Recreationists are overrunning some popular federal-land areas, land managers told Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah.
"We're at the point we've got to do something such as restrict access at Yuba Lake," said Jerry Goodman, manager of the Richfield District of the Bureau of Land Management."During Memorial Day weekend, we had at least 20,000 people there and there's a major element of people there that are simply uncontrollable with our law-enforcement capabilities," he said.
BLM, Forest Service and county leaders from central Utah took their problems Tuesday to Bennett, who is touring southeast Utah during the congressional recess.
"With gasoline prices, a lot of people who would normally go to Lake Powell have discovered Yuba Lake," Goodman said. "We contract with Juab County for law enforcement at the site, but on a busy weekend, we have major problems with that undesirable element of people."
BLM San Rafael Resource Area Manager Penny Smalley recalled her first Easter weekend in the central Utah desert country.
"I was amazed at this Easter ritual where everybody within 200 miles just hits the San Rafael Swell," she told a news reporter.
"We have some areas where we've been forced, because the plant and animal life is so fragile, to set aside some lands where access is only allowed on designated roads and trails," she said.
More than half the use of developed camping facilities in the Manti-La Sal National Forest's Ferron District is by Wasatch Front residents, District Ranger Ira Hatch said.
Bennett said the stories provided him with ammunition in his fight to change the federal payment-in-lieu-of-taxes formula. Counties are compensated for tax-exempt federal lands with the payments based primarily on revenues from timber harvests, mining leases and grazing fees.