Re: (Fwd) Comments on Colorado River Management Plan

Tom Martin and Hazel Clark (tomandhazel@azaccess.com)
Thu, 9 Oct 1997 06:07:11 -0700


Lots of interest in this one. Isn't it funny how some topics get people
going. What we are seeking is not how bad xyz is but how bad it is and how
abc might make it better. The following is VERY long. i'm sorry. Turn back
now!

> With the system we have now, an allocation of commercial user days
> is a valuable item. User days are passed through the generations in
> family-owned businesses. They are worth a lot of money because
> those who have them can earn substantial profits selling river trips.
>
Is the Grand Canyon and the river experience set up to serve as a water
right? First in line, first in time? Is this experience to make a few rich
as access brokers down the generations, when the "public" they serve are
those that can afford it, and not necessarily those that can not? You are
right Dave, allocation becomes valuable. This is where greed and profit
enter into the Grand canyon equation.

> A private permit, on the other hand, is worthless (from a monetary
> point of view). You can't sell it. You can't sell space on a trip.
> The only thing you can do with one is go to the river and have a
> good time.
>
As should all river trips be. Remember, concessionaires are not to
interfere in access rights of the general public that do not need their
services. Hey Pat Hattaway, can you weigh in here and set us straight on
this?

> If you remove the distinction between private permits and commercial
> permits, then any launch permit is potentially valuable. In the
> hands of a commercial operation, it could be used to generate a
> significant profit. In your proposed new world of open competition,
> de-regulation, and loosened restrictions, there would certainly be
> a financial incentive for commercial companies to try to control
> as many permits as they can.
>
Way good point. Sterling point. Here's a solution, not the best but maybe a
place to start. If i get your point right, it would not be impossible for
anyone, outfitter or otherwise, to hog the reservation system. Like a block
of rooms in a Hotel. Ok, so introduce the "L" word. Lottery. Weighted over
time. The NPS gets fees from each applicant, and each applicant represents
ONE trip.

How would it work? Joe America wants to do a commercial trip. He gets drawn
in the lottery. He now has a 16 person trip to fill with his friends or no
one, to go with guide or fully outfitted trip. As in the private world, all
trip costs are shared, as is done now in private world. IF Joe can't fill
his trip on can not launch even, he can cancel up to 6 months in advance,
when a cancellation lottery replacement is drawn. If a cancellation happens
within 6 months of launch up to 8 weeks of launch another group of lottery
folk have a lucky winner. Less then 8 weeks does not go and the river sees
one less trip.

Remember, snip wizards, to sit back and don't just pull this apart unless
you build something that works better.

> In the arena of high-demand tickets for rock concerts and sporting
> events, there are ethically-challenged scalpers who pay homeless
> people to stand in line and buy up whatever ticket allocation is
> allowed. The scalpers, of course, take the tickets and re-sell
> them at a huge profit. The poor music/sports fan ends up having
> to cough up big bucks or sit at home. Now I'm not saying that any
> of the river companies currently doing business in the GC would ever
> do anything so devious (and I hope one of them will give me a free
> breakfast sometime for making that comment), but the potential for
> abuse is certainly there.
>
Any system may be potentially abused, so says the IRS. Good point Dave. How
would a lottery help here? In theory, you who win the lottery have to go.
Maybe on your application you name a second. This way, if you can't go, at
least your second can. But neither you or your second can sell the permit
to anyone else. This avoids scalpers.

On to Judy

> Well, good luck selling it, 'cause I don't think it'll happen anytime
soon.

You may be true, but the Wright Brothers thought differently, so did John
Glenn and Nicolas Tesla.

> The basic problem being that it pretty much undermines the possibility of
> running a successful business of commercial trips in the Grand Canyon. If
a
> company cannot be reasonably certain of being able to fill trips
regularly,
> they can't stay in business.

As the current monopoly has it, no, you are right. But many small
businesses would flourish possibly, with incorporation papers, Business
Insurance and Out of Park boundaries concessionaire licensee in hand.

