The US Forest Servcie Department is seeking an end to the Senior Discount Pass and the Disabled Access Pass for next year.

If you were looking forward to spending your golden years  parking your camper at national forest campgrounds for some inexpensive camping? Might be time to redo your budget.

According to a Press Release from “Oregon Environmental News” the Forest Service Department wants to end the 50 % discount for the disabled and Senior campers at the parks now run by Concessionaires.

The argument that the discount ends up making the cost to the other campers increase to cover this loss is now going to bring the end to the passes.

I find this very disturbing.  It is hard enough to budget for camping expenses as it is and now with this increase we will be doing most of our camping  at a seasonal site where we can get the most for our money.

The Forest Service’s campsites that are managed by the private concessionaires were required to continue to give the discount to seniors and disabled and honor their passes as part of their contracts.

The Forest Service’s agency,  this week filed a notice in the Federal Register proposing to reduce to 10 percent the minimum discount that private concessionaires are required to offer to those groups.

A quote from Kitty Benzar, “No more special honors, no more special breaks,” president of the Western Slope No-Fee Coalition which opposes fees for public lands. “Pay up or stay home now applies to everyone.”

The report is that  there are likely as many as hundreds of thousands of pass-holders nationwide, though the agency doesn’t have figures for how many passes are active.

Camping is not the same as it was  a few decades ago, when the Forest Service employees we knew were the employees  in green uniforms were in charge of the campground.  Not like today where the campground you stay at is run by a private corporation.  They report that there are over 150 such separate contracts.  Meaning that about 90% of the reservable camping sites in the national forests system now are privately managed.  They do however report that the other oh, about 10% the passes would be accepted.   Who knows we may even get a report of which camping spots they are some day.

These corporations have been trying for years to  eliminate  the mandatory discount, arguing that recent federal laws no longer require them to offer it.  And with the baby boomers coming of age they further argue that the discounts are too steep and unreasonable.

I remember taking my children camping and the overnight fees were a manageable $3.00 a night (I know I am really showing my age now).  Now we pay $19.00 – $ 24.00 depending on the day of the week and the services available.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Seniors to lose camping discounts with US Forest Service proposal (gadling.com)
• Ballot Measure to Save State Parks Submitted to State (laist.com)
• Advice for disabled travellers (telegraph.co.uk)
• Bills would push more national forest thinning (sfgate.com)

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