You’ve never been to Isle Royale, you’ve
missed one good thing. First of all, it’s the largest island in Lake Superior.
You don’t go there by accident. You go by boat, or sometimes by air. You
can’t drive there. It has no road, only trails. And they’re constantly
in use, because it’s one place where you can come face to face with nature
and love it. The island is classified as a National Biosphere, which means
it’s pretty well protected from future development. Oh, yes. And it’s also
a national park.
Well, the National Park Service has been reviewing all of
its national park franchises recently, and Isle Royale is no different.
In fact, Isle Royale happens to have about the lowest visitation among
all national parks, which makes it suspect when budgets continually increase.
The General Management Plan, as the review is called, has been going through
gyration after gyration for several years. At first there were five basic
proposals, spanning from keeping things just as they are all the way to
basically keeping everyone out. Several versions continue to remove many
historic buildings and docks at great expense. Almost none of the plans
received overwhelming support. But, there was public input that offered
creative ways to decrease costs, increase protection and still serve the
basic aim of the national legislation to give people access to our national
parks.
The “final” proposed plan was issued in February, but all
comments had to be in by the middle of May to be incorporated in the “final-final”
plan. Guess what. As we are going to press, the final plan is being issued.
There is no more time. Without us realizing it, the plan is here. And although
we haven’t officially seen the final version, none of the public is totally
happy with the results. Recent hearings and correspondence have shown that
there is still as much opposition to the plan as before.
The reason has a lot more to do with the process than the
plan, although many people have specific items that give them the willies.
Check out “Lake Superior Journal” in this issue (page 10) for just some
of the views on the specifics. The process, however, has many people feeling
that, although the NPS gave lip service to public input through a series
of hearings held around Lake Superior’s adjacent states, no one at NPS
really paid any attention. More than one person has suggested that it was
all a smoke screen to espouse a plan that the Park Service had predetermined.
Without being on the “inside” of the planning room, we can’t make that
charge. But having attended some of these meetings ourselves and heard
the creative ideas that were suggested, we wonder just how they got lost
in the final analysis.
Even though the final plan has been issued, it is probably
not the end of it. We’ve heard that some folks plan a lawsuit to block
implementation. Isle Royale has been in the hearts of folks around here
for a long time and they won’t easily let it be changed. There may still
be time to voice your opinions.
Paul L. Hayden
Editor
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Is
the Final Plan Final?