>They are supposed to wait around until enough
> people with launch dates near a certain time call in and say, "we have a
> mid-June date, will you take us down the river?" - it'll never happen.

As currently set up, no, you are correct. But look into the Next century.
This dilemma will just get worse unless we retool now. It's never a good
business practice to say everything's fine, if it aint broke, don't fix it.
We are trying to solve the Longitude equation hear by inventing a time
piece, not by firing canons at noon around the world, if you know that
history.

>They
> have to be able to sell a trip on a certain date in advance. It's
somewhat
> admirable, this idea, but it won't happen because it's not feasible to
> maintain commercial companies.

See above.

>And whether or not people on this list like
> it, there is a big market for commercial trips. If you undermine the
> commercial business, you displace those people and simply switch the
> inequity.

Maybe yes, maybe no, but in a freedom system, they will still be served but
so will ALL others. Imagine!

>There will also probably be a lot more yahoos who don't know what
> the hell they are doing trying to run the river on their own, which is a
> safety issue.

Safety is a concern of all of us, commercial (who just had the last
fatality in Grand Canyon) or otherwise. John Wesley Powell took that risk,
travelling into the unknown wilderness. Three of his crew died. Wilderness
implies risk. Please, i beg you, don't ever take that from us as an option.

> Also, how can you have employees if you don't offer them any job
> security whatsoever? There is already little enough job security for
> boatmen. You really think it's fair and feasible to have commercial
> companies where the companies can't hire guides in the winter and tell
them
> they have work for the season?

That's exactly how it is now. What would it be like if the guides owned the
company??

>I also wonder whether, in the effort to
> treat commercial and private boaters the "same", people are suggesting
that
> commercial boatmen be restricted to the same number of trips as other
> people, e.g. 3 trips in five years. Well, there goes your commercial
> company, the profession of river guiding in the Grand Canyon, and skilled
> and experienced guides on commercial trips, which is what people are
paying
> for.

Good Point. Oh well. No sorry, that's not an answer. In a freedom of choice
system, anyone can sign up as often as they want. There would be no limit
on repeats, as there is none now for all folk except Wait List applicants.

> I think there is a fundamental difference between commercial and
> private trips, and I think that's good.

Mee too.

> What's wrong with just allocating a
> greater percentage of launches to private boaters, without doing
everything
> else to try to manage commercial trips?

Well, allocation is defined by demand. How do you measure this? With a
mathematical formula, all would possibly balance out. But arbitrary
allocation is arbitrary (and illegal). So how much do you give to the
privates? And where does it come from? The outfitters? Hey, not in my back
yard. There is a ceiling beyond which the resource will not stand. Even if
this ceiling were not yet met, and even if the difference between present
and that higher ceiling solved the private dilemma today, tomorrow morning
is just that, tomorrow. Then what. Allocation adjustments have to be
dynamic. How can we define the parameters? Any ideas?

This may split the discussion into two. An allocation management plan and a
freedom of choice management plan. i thought an allocation plan based on
demand would work, until i factored in advertising and packing the system
with $260 commercial trips. The privates could not compeat. It made for an
us against them picture, in which the non commercial loose. What do you
think about elliminating advertising? In 20 years of selling the river,
maybe that's all it needs?

>I don't see what's wrong with the
> way commercial trips are run.

me neither

> The problem is just that they have a much
> higher fraction of the user days than privates, and a fraction that is
not
> representative of the total demand.

agreed.

> If you treat everything the same, then what do you get? I'd say
one
> thing you get is the end of 18-day private trips. Only privates have long
> trips like that. Commercial trips are between a week and 2 weeks long. If
> you throw everything into a common pool, you have to recognize that no
> longer will private boaters be favored with longer trips. In the
interests
> of not increasing overall use, it would force shorter trips. Well, one of
> the great things about the Canyon is that you can do a trip that is
longer
> than 2 weeks. I think that would disappear if you try to pretend that
> private and commercial trips are the same animal. They are not. They are
> totally different. Ask anyone who has done a lot of both, like me.

