Here is the Cover Letter, describing the survey and here is the survey itself. Please fill out and mail to:

Tellico OHV Recreation Survey
Dept of Forestry, Wildlife & Fisheries
The University of Tennessee
274 Ellington Plant Sciences
Knoxville, Tn 37996

PLEASE NOTE: The surveyor we met at Tellico told us that they get almost ZERO cooperation from the OHV crowd, and tons of cooperation (ie survey responses) from the fisherman. Lets CHANGE that.
http://www.sfwda.org/forum/index.php?topic=112
PLEASE DO IT!!

Sendin mine tomarrow. :thumbup

I may not ever get to go, but at least I can try to keep it open that I may be able to one day.

KC

Printing the survey know and placing the stamp on the envelope.


Let's turn the tide here people!!!!!

Help Tellico Out and send this in

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Forward:
On Behalf Of Herndon Elliott
Tuesday, June 17, 2008 7:21 PM


http://www.sfwda.org/forum/index.php?topic=112

Link to Survey
http://www.sfwda.org/trails/tellico/...OHV_Survey.pdf
Link to Cover letter
http://www.sfwda.org/trails/tellico/...overletter.pdf


Please ask everyone in your club (and anyone else you know who uses Tellico
OHV area!) to fill out the survey and MAIL it in to the address noted in the
forum post.

RE-EMPHASIZE: The surveyor lady we spoke with who was handing these things
out at the Allen Gap pay station said that she had been accused of not doing
her job properly because none of the OHVers were responding, only fishermen.
She said they had nearly 100 to 1 ratio of responses from fishermen to
OHVers. LETS FIX THAT PROBLEM FOR HER!


Herndon Elliott

Sendin mine tomarrow. :thumbup

I may not ever get to go, but at least I can try to keep it open that I may be able to one day.

KC

Printing the survey know and placing the stamp on the envelope.


Let's turn the tide here people!!!!!

you guys are awesome. thanks.:beer

printed the 6 page survey and filled it out. mailing it in tomorrow.
thanks
i used this link
http://www.sfwda.org/forum/index.php?topic=112
when it opens click on the word survey and print it.

Bump - Mailing out today

I printed out the survey and would be happy to fill it out, but I've never been to Tellico. I'm reading the questions and can't honestly answer any of them. Should I just make stuff up? Are there any areas of the survey that are more important (ie. questions 12,13,20, & 21)? I just want to make sure I'm helping not hurting the cause because I definitely want to wheel there in the near future.

I printed out the survey and would be happy to fill it out, but I've never been to Tellico. I'm reading the questions and can't honestly answer any of them. Should I just make stuff up? Are there any areas of the survey that are more important (ie. questions 12,13,20, & 21)? I just want to make sure I'm helping not hurting the cause because I definitely want to wheel there in the near future.


I feel the same. never been, but I will help if I can.

Bump - Mailing out todaythanks

I printed out the survey and would be happy to fill it out, but I've never been to Tellico. I'm reading the questions and can't honestly answer any of them. Should I just make stuff up? Are there any areas of the survey that are more important (ie. questions 12,13,20, & 21)? I just want to make sure I'm helping not hurting the cause because I definitely want to wheel there in the near future.
question #11 some of those trails are closed so just check trails 4,5,11,12
question #12 you would like them all , trust me.
#13easy trails , i checked least important. i checked extremely important on the others
#20 not a problem on all of them
# 21 circle whatever you think is best for us. closing trails at anytime> strongly oppose, strongly support having more trails.
I feel the same. never been, but I will help if I can.
thanks. just carefully read and fill in the blanks. :beer

I just got done filling it out and I'm going to mail it in the morning. It's unbelievable that so may people are willing to spend literally thousands of dollars and months of time building a rig, but are too lazy to fill out a survey in order to keep a place open to use it. Thanks for posting this up Mike.

I just got done filling it out and I'm going to mail it in the morning. It's unbelievable that so may people are willing to spend literally thousands of dollars and months of time building a rig, but are too lazy to fill out a survey in order to keep a place open to use it. Thanks for posting this up Mike.

thank you dave and thanks to anyone willing to take the time to do this. it might help or it might not but lying there like a dead dog is not gonna let us find out. i love to wheel at tellico i'd hate to see it close. we should have the right to go there and pay to use the land anytime we want to. thats what its there for. has been for years. all of a sudden some groups of people got together and are trying to shut it down. people fight and die for a free country so it needs to remain free. everything is being regulated by government or trying to be controlled by groups that are just making up shit to do so they can hold a hi paying job. you cant do anything anywhere anymore without cry babies being involved.

