Colorado’s U.S. Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper have joined 12 other senators in urging the National Park Service and Forest Service not to ban fixed anchors in federal wilderness.
Federal land managers are considering an overhaul of climbing management policies in designated wilderness and the senators recently sent a letter to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack asking for a briefing on proposed changes before a final decision is made.
It’s the third letter Hickenlooper has sent Haaland since April 2023 advocating for protection of rock climbing on public lands. A letter sent to the heads of the Park Service and Forest Service in February was signed by four senators.
The latest missive from, six Democrats, seven Republicans and an independent, expresses concern that the proposed policy, which would prohibit new fixed anchors in wilderness unless they have been reviewed by local forest supervisors or park superintendents, will “unnecessarily burden” agencies with backlogs for deferred maintenance, hiring challenges and “already strained budgets.” The senators also said the proposal could “limit access to these special places and endanger climbers.” They specifically asked that fixed anchors in wilderness not be considered “permanent installations,” which are banned in federally designated wilderness.
The Park Service and Forest Service late last year issued draft guidance on the rock climbing proposals, calling for local land managers to inventory fixed anchors in wilderness. The draft guidance outlined a process for local managers to approve bolts and fixed anchors as “permanent installations,” which are expressly prohibited in the 1964 Wilderness Act. The proposal could affect more than 50,000 routes in wilderness areas across 28 states.
Meanwhile, the U.S. House in April unanimously approved the first-of-its-kind Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experience Act — or EXPLORE Act — which includes the Protect America’s Rock Climbing Act — or PARC Act — sponsored by Colorado’s U.S. Rep. Joe Neguse and Hickenlooper. The PARC Act directs the Forest Service and Park Service to create a uniform policy for all wilderness areas that allows climbers to place and maintain fixed anchors.
Wilderness advocates who see the approval of permanent installations as “the proverbial crack in the Wilderness Act’s armor and a harbinger of what’s to come,” according to the national Wilderness Watch group. Amending the Wilderness Act to allow fixed installations will open doors for mountain bikers, trail race organizers, commercial filmmakers, motorboat users and airplane pilots, Wilderness Watch warns.
“The Wilderness Act needs to remain intact and not eroded by the recreation rage de jour,” reads a statement the group sent to its members in January asking them to send letters to federal lawmakers urging opposition to the PARC Act.
The Forest Service has collected more than 9,000 online comments from wilderness and climbing advocates on the draft guidance issued in November 2023. The agency is reviewing the comments.
Erik Murdock, the deputy director of policy and government affairs at the Access Fund, said the senators suspect that the Forest Service and Park Service may finalize the climbing management plans in the final months of the Biden administration. Murdock said the recent letter is the first time the senators supporting the PARC Act have asked for a briefing and recommended “that the agencies change course and rethink their proposal” requiring a review of tens of thousands of climbing routes.
“The agency proposals include no funding source and commit the agencies to a long-term project that is unnecessary because the local land managers have been successfully managing the wilderness climbing areas for 60 years,” Murdock said. “With recently proposed land agency budgets cuts, congressional members are frustrated that the agencies are committing bandwidth to an untenable and ill conceived project when our public lands need so much attention in areas that actually make sense, like fire mitigation, climate research and law enforcement.”
West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, one of the senators who signed the letter to federal land managers, included the EXPLORE Act in July as an amendment to the U.S. Senate’s fiscal 2025 National Defense Authorization Act. If that outdoor legislation is passed by the Senate, it’s unclear how it would work with any new rules by the land agencies.
Murdock said the fixed anchor guidance is troubling not just climbers. If the federal government decides that bolts, slings, chains and pitons are permanent installations banned by the Wilderness Act, then it is conceivable that backcountry skiers in wilderness areas could be viewed as using mechanical transport prohibited by the Wilderness Act and hikers using GPS devices could be viewed as using banned motorized equipment, Murdock said.
“It will be very difficult to build support for future wilderness designations if the agencies prohibit many longstanding, historic and appropriate uses of wilderness, especially when the Wilderness Act lists ‘recreation’ as one of the primary purposes for wilderness,” Murdock said. “For these reasons, Sens. Hickenlooper and Bennet chose to sign the recent Senate letter and are leaning in harder to obtain realistic, fair and tenable wilderness policies that do not squander taxpayer dollars.”