Peaceful picnickers to take stand against off-roaders

Note: There are easily more hiking trails than offroad trails. I'm  troubled by the environmentalists clamoring so loud about these issues. In the areas I've ridden, I've never seen a single hiker or person smelling the cacti - yet, I'd be willing to bet you'd get noise about closing the west desert to offroad vehicles. I'm curious to see how this turns out.

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A Kanab businesswoman is organizing a "picnic with a purpose" alongside the Paria River as a peaceful way to speak out against hundreds of off-roaders who plan to take a protest ride Saturday in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

But Susan Hand insists her event won't be a counterprotest. She hopes her allies won't try to stop the four-wheelers as they tool up the river in defiance of an expected Bureau of Land Management announcement that it will begin enforcing rules against riding in the Paria streambed.

"We want to show the world that local people care about protecting our land from illegal and irresponsible use. We will not be confrontational, inflammatory, aggressive or hostile," Hand said in an e-mail she sent to others who favor protecting the Paria. "It's hard to yell at someone who is calmly sitting in a lawn chair, munching a muffin and sipping tea."

Hand hopes the picnic will proceed without any fuss from the riders. "I'd like to invite them to have coffee."

But others are ready to mount opposing protests. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance issued a call to action against "renegade off-road-vehicle riders."

"The canyon is a wilderness study area and has been closed to ORV use for years by the Utah [office of the] Bureau of Land Management," SUWA said, "but the protest organizers believe this beautiful canyon, along with every other piece of public land in Utah, should be open to ORVs."

An ad

It's rumored that Kane County Commissioner Mark Habbeshaw placed the unsigned ad. Habbeshaw hasn't responded to multiple requests for comment. But he has a history of opposing federal attempts to keep Jeeps and all-terrain vehicles on designated trails and out of wilderness-quality areas.

Kanab resident and off-road rally organizer Shawna Cox expects 500 to 1,000 riders to show up for the Paria protest. She doesn't expect any trouble.

"Nobody I know is going to be causing any problem," she said, adding she has arranged for county law enforcement to be there "to see that things don't get out of hand."

Picnic organizer Hand said that's what she and others fear.

"There are a lot of people I know who are environmentalists in this area. But I don't know how many people will show up. It's kind of intimidating for people," she said. "They are afraid of repercussions in the community. Because you are a minority, you open yourself up to consequences."

Frustration over the monument's management, particularly concerning county claims on roads that cross public land, has been constant since 1996, when President Bill Clinton designated 1.8 million acres in Kane County for the special status.

This weekend's ride comes in the wake of a federal appeals court ruling that said the 2000 monument management plan has the force of law. That plan does not recognize the Paria corridor as a route for motorized-vehicle access.

Habbeshaw -- who on Thursday was circulating a photo of a BLM sign that says, "Streambed of Paria River Open to Motor Vehicles" -- and others maintain the Paria has long been a road.

Salt Lake City resident Todd Adams said he took the picture in June 1999. He stayed in an RV park whose owners commuted to St. George on the route every week to visit a sick relative.

"I got an appreciation of how important this and other non-paved routes are to the rural communities," he wrote in an e-mail. "There is a reason the locals are upset and going forward with this protest led by Mark [Habbeshaw]."