Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland

Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland Monitoring and Evaluation Report of the 1997 Revision of the Land and Resource Management Plan for Fiscal Year 2013 Table of Contents Forest Certification ............................................................................................................................ iii Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 1 A brief overview of the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Grassland Monitoring and Evaluation ................................................................................................................. 9 A review of the past sixteen years of monitoring by the Forest Monitoring and Evaluation Team Table 4.1 Minimum Legally Required Monitoring Activities Lands Adequately Restocked ............................................................................................................................... 10 Control of Destructive Insects and Diseases ........................................................................................................ 11 Comparison of Projected and Actual Outputs and Services ................................................................................. 12 Table 4.2 Forest Plan Monitoring Questions for Priority Management Emphasis and Stakeholder/Public Involvement. Biological Diversity, Ecosystem Health, Sustainability Air, Soil, Water: Non-point Source Pollution ...................................................................................................... 15 Vegetation: High Fire Hazard .............................................................................................................................. 16 Human Uses Wilderness ........................................................................................................................................................... 16 Developed Recreation .......................................................................................................................................... 16 Dispersed Recreation ........................................................................................................................................... 18 Visitor Satisfaction .............................................................................................................................................. 18 Land Uses and Ownership Boundary Management, Access. Land Ownership Adjustments ......................................................................... 20 Case Backlog for Special Use Permits, Right of Way Grants and Land Ownership Adjustments ..................... 20 Permit Review and Cost Recovery ...................................................................................................................... 21 Stakeholder and Public Involvement ................................................................................................................... 21 Emerging Issues and Recommendations .............................................................................................................. 22 List of Preparers ................................................................................................................................ 35 List of Acronyms ................................................................................................................................ 36 i ii Forest Certification The 1997 Revision of the Land and Resource Management Plan (Forest Plan) provided goals and objectives to direct the future of resource management of the Forests and Grassland. The Forests and Grassland have completed the sixteenth season of implementing plan goals and objectives. Lessons learned from these sixteen years of monitoring and evaluation point how to better conduct interdisciplinary resource management and monitoring and evaluation of plan implementation by Forest and Grassland personnel. Monitoring and evaluation carried out by the Monitoring and Evaluation Team has resulted in no significant problems or reasons for change to the Revised Forest Management Plan at this time. RON J. ARCHULETA Acting Forest Supervisor iii Introduction Location and History The Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests (ARNF) include 1.9 million acres of public land in the Rocky Mountains and foothills of north central Colorado. Boundaries extend north to the Wyoming border and south of Mt. Evans and Interstate-70. These two National Forests include lands on both sides of the Continental Divide. Topography on the forests varies from rolling hills to snow covered mountain peaks over 14,000’ in elevation. President Theodore Roosevelt established the Arapaho National Forest on July 1, 1908. It is named after the Native American tribe that occupied the region for summer hunting. Roosevelt National Forest originally began as a part of the Medicine Bow Forest Reserve, created in 1897. In 1910 portions of this reserve were renamed Colorado National Forest. Finally, in 1932 the Forest was renamed by President Herbert Hoover to honor President Theodore Roosevelt, the person who was the most responsible for its creation. The Pawnee National Grassland (PNG) includes 214,000 acres of primarily short-grass prairie in two units located approximately 30 miles east of Fort Collins, Colorado. Elevations range from 4,300 ft. on the prairie to 5,500 ft. at the summit of the Pawnee Buttes. The Pawnee National Grassland was transferred to the US Forest Service from the USDA Soil Conservation Service (SCS) in 1954. The SCS acquired this prairie during the dust bowl days of the 1930’s and was charged with its rehabilitation. It was designated a National Grassland in 1960. The Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests and Pawnee National Grassland (ARP) are within a one- hour drive of the heavily populated Denver metropolitan area and the other heavily populated areas along the northern Front Range (Boulder, Ft. Collins, Longmont, Loveland and Greeley) and, therefore, are considered to be one of the fourteen Urban National Forests nation-wide. The landownership pattern of the ARP creates special challenges, with approximately 750,000 acres of small private parcels intermixed with federal lands. Sixteen Years of Forest Plan Implementation The ARP has made much progress in accomplishing Forest Plan objectives. Actual levels of accomplishment vary by programs due mainly to funding levels. When program budgets were low during these past sixteen years, staffing was reduced and projects were not implemented. The Forest Plan was optimistic in its funding predictions and, therefore, predictions for program objectives (Chapter 1, Forest Plan) were also overly optimistic. Some programs, though under-funded, have benefited from other well- funded projects. For example, the Wildlife Program is typically under-funded and wildlife habitat improvement acreage would have only increased in small increments. Yet, due to the increased funding to treat hazardous fuels, more acreage of wildlife habitat improvement has occurred than allocated program funding would have allowed. In addition, the wildlife program, as have other programs, has been successful in securing funds through both internal and external partnerships. The Forest Plan was overly optimistic in predicting future Recreation budgets (Base, Experienced or Full) as shown in the S-Tables. Funding has come to the Forest that has gone to accomplishing other priorities than the Forest Plan stated objectives on pages 7 and 8. However, there are many accomplishments in the recreation program since the 1997 Revised Forest Plan was approved. In 2000 the first round of National Visitor Use Monitoring surveys was conducted by the Forest Service. Another survey was conducted in 1 2005 and the most recent survey for the ARP was completed in Fiscal Year 2010 (FY 2010). The compilations of data for the 2000, 2005 and 2010 surveys shows that the ARP is in the top 5 of the most visited National Forests in the country. Developed recreation has been somewhat invigorated through the Capital Investment Program since 1998 and more recently included infusions of capital from the Recreation Site Improvement (RSI) funds and funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). In 2007, a Recreation Facility Analysis (RFA) was completed enabling the ARP to align management of facilities with expected budget levels and to reduce costs by proposing elimination of little-used recreation facilities and focusing appropriated and other funds toward reducing deferred maintenance. The RFA directly enabled the ARP to take full advantage of the RSI and ARRA funding that was initiated in 2008 (RSI) and 2009 (ARRA). Many of the projects from these funds were contracted and initiated in 2010 and many were completed as well. The most recent of the ARP’s construction projects for developed sites and facility improvements to have been reconstructed to bring them up to the standard our visitors expect include: Forest toilet vent stack replacements, Forest toilet replacements, Forest water system improvements, Pawnee National Grassland Bird Tour roads, signs and kiosks, Molly Lake, Mt. Margaret, and Lady Moon Trailheads reconstruction by Redfeather Lakes, Rainbow Lakes Campground (CG) reconstruction, Pawnee CG reconstruction, Brainard Lake Recreation Area (BLRA) Portal parking construction and Sourdough Trailhead reconstruction, BLRA day use parking construction, BLRA water system

Load more