NYSORVA Position StatementNYSORVA POSITION STATEMENT— March 8, 2004 WHAT THE GOVERNOR'S ATV PROPOSAL WITHIN THE STATE BUDGET MEANS TO TRAIL RIDERS INTRODUCTION: We feel that on the whole, the Governor's Executive Budget proposal as detailed below is fairly well balanced in recognizing the ATV and Trail Motorcycling community. However, the proposed registration fee increase, from $10 to $45, has gotten a lot of people upset— the amount and mix of spending of the fee increase must be adjusted. If we can improve the funding aspects of the proposal, then we will be getting somewhere. In other words: As written, the Proposal as it relates to the future of ATV & off-highway motorcycle ("OHM") recreation in NY, has some very positive aspects indeed. But it does have its faults, and this means it is a job for all of us to make sure that the Assembly & Senate counter-proposals improve on this good start. SUPPORT AN IMPROVED PROPOSAL:
We urge you to support the positive
aspects of the Governor’s Proposal. But you should strenuously call for
significant changes to the funding model, detailed later in this
document. Your State Senator and Assembly Member need to hear from
you NOW about these funding details! If the Executive Budget as written by the Governor was passed today with the ATV Proposal intact, the following would occur: THE GOOD: 1) ATV recreation would be recognized, as a point of law, as a LEGITIMATE form of recreation by New York State (currently, we essentially "don't exist" in the Laws and programs of NY State, thus there has been no accommodation to date). 2) By Law, ATV ACCESS and trail building could be authorized (but not required) on state reforestation areas (areas of state-owned lands managed for resource extraction and intensive recreation) and State Recreational Easement lands (e.g., the former Champion lands in the Adirondack region). 3) FUNDING would be provided to a program under DEC that would direct and manage sustainable ATV recreation. Grants would be made for development and maintenance of trails on private land and state-owned recreational easements, for safety education, and for law enforcement. (See the following for a discussion of the flaws in this part of the proposal.) THE BAD (Could be fixed with your help): 1) The proposal for the funding stream is by annual budget appropriation from the General Fund, not directly from annual registrations. This is highly flawed because we would have to ask for new funding to be included in the State Budget every year. Instead, a dedicated fund should be set up and its funding must come directly and automatically from annual registration fees, exactly the same way as snowmobile registrations currently fund the State Snowmobile Trail Fund. 2) As proposed, the vast majority of the $35 fee registration fee increase (to a total of $45/year) is intended for completely-unrelated expenses of the government. Only $850K, or 11% of projected revenue from the registration fee increase is proposed to be returned to the ATV community. The projected $5.8M of General Fund revenue from the increase is intended to cover the $3.3M in relief to towns that lost revenue under a tax break for large forest landowners; the rest is gravy for other programs. We assert that the entire $35 increase should go to ATV trails, education, and enforcement, leaving the State with $10 for the General Fund. This would be consistent with the Governor’s proposal to increase snowmobile registration fees to $45, $10 of which would go to the State General Fund. THE INDIFFERENT: The proposal would specify in law what is — by state policy and court decisions — already a de-facto "ATV ban" on access to state-owned lands within the Adirondack and Catskill Parks (aka "Forest Preserve" lands). Those of you inside the Adirondack and Catskill Parks are keenly aware that there is very little access allowed today to the vast state-owned Forest Preserves (2.9 million acres and growing). Thus, the ban does not take much away, even as far as roads are concerned. We lament that in order to remedy this situation, it would require no less than changes to the Constitution, the Law creating the Forest Preserve and the APA, and DEC State Land Master Plans, or a revolutionary re-interpretation by the Courts of all such documents.
This analysis was provided by:
ATV Registration Renewal Moratorium
It has come to the attention of NYSORVA that the
NYS Department of Motor Vehicles has made a decision to freeze current
ATV registrations until the State Budget issue is resolved (recall the
proposal to raise registration from $10/yr. to $45/yr and change the
annual term start/end date to September 1, see
http://www.nysorva.org/Legislation.htm).
Sample Letter for Writing to Your Senators and Assembly MembersCopy this letter or create a version in your own words (exclude these instructions!) For clubs, distribute two copies to each of your members, one-each to be addressed to the members' local Senator, and to the members' local Assembly Member. Use the http://www.vote-smart.org/ link to determine the correct address to fill in. Each letter should be signed at the bottom with the name, address, and phone number of the sender printed below the signature. Letters without return addresses are thrown away! Each letter should be individually mailed in hand-addresses envelopes for best results. The
Honorable Sen. ___________________ The
Honorable Rep. ___________________
Dear [Senator ___________] or [Assemblyman ____________], I am an ATV/trail bike rider and a voter in your district and want to bring to your attention the matter of Legislation that I would like you to support. The Executive Budget calls for the direction of a portion of each ATV registration fee collected by DMV to a trail fund and provides that cities, towns, villages, counties, and organizations may apply for monies from the fund for the development and maintenance of all terrain vehicle trails and facilities in the various counties of the state. DEC would be directed to run the program to address our needs while protecting the environment. Specifically I ask that you promote a dedicated funding account instead of an appropriation. Furthermore, the split of the new $45 registration fee must be made more equitable in par with the registration fee split proposed for snowmobilers in the Budget. Addressing these two matters in the final State Budget will make a good proposal great and ensure the ATV Program’s effectiveness in getting the job done. Any less funding or the Legislature’s failure to annually renew the funding would result in the program falling short of everyone’s expectations. So that I may have a legal place to ride my ATV or trail bike, a trail program and fund is needed to support ATV trail development and maintenance. By directing funding to private/easement and municipal lands, State lands are protected. And for clubs trying to develop trails on private land, where most of the trail should go, they face a difficult funding problem without passage of this law. This proposal would establish a program and funding mechanism analogous to the very successful snowmobile trail program that supports the vast network of official state trails. The State and ATV users like me will benefit much in the same ways as we have with the snowmobile trail fund. Thank you for your kind consideration of this matter. Sincerely, [your signature here]
[Your name printed here]
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Please visit http://www.nysorva.org for more information. |
