Proposed compromise could salvage major desert race

The popular Las Vegas-to-Reno off-highway race would go forward as planned under a proposed compromise aimed at protecting Nevada’s newest national monument.

Michael Herder, manager of the Bureau of Land Management’s Ely District, said a decision on whether racers can traverse a portion of the Basin and Range National Monument could happen by the end of the week.

If the deal racers offered to assuage environmentalists’ concerns is approved it would end the first major land use dispute in the short history of the one-year-old monument, at least for now.

“It is a compromise that actually could work,” said John Hiatt, who represents environmental organizations on the BLM’s Mojave-Southern Great Basin Resource Advisory Council.

Without a permit, organizers would be forced to make alternate plans to avoid the monument, a tall order considering the two-day, 640-mile race is scheduled to start August 19.

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The original application called for the race to enter the monument from the east at Seaman Wash Road north of Hiko and exit heading west near Rachel, traversing just 40 miles on existing roads at the southern end of the 704,000-acre monument.

Under the proposed compromise the route would remain the same.

But when racers reach the monument they will slow down to 35 miles-per-hour and will not be allowed to pass each other. The racing could resume once competitors leave the monument.

Although Herder said he doesn’t expect a final decision on the race permit until at least Thursday or Friday, Best in the Desert Racing Association, which organizes the event, already has terms of the deal on its website.

Daryl Folks, who represents outdoor recreation interests on the advisory council and is the son of race organizer Casey Folks, said slowing down is preferable to trailering some 300 motorcycles, all-terrain vehicles and desert racing trucks.

“For these truck and buggy operations that is a major operation,” Folks said.

Objections to the planned event cropped up after the BLM issued an environmental assessment stating the race wouldn’t do significant harm to the monument. The assessment published July 1 with a 30-day window for public comments. The window closed last week. Race organizers made their application before President Obama designated the monument.

“The Monument was explicitly created to both preserve and protect the unique natural environment … (the race) does not enhance the historic or scientific legacy of the Monument, nor does it benefit the varied flora and fauna within,” Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, wrote in response to the application. “In fact, it does the opposite.”

Although the compromise, if approved, would salvage the 2016 version of the race it won’t ensure long term peace between off-highway riders and environmentalists when it comes to Basin and Range.

Hiatt and John Zablocki, another member of the resource advisory committee, said the proclamation Obama issued in creating the monument doesn’t include a mandate to preserve off-highway riding on desert roads in the remote region.

Zablocki said he didn’t want Basin and Range to become an outlier among national monuments by allowing motorized racing.

“If there has not been a motorized race in a national monument, a motorized race in a national monument would set a precedent,” he said.

Susan Agee, a rancher and member of the advisory council, said the opposition to the race reaffirms her concern environmental groups will leverage the monument designation to eliminate other forms of land use in Basin and Range.

“Ranchers and racers have not always been friends,” said Agee. “But at this point they are going to take down the races first then start on the ranchers.”