Thats two of us. 30 days is to short for this keyboard pusher. But i missed
the point. A system based on total # of bodies and a seasonally adjusted
daily number of launches, with minimum and maximum trip lengths would not
drive the equation to shorter trip lengths. Forcing more people through a
fixed allocation based on user days would. Yikes!

> A couple of other concerns raised by these suggestions -
> I think the access comments miss some big issues. Ben said separate
access
> from outfitting and that part of the prohibitive cost of a commercial
trip
> is the "selling" of access. But, that's because outfitters pay big bucks
> for a permit, right? I'm asking because I don't know in GC, but on every
> river I've worked in Idaho and Calif, outfitters buy a commercial permit
> and it is not cheap. Of course, you have to pass this cost on in the cost
> of the trip. If you suggest getting rid of the commercial permits, so
> outfitters no longer have to pay for their rights to run trips, where's
all
> that money going to come from? From individual boaters. If the
distribution
> stays the same, it won't decrease the costs for the commercial
passengers.
> If the cost of access goes down for commercial passengers, it will go up
> for private boaters, because NPS, or whoever gets that money now, isn't
> going to stand for losing it. You'll be robbing Peter to pay Paul, and
I'm
> not sure of the overall benefit. But, maybe there is something totally
> different about the way commercial permitting in the Canyon works?

Ben, you going to answer Judy? Don't forget, in the Canyon, you can't sell
user days, so the story goes.

> Another concern I have about getting rid of permitted outfitters
-
> if you open up the Canyon to unregulated outfitting, do you necessarily
get
> the best protection for the Canyon? I know it's very American to say
> everything ends up better for the consumer if there is totally free
> competition and everything is regulated only by the marketplace, but it
is
> clearly not always true (witness HMO's). With a quadrillion companies
> trying to make a go of a now marginal business (because of the new
> uncertainties from the common pool method), where are the constraints? I
> think long-lived companies with an investment in the resource have a
sense
> of proprietorship that makes than want to protect and maintain it. Where
is
> that motivation for the free-for-all companies that have made no initial
> investment for a permit, and simply want to grab as much money out of the
> system as they can quickly? I don't think it's there.

Good point, but in a market place that is driven to maximize profit, there
are no safeguards beyond those instituted by the NPS in the form of written
prospectus, ride alongs, visitor letters of complaint, the river patrol
trips, etc...

>These would not go away.

Only if a new plan said they would. Otherwise, outfitters would guide trips
in the Canyon just like guides lead backpacks in the Canyon now.

>Also, I am concerned
> about introducing lots of new different guiding services - that's not
> necessarily a plus - Joe's JetBoat Canyon tours - do the Canyon by jet
boat
> and have a baloney boat carry your gear. Great. Well, it would probably
> decrease demand for other trips.

True. Thank God thats what guiding principles and wilderness designation
are all about.

> One other comment - I think there is something to be said for
> rewarding people who are ready to give up things for their Canyon trip,
or
> are ready to get up and go at a moment's notice for a trip. There's all
> this talk about how times change over 8 years and maybe now you have kids
> that have school and you can't go etc etc. I agree that 8 years is too
long
> to wait, and that it would be nice to be able to have some sense of where
> you'll be in life when you get your permit, but there is also some
element
> of valuing the trip that comes into play. How important is the Canyon
trip
> to you? People who give up things to go, whether it's a whole lifestyle -
> people who choose the financial precariousness of a freer lifestyle - or
> something more short-term like use up all their vacation or sick leave or
> take unpaid leave or quit their job or take the kids out of school or
> whatever - are showing the degree to which they value the Canyon trip. It
> is clearly greater than that of people who do not make those sacrifices -
I
> think it's OK that they be rewarded to some extent for their extra
> devotion. People give up a lot to have a lifestyle that allows them to
get
> up and go. Why should the people with the steady income, house,
insurance,
> retirement fund, all the bennies of stable lifestyle necessarily have the
> rules changed to suit them in scheduling their Canyon trips?

