cousins) would meet there every weekend to hike, hunt, fish, explore. I think it was a formative place that led a couple of those kids to grow up as fierce advocates for public lands and public wildlife in Montana. Right now, the third generation of kids is learning to camp, fish, and shoot in the very same yard their grandmothers and grandfathers learned those things.

Given the specifics of the arrangement in this case (not sure what arrangements others may have), I would not characterize it as squatting. The family pays annual lease payments and have zero control of anything other than the structure. People walk through the yard to access the creek or trail all the time. As long as they leave the buildings alone, the public isn't prohibited from accessing the land. I'm hopeful that we'll be able to find some kind of solution when the lease is up.

 

[2ski]

If Michigan needs help with a solution, have them get a hold of Norman Maclean's son, John. Norman, if you recall, is the author of A River Runs Through It and John is an author and professor. If you google John you will find where he gave a commencement speech at UM-Western and it touched a little on FS leases and what it meant to the Maclean family. http://johnmacleanbooks.com/montana/


The south end of Seeley Lake in MT is all private land. The north end and the river outlet are forest service leases. One of the leases is the Maclean family lease. The cabin was built by Norman's dad from the wood that was in the woods surrounding it there. When Norman was teaching, he would bring his family back for the summers and the kids were told to go barefoot the whole time, like the native american kids did. If you read the book, you'll know that some of what the movie has happening at the Blackfoot River(fishing with his brother-in-law and the prostitute) actually happened at Seeley Lake and they showed up uninvited. I'm pretty sure that the picture on the back cover of the book is of Norman in a canoe at Seeley. Looks like it to me anyways. In the background looks like the marshy area just north of the beach at Big Larch campground.

Anyway, I believe it was Brian Schweitzer that sued to make those leases fair market value. For a long time there were a lot of families that had leases that were CHEAP and affordable. I know of a family of teachers that was able to afford a cabin by one of the campgrounds. And the south end, I know a cabin that was closer to a million than half a million. It took less than a month to sell, so the fact that a teacher could afford a cabin is awesome. After the lawsuit, the leases went way up making them harder for a lot of the families to pay. They had leases that had long terms to them but when they came up for renewal they skyrocketed. Also, because they had leases and could be told that they no longer had the lease at the end of the term, noone puts any money into the cabins. Why put any money into it when you might not get a return. So the cabins on the north end are cabins....the south end, houses.

Anyways, all that to say, I can sympithise with these cabin owners and don't see this as squatting at all. They took advantage of something any of us would've. Now it sucks they have to go. I heard at Seeley, the FS may sell the leases and I guess do something like what Randy said happened at CF>

 

[hank4elk]

We had a cabin in the Sierra NF for many years. Was built by another retired Park Ranger the year I was born,1955. The second stage of leases & cabins built in our Tract.
The area was the 1st cabins leased on FS lands & the largest group of cabin owners in country. The 1st ones were on Forest Reserve lands,before the Sierra Nat. Forest was divided into 6 NF's & 3 NP's. The 1st Forest Reserve Ranger station was the Billy Creek & our assocition bought the cabin to save it & house a museum. Cabin owners donated tons of historical artifacts for it,including 1st uniforms that looked like Union Soldier blues.The rangers wound up wearing buckskin til they wore WW1 green wool.
I was on the BOD of my tract & National Forest Homeowners Ass.,Huntington Lake. Went thru the renewing of leases,appraisals,appeals,permits,easements,land swaps, forest thinning, plans & meetings with FS & Congress.....years of meetings.

 

[icebreaker12]

County forests in northern WI used to have cabin leases. I believe the last hold out was 2011. These leases had rates well below normal and was a steal for those who had them. Often those using the cabins felt entitled to the land immediately adjacent to the cabins. It led to some pretty significant conflicts (in fact one of those conflicts involved one "public land" cabin group threatening to burn down our cabin built on our land).

I didn't feel even an ounce of sadness when they had to remove the cabins.

Looks like this situation is different. But, I still don't like private cabins on public land.

 

[Northwoods Labs]

Yea I guess my statement of squatting was too harsh. It is too bad some sort of an agreement couldn't be made where they could keep the cabin leases with some restrictions, such as no new additions, cannot be locked to keep people out, etc. However, I definitely see icebreakers point of view and I am not a huge fan of private cabins on public land either

 

[grandejuan]

I think there are two sides of each story, however the lessees had a privilege a and benefit you and I didn't for 35 - 99 years. A deal is deal and the time ran out. The families had years of use and access, depending on the lease terms, that the ordinary citizen didn't have at a minimal price. The original lessees made a bet that the Feds would renew and now this generation has to pay the piper. The Brits made a 99 year lease on Hong Kong and invested $ billions and lost it all. I feel badly for the families but hey, its time to go. They shouldn't ask us to pull their chestnuts out of the fire. GJ

 

[buckbull]

We had a lease on the kaskaskia river in southern illinois. The corps of engineers owned the ground on each side of the river and they straightened the river to allow barge traffic to the numerous coal mines along the river. Eventually the corps gave the land over to Illinois and we lost our lease. They bulldozed the cabin. Besides river access, the only way to get to that cabin or thousands of acres of hunting ground was a farm field road that we maintained. Now, nobody has access to that property.

 

[mdhunter]

We have had the same thing happen here on the east coast. The federal government bought up the private land on a large barrier island that is split between Maryland and Virginia. The owners of the lodges and cabins were given a twenty five year lease. That time has been up for several years now so all the structures are gone. What remains is an incredible National Park and probably the largest undeveloped stretch of beach front land on the east coast.

 

[Deleted member 28227]

Isn't projecting/feeling that you have ownership of leased federal property because your family has been using it for decades basically the exact same thing that was going on with the Bundys in Oregon. I'm not saying this is parallel behavior these people aren't taking over a refuge... just saying this seems to be the exact same sentiment.

