ADDITIONAL CAL COMMENTS
July 2007 and August 2007

To: Superintendent Dusty Shultz

We would appreciate your attention to these additional comments.  We would also appreciate they be entered into the Park Service GMP record.  If such cannot be accommodated till after the next Newsletter comes out, then we so request.

GIANT CEDARS:
  
We continue to strongly feel that the concessionaire tour on South Manitou Island should be allowed to be extended to the Giant Cedars.  Following up on that issue, we have been in contact with Megan Grosvenor of Manitou Island Transit and have received a letter informing us that they have “informed the National Park that we would like to see the road to the cedars opened for our motorized tours.”  We have also been in contact with the Leelanau County Road Commission who have told us they have no objection to Manitou Island Transit extending their tour along that county road.

 In addition to the above, at CAL’s June 14, 2007 Board meeting, after viewing comments on NPS Newsletter 4 by other organizations and individuals, CAL decided to let the Park Service know that we wish to also add the following to our previous Comments: 
 
HISTORICAL PRESERVATION

1. CAL recommends all historical resources be deemed within a “Experience History Zone”, no matter how small;
2. We recommend that all historical resources be mapped out of “wilderness” so that mechanized tools can be used not only for protection, stabilization, preservation and repair but also for necessary ongoing maintenance;
3. We feel the GMP needs to include as an addition to the GMP’s “Purpose Statement” and the Preferred Alternative’s “Overall Vision” the instructions Congress already provided to the Secretary of Interior regarding development of a “management plan” for this Park, that is:

Section 6 (b) of the enabling legislation (1970 Public Law 91-479) provides that the Secretary of Interior (through the National Park Service) shall:

“prepare and implement a land and water use management plan which will include specific provisions for –

1.   development of facilities to provide the benefits of public recreation;

2.   the protection of scenic, scientific and historic features contributing to    public enjoyment, and

3.   such protection, management and utilization of renewable natural resources as in the judgment of the Secretary is consistent with, and will further the purpose of, public recreation and protection of the scenic, scientific, and historic features contributing to public enjoyment.”

Our concern here is to eliminate any possible consideration of neglect or “return to nature” of “scenic, scientific or historic features”, and to reiterate, for future funding allocation purposes, the Congressional statutory directives to protect historic features.  

 

CROSS COUNTRY SKIING

Additional Comments from August 13, 2007

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS TO GMP ON BENZIE CORRIDOR

Thank you for posting access to the National Park Service’s 1982 feasibility study for the Benzie Corridor in the June 2007 FAQ’s on the NPS SLBE Web Site.  I downloaded these materials and mailed them to each of our Board members.  We had not been aware of the 1982 study or its maps; it answers many of the questions we believe were unaddressed in the GMP Newsletters on this topic.  Our Board of Directors met on August 6, 2007, and, based on this new information, adopted the following resolution which I was instructed to send to you as additional comments on the GMP:

If the National Park Service chooses to continue to acquire land for the Benzie Corridor at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, Citizens for Access to the Lakeshore (CAL) supports the idea of making it into a non-motorized biking and hiking path only. 
 

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS TO GMP ON HISTORICAL PRESERVATION

Our Board of Directors on August 6, 2007, also adopted another resolution about historical preservation, which I am instructed to send to you as additional GMP comments:

Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear (PHSB) has provided comments on the GMP arguing that the enabling legislation should be reopened in Congress in order to insert something about historical preservation into the Park’s purpose statement.  While Citizens for Access to the Lakeshore (CAL) continues to support the fine work of PHSB and are empathetic to its concerns, we believe that the enabling legislation is already adequate.  In particular, we point out Section 6 (b) and reiterate our July 16, 2007 additional GMP comments requesting that this section of the law be included in the GMP’s Preferred Alternative and Final GMP’s “purpose statement” and “overall vision”:

Section 6 (b) of the enabling legislation (1970 Public Law 91-479) provides that the Secretary of Interior (through the National Park Service) shall:

“prepare and implement a land and water use management plan which will include specific provisions for –

1.       development of facilities to provide the benefits of public recreation;

2.       the protection of scenic, scientific and historic features contributing to public enjoyment, and

3.       such protection, management and utilization of renewable natural resources as in the judgment of the Secretary is consistent with, and will further the purpose of, public recreation and protection of the scenic, scientific, and historic features contributing to public enjoyment.”

INSERTION INTO THE RECORD

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