Do you mean the present GC commercial passenger. Just a minute, gotta go
wash out my mouth with soap. I'm bubble back. What the GC trip means to
each individual may be to hard to tell. Again, freedom of choice allows
those of various lifestyles the chance to go, and could allow the flexible
to be flexible, the stable to be stable.

> Anyway, these are just some thoughts in response to what I saw as
> an oversimplification of a problem and a solution that does not take into
> account the needs of everyone, but favors a certain group. This is not to
> say that I don't think the current system is also inequitable and favors
a
> certain group (enough negatives in there for you?). I just don't think
all
> those facile solutions will solve problems for anyone except middle class
> private boaters. I don't see this helping poor boaters at all, for
example.
> I suspect the cost of doing a private trip will increase if these
> suggestions are implemented.

Hey Judy, you are so right on. The NPS has instituted Fee demo. Expect
nothing but fee increases unless you've already written you Senator. We
have, lots. Using $ to limit access is already practiced in the commercial
sector.

>It won't be as much as a commercial trip is,
> of course, so it won't be limited to the rich as those trips are, but it
> may knock the bottom people off the rungs, as the new fees have already
> begun to do. I know that doesn't matter to most people, at least those
not
> on the bottom rungs, but it matters to me. I am also, as usual, bugged by
> the anti-commercial-guide tone of it all, but I've been through that
> already. I would like to see a reallocation of user days to reflect the
> true demand of private and commercial boaters. But, I don't like some of
> the other suggestions that change the nature of both commercial and
private
> boating. I think they are unnecessary intrusions into things that aren't
> germaine to the issue of access. I'd love to hear if I have
misinterpreted
> and why.
>
Thanks Judy for the chance to mull this over some more. Please write back
with a solution to the Longitude, ah blurp, i mean the allocation equation.
Dog gone soap, anyway.

Hi Drifter, it was great to see you at the Ferry the other day.

> Under the EXISTING SYSTEM all commercial permits are up for bid every
seven
> years. This means that the transferrable value of a commercial permit -
> should one want to sell it or pass it on - diminishes from 100% (when the
> permit is renewed) to NOTHING in seven short years. All transfers, of
> course, must meet NPS approval - you can't just sell (or give away) your
> interest in what's left of your existing contract.
>

Did you include preferential right of renewal? This insures the outfitters
maintaining a quality of product. With a bad rating, they loose that
preference, isn't it? With it, they have the upper hand over anyone bidding
on their permit. Do a good job and keep your buisness.

> For the sake of arguement: the opposite is the case for a spot on the
waiting
> list, which is close to worthless when it is obtained but rises in value
as
> the years pass. Your spot on the waiting list (assuming you have one)
will
> be worth more in five more years than any existing commercial permit.
All
> you need to do is pay the $25 bucks a year to keep your place in line;
> commercial outfitters have to bid against all comers to have their
permits
> renewed in another five years.
>

Wow. And here i thought every second spent in the Canyon was precious.

> While I haven't asked any commercial outfitters about this, I'd bet my
life
> that if they could reserve the right to run trips (ten or more years down
the
> line) by paying $25/trip/year, they'd think that was a screaming deal.
As it
> stands, if anybody (including you) beats their bid five years from now,
> they're out of business.
>

You're right, but could they do it for the following equation? allocation
distribution (lets say 70-30) times demonstrated wait, (lets say 8 years
private) equals 19 years commercial demonstrated wait.. Did i do the math
right? Mr Guisy, i take back
all the bad things i ever said about you in math class. Lets see, 19 years
times $25 a year times current 680 trips a year.... oops, forgot the $100
per trip initial fee, and we get ... WOW, $32,000,000. That's 32 million
dollars!!!