Our family has had a cabin since the 50s in Colorado and we will likely loose it soon, but while I can wax nostalgic about getting to spend summers there times change and I think our family needs to fondly remember the great times move on.

 

[Straight Arrow]

We had a USFS lease cabin on Silver Lake west of Anaconda in partnership with another family for several years. We replaced the roof and completed a lot of work to maintain the old log cabin. When a land swap occurred to consolidate public lands and improve elk habitat as part of another great RMEF project, the leased parcel became privately owned by a timber company. Naturally the lease ended, but we still owned the cabin structure itself. It would have been almost impossible to move the old cabin and to where? We were prepared to suffer a complete loss of our investment of time, money and wonderful recreational spot, but fortunately the timber company chose to treat us fairly and gave us a small parcel of property to compensate for our loss. The point is that we were happy with the land swap / public land consolidation, disappointed in our loss ... but we knew that leased land was not a certainty forever.

 

[MJE2083]

We have a lot of leases on our state forest lands in PA. I think they stopped leasing sometime in the 70's. It's my understanding that the leases are renewed every 10 years, but as long as you're playing by the rules they could continue to be renewed forever. You can even sell your cabin and transfer your lease.

I'm torn on the issue...certainly it's a sweet deal for those who have established leases. Part of me would like to see them phased out in some ways.

 

[ChrisS]

I have some sympathy for cabin owners, but it is public property and IMO the USFS isn't (and shouldn't) be in the business of leasing out private recreational properties.

The Adirondacks in NY has a very long and complicated history with leases, cabins, and private camps on public land. Up until the 1960s, it was "allowed" for people to maintain rustic camps in the backcountry and what happened was what usually happens at camps - little landfills started springing up around these rustic camps. In conjunction with increasing environmental awareness, the state started phasing that authorization out and closing out camps. Currently, no private property is allowed to remain on state lands (excepting portable tree-stands which must be removed by the end of the season) and no permanent or semi-permanent structures are allowed on state property. These days you can still find stashed boats, barrels, and supplies covered with plastic and tarps. Sometimes its not big deal, but most of the time it's a damn mess and often there are piles that have been left there for years and decades by people who passed on, forgot, or are too lazy to retrieve their junk (and most of it is junk, no one is leaving their kifaru tipi out in the woods and forgetting about it. A $20 blue tarp, yep). If the state rangers find a camp, they burn it to the ground. They lack the time and money to extricate what is now garbage from the backcountry.

Timber companies owned vast swaths of the forest preserve and leased out parcels for camps (hunting clubs mostly). Clubs were allowed to build a cabin that was not permanently attached to a foundation for a nominal fee on a 5-10-acre parcel that they would have exclusive right to (something like $1-2k per year usually) and access to the remaining timber company land not otherwise leased. Eventually though, timber companies weren't making nearly as much money as they needed to profit off the lands and typically would put them up for sale. The Nature Conservancy would buy the property and arrange for sale to NY to add to the public land inventory. Three good sized parcels (totaling 161,000 acres) were recently acquired when Finch Pruyn decided that they couldn't make enough profit on the slow growth of ADK hardwoods. There were a handful of clubs that were allowed to continue their lease for 10-years which ends in 2018. That'll be a fun fight.

I had a chance to belong to a club that held a timber-company lease. It was decent enough, but mainly everyone showed up Friday night and zoomed off on their ATVs in the morning carving new trails in the woods. It wasn't my cup of tea and I passed. ATVs are not allowed on public forest preserve land except on designated roads (outside of wilderness areas). The camp I belong to now owns a small parcel (8-acres) that is adjacent to a wilderness area. The club has been active since 1961 when some guides from a lodge (which had gone out of business and sold their property to the state for inclusion into the Forest Preserve), joined together and bought some of the land. Many of the current members are related, but not all, and the club charter stipulates that if it is no longer a hunting club, the property and buildings pass to the local township.

I understand the attachment that can happen with a person to a place, but if you want to protect that investment, buy it. I saw a lot of references in that article to people no longer being able to access the property, but that's not true at all. Now, everyone can access the area and has equal footing. No cabin? Plenty of places sell tents. Yes, people get old and access can continue through motorized means, etc, but that also comes with impacts.

I do not look forward to the day when I can no longer access the backcountry on foot, but I do not expect special exceptions and other people to sacrifice their opportunity to explore quiet and remote feeling backcountry like I have.

 

[Straight Arrow]

I do not look forward to the day when I can no longer access the backcountry on foot, but I do not expect special exceptions and other people to sacrifice their opportunity to explore quiet and remote feeling backcountry like I have.

Well said. Thank-you, Chris.

 

[MN Public Hunter]

I would not say "kicked" out as the title say as it was more of an understanding the lease would be over with no renewal. With that said I'm not sure why they don't just let them buy the land either. Either way they knew the time was coming and now everyone can enjoy the public land as an equal.

 

[hank4elk]

I almost had a stroke when I found our cabins had been offered the chance to buy the 1/2 ac leases...twice,cheep & they refused.$1200 the 1st time in 60's then $2500 in 78'. Some of the cabins had been in area before there was a NF,so there were always disputes.
I was going to retire & live part time there. Even had jobs lined up.
One of the biggest problems is the FS did nothing in oversight for 30 yrs.Then the pendulum swung & a touchy feely FS became SClubber ogres. IMHO.Got fed up & sold it & bought my ranch.
1450 sq ft . total,upstairs & down,& deck area. Cute little cabins turned into ugly 70's ski lodges & chalets of 5k sq ft.
The whole program was to get people into the woods to enjoy nature.Big deal in the 1920's & after the war. It worked & the local communities prospered. The FS prospered.