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County Supervisor Tom Wilson's South County Trail Summit

Chris Vargas

      Supervisor Tom Wilson's Trail Summit was the best ever! The Trail Summit was held at Oakley Corporate Offices in Foothill Ranch. Oakley is one of Orange County's best corporate citizens and sponsors Trails4All, The Warrior's Society and Share. We thank them for not only hosting the Trail Summit, but also for being  one of the biggest supporters of trail maintenance and advocacy in Orange County.  If you've never been there, Oakley's headquarters is a unique place with a pirate flag flying high above the building. Inside we were treated to a great feast of sandwiches, vegetables and various drinks. 

      The summit began with a brief introduction by Supervisor Wilson who then introduced a great extreme video featuring Oakley sponsored athletes. There were a lot of Ohhs and Ahhs during the video because of the many stunts of various mountain bikers, skiers, snowboarders, motocrossers and others.  After the video Al Krueger of Oakley thanked all those who attended and especially those who volunteer their time on the trails.

      Tom Wilson returned to the podium and thanked Oakley for hosting the event. He also thanked Jim Meyer of Trails4All and his aide Melissa Bigelow for helping to organize it. Tom spoke of the recent fire in the Coto De Caza area as an example of a situation that makes us realize how precious our land is.  Some of the other topics Tom spoke about was the importance of connectivity of our trail system to link communities, the recent donation of land by the Irvine Company, the future park at El Toro and the development of Rancho Mission Viejo and the importance of getting involved in the planning to insure trails, open space, and recreation are addressed.  Tom then introduced a video showing typical people enjoying the trails. It had a hilarious scene of 4 elderly ladies all wearing cover-ups that had front and back graphics depicting women in string bikinis. Our very own Joe Lopez was also featured in a few pictures.

      Kevin Thomas, the Director of the County Harbors, Beaches and Parks introduced himself after the video and talked about the goals of HBP. He also showed a video and explained the various planned trails within proposed developments. We had a very productive meeting with Kevin a week before the Trail Summit which we will feature in our September Issue of Smoke Signals.

      The featured speaker, Peter Vidmar, Olympic Gold Medalist and two time top 20 finisher of the Vision Quest followed Kevin. Pete began his speech by expressing his love of the county and the quality of life we enjoy here.  He then went on to talk about the need to focus on whatever your goals are and as an example spoke of the determination and team work he and his teammates needed to win the Gold Medal. The story he told of his journey to winning the Gold Medal showed what a class act Peter is.

      He is a gifted speaker who kept the audience in stitches relating the nervousness he had and the pressure to win. He again stressed the importance of working with the team and how by doing so we help each other achieve our goals.  Peter said their success was also based on having a vision of what he and his teammates wanted to accomplish and how we must apply these principles to working together to achieve our vision for the trails and parks in Orange County. Many thanks Peter for a great speech.

      We then participated in Trail Vision Dialogs discussing various trail issues and our suggestions to resolve them. One of the most important issues for mountain bikers is the need for recreation specific parks. These dialogs were important because they give Tom feedback as to what is needed and provide him with insight as to what is on the minds of the public.

      After the dialogs we returned to the Oakley amphitheater for a basic overview the suggestions from the various panels. Tom then honored two members of the Nature Conservancy, Trish Smith and Debra Clark,  for their dedication to trails and open space.

Thanks again Tom for a great Trail Summit!

IMBA SoCal Regional Meeting

      Warrior's Society club members Bob Loeffler, Keith Eckstein and Chris Vargas attended the IMBA SoCal Regional meeting, as did representatives from other clubs in Orange County such as Grant Curtis from SHARE, Alice Danta of the Trail Angels, Randall Danta of the Sierra Club and Jim Meyer of Trails4All.

      We met to discuss issues related to advocacy and how we can better approach the challenges that confront us. The meeting began with introductions, and progressed as the leaders of the various clubs and organizations explained a little about their clubs and the issues concerning them.

      Stephan Michaels of the Trailriders expressed his concern that some trails were being too "sanitized" and because of this much of the challenge is being taken away. An issue related to this was the non-acceptance of trails that provide a challenge to riders.

Jim Meyer of Trails4All discussed the importance of all of us "recreational users" working together—that the issue is not motorized vs. non-motorized, downhill vs. x-country, mountain bicyclist vs. equestrian and/or hiker. The issue becomes more of balancing the need for "preservation" with the also-legitimate need for recreation.

      Chris Vargas of the Warrior's Society and Dave Moore of the Southern Sierra Fat Tire Association expressed their concern that IMBA is not being effective in fighting unfair wilderness proposals. Both brought up the need to strengthen our ties with other stronger and more powerful recreation advocates such as the Blue Ribbon Coalition (BRC).

      Chris Vargas also stated that IMBA acts as if it is embarrassed to admit that it represents a recreational advocacy organization as if there is some shame to admitting such. Chris believes that IMBA must refrain from operating at a position of constant apologies or defending mountain biking. IMBA must attack the environmental fanaticism that leads to trail closures. Wayne Stetina, vice president of bicycle components for Shimano, also mentioned a recent story from the press that reported on the use of false evidence to justify the closing of areas.

      Chris Vargas agreed and added recent reports in the press regarding farmers in Oregon whose lives and livelihoods were ruined due to water cutoffs to protect an endangered fish. This year the National Academy of Sciences proclaimed that the water cutoffs were not based on science or, in other words, the small-time farmers' lives were ruined not to save fish but to further a fanatical ideology.

      IMBA's current course of appeasement and apparent positioning of "we're green, too" has not been effective, and the proof of that is Jim Hasenauer's admission that the Sierra Club has not honored the Park City agreement that it signed with IMBA.

      Niccolo Machiavelli, author of the 16^th century political masterpiece The Prince, worded the following phrase better than I can and it applies to the potential result of IMBA's acceptance of the Sierra Club's unwillingness to live up to the Park City agreement:

"…one should never permit a disorder to persist in order to avoid war, for war is not avoided thereby but merely deferred to one's own disadvantage."

      A more effective and aggressive strategy must be adopted by IMBA to get the respect of the anti-access activists. IMBA must quit being their whipping boy, for this will only embolden them—and result in defeat.

      Randall Danta, a progressive within the Sierra Club, gave a talk on his attempts to get the Sierra Club to embrace mountain biking. Randall is the Chairman of the new Mountain Bike Committee within the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club, which oversees Los Angeles and Orange Counties. Randall is an innovator and honestly is looking at ways for the Sierra Club and mountain bikers to work together.

    We appreciate that the Angeles Chapter saw fit to acknowledge  mountain biking as a legitimate form of recreation. We are hoping they take the next step of honoring the Park City Agreement and also push to remove the 50 percent of areas now in the wilderness bill in which we have had historical access. Actions speak louder than words, or forming committees.

     Chuck Anderson discussed the "downhill" phenomenon and how he has dealt with this in Santa Barbara. The group members offered their suggestions. Daniel Greenstadt gave a talk on working with the state park system and related methods to work effectively with the state land managers.

      It was decided to create a SoCal list server as a way to help us in our activism. IMBA will be having a National Advocacy Summit with all its reps in late April, and I'm sure many of the issues discussed at this regional meeting will be discussed there.

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