> Sure, you can make money running river trips. But how many folks would
want
> a business that is automatically retired in seven years? Consider the
> capitalization cost of being an outfitter: you need a warehouse, boats,
> trucks, a bus, a mess of skilled employees, etc. Most of this stuff is
close
> to worthless if you loose your permit. The hazards of permit renewal
make
> running Crystal look like a piece of cake...

Gosh, that ride along is real important, ie leading a quality trip,
effecting peoples lives, and making a very health profit must mean a ton of
folk would not love to try it. Look at the last prospectus. Did no one bid
knowing what you just mentioned? Why should they if this were so? As it
was, few companies were not bid on.

> I'm not trying to defend the status quo - I think a number of outfitters
> agree that the system is broken and needs repair or a major overhaul.
But
> private boaters aren't the only ones with legitimate gripes about the
system.

Amen. Hey, don't forget the NPS in the legitimate gripe department.

It's Judy again. Hi. Wow, what are you cookin. Sure smells GOOD. Moose
what?
I hope you are laughing. Laughter is so much fun. Ok, back to work.

> I'm not sure on the numbers here, but this is a demo -
> Say 20% of users now are private and 80% are commercial peeps. And the
> average wait for a private trip is 10 years, while the average wait for a
> commercial trip is 2 years. To get an estimate of how many people are
> sitting around wanting and waiting for a trip at any one time, what if
you
> multiply 20 by 10 years = 200, and 80 by 2 years = 160. Total of 360. So,
> 200 out of 360 or 55% of user demand is private and 45% is commercial. So
> allocate user days like that. And everybody waits 3.6 years to go (does
> that work?). Allocation could be adjusted if one or the other sector
starts
> developing a longer wait list. Actually, I'm assuming there still
wouldn't
> be a formal NPS waitlist for commercial trips but each company would
> develop one which would end up about 3.6 years because of fewer launch
> days.

Cool. Way cool. Only as it now is, those pesky privates, bless us all, are
wanting longer trips. This means that with 20% of the allocation based on
user days, they have way less folk on the water then those speedy
commercial folk, ie, 3000 private bodies, 19000 commercial, in a supposed
70-30 split. Hmmm.

> There are certain changes that would result from reallocating no matter
how
> you do it, i.e. the probable shorter limit to private trips. That's the
> nature of the beast with limited resources. I wonder, folks - how much
does
> the value of waiting less time compare with doing a longer trip? Would
you
> be willing to have a longer wait time for an 18-day trip? Or would you
> rather forego the longer trip in order to get your permit within 4 years?

This is exactly what the concessionaires have done. In order to maximize
revenue, they have increased the # of bodies in the canyon by decreasing
trip length. The idea of a faster trip to get more folk through is based on
user days. This again may clear up in a body count and # of launches,
currently not afforded by a user day system. Oopsy. Getting to serious.
Thanks for the good idea. Math is a wonderful thing. You may be onto
something in an allocation equation.

> I'd like to hear people's ideas about having this approximate 50-50
> distribution between private and commercial, if the commercial system
were
> relatively unchanged except for its size. Do you think the Canyon would
see
> more wear and tear or less? I'm inclined to think the damage will
increase.

It might, might not. Having seen commercial 25 year veteran trip leaders
burn ants and destroy native veg to build a shitter, and seen privates
trundle rocks, there seem to be idiots on all sides. Me too. Educate me.
I'm trainable. Exclusion based on lack of education is to scary to think
about.

> I am biased because in my experience in Idaho, commercial trips are more
> careful about environmental impact and not littering and protecting the
> resource than privates. Overall, of course. My company happens to b
> pathologically (well, in a good way this time) committed to minimizing
> impact, so frankly, we look good compared to most private trips we see.
> This is not to say that there are not private trips that are equally
> committed, but there are some real idiots out there. On commercial trips,
> the impact of idiot passengers can often be damped by a guide with
> knowledge.

What a wonderful word, knowledge.
i hope no one read this all the way to here. Goodnight. t
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