I'm in Missouri right now and didn't bring my printer, but I'll do the survey as soon as I get home next weekend.

Printed,filled out and all that is left is to drop in the box.:rockon

Kinda sad, tried getting some guys at work who do go up to tellico some to fill out and they were turned off by the length of the survey. I wish people would realize we are in very real danger of losing places to wheel.

Kinda sad, tried getting some guys at work who do go up to tellico some to fill out and they were turned off by the length of the survey. I wish people would realize we are in very real danger of losing places to wheel.

You can say that again. What people don't see here is that this Tellico thing is far from an isolated case. Trail closures are going on all across the country. Victory for the trail closers in one spot emboldens them to fight harder in another, and make no mistake, so far they are winning. This is the sort of thing that I could write a book on, but in the interest of being brief I wrote this on my survey:

The existing trail closures have already had a negative impact on the remaining trails by forcing more traffic onto fewer trails, and I expect that increasing the number of trail closures will only exacerbate the problem. We need more trails, not fewer. OHV use is at an all time high, and when the legal spots to wheel are closed it only encourages illegal wheeling, which isn't in anyone's best interest. I would be in favor of greatly increasing the trail fees in order to pay for more trail maintenance.

Sendin mine tomarrow. :thumbup
KC

Printing the survey know and placing the stamp on the envelope.
Let's turn the tide here people!!!!!

Bump - Mailing out today

I printed out the survey and would be happy to fill it out

I feel the same. never been, but I will help if I can.

I just got done filling it out and I'm going to mail it in the morning. .

I'll do the survey as soon as I get home next weekend.

Printed,filled out and all that is left is to drop in the box.:rockon

you guys/gals rock.:rockon the 4x4 community cant thank you enough.
anyone else ???? i figured reptillikus and ox would jump in cause they have wheeled tellico before.

I'll print out the survey next time I'm at my gpa's. No printer here.

mailing mine today

I'll print out the survey next time I'm at my gpa's. No printer here.

mailing mine today

:beer

also fill this out. its quick and simple.
http://www.sharetrails.org/letters/letter.php?id=14

Done. (link)

I even sent my survey with the new star wars stamp. Figured we could use the force about now :D

I chose not to use their canned comments. I feel I have a better chance of being given weight or consideration based upon my individual pleas.

My letter:

SUBJECT: COMMENTS ON UPPER TELLICO OHV SYSTEM

Dear Ranger Lohr,

I am writing to provide comments on the scoping letter for changes at the Upper Tellico ORV Area in the Nantahala National Forest.

First I would like to provide a personal background to my opinions.

1. I am a boy scout leader committed to the lands God gave us.
2. I am a registered merit badge counselor for Oceanography, Nature, Weather, Camping, Forestry, Personal Financial Management, and Automotive.
3. I hold a master's degree and practice accounting for Fiat.
4. I camp and off-road in the Upper Tellico ORV Area on average once every month and a half.
5. I spend on average $500-$1000 each trip between trail-use fees, lodging or camp fees, truck diesel, grocery purchases, off-road vehicle fuel, etc.

I am disappointed in the decisions recently made regarding trail closures at Tellico. I was taught in my university studies to never judge a decision by emotion. Therefore I had hoped to find extensive sediment erosion studies with causals to support the conclusion that off-road trail use has eroded parts of Tellico beyond maintainability. Instead I am disappointed to learn that the basis for this knee-jerk reaction is the threat of lawsuits from an environmentalist group. The closures of multiple trails has much farther impacts than the placation of a lawsuit. Out of state visitors such as myself will no longer make Tellico a destination for our downtime activities. The loss in revenue for the local county is substantial and the closure of the trails still does not solve the sedimentation problems. If all of the causes for sedimentary deposits could be identified then appropriate measures could be taken to fix the problems. I do not believe simply closing some off-road trails will stop the sedimentary deposits in the watershed. Other local activities such as logging are major contributors to the problem. I also strongly believe that the public who uses the land for OHV purposes should be given the opportunity to pay higher land use fees to contribute to the maintenance of trails and end goal reduction of sedimentary deposits.

If the local park service wished to be fair to your community, fair to your land duties, and fair to the environmentalists who propose the trail closures, then you would consider a more thorough study to analize the cause of the river sedimentation. You would also give the OHV users the opportunity to contribute to the healing of Tellico via monetary land-use fees and volunteer maintenance crews, instead of punishing them by denying them access to public lands.

Sincerely,

Audra Deiber,
(address removed for privacy :p)

awesome audra !!!!!!!