One of our most notable fights to protect motorized access to public lands for disabled Americans was a legal challenge to the closure of a small beach in the King Range National Conservation Area. Back in 1999, BlueRibbon Coalition joined a lawsuit pertaining to the closure of Black Sands Beach in northern California to all motorized vehicles. This particular stretch of beach had a rich history of accommodating various forms of recreation beginning in the 1950s. Recreation included things such as fishing, surfing, camping, surf fishing, racing dune buggies, and more. Most, if not all, of these activities required use of a motorized vehicle to either assist in carrying supplies to and from the beachfront, or to simply provide pleasure.
Motorized access came into question in 1970 when President Nixon signed the King Range Act, which designated 54,000 acres of federal and private land as the nation’s first Conservation Area. This Act allowed vast power to the Secretary of Interior to manage the land in a way that allowed for multiple uses and sustained yield. Despite being designated for “multiple use and sustained yield” the King Range National Conservation Area designation in 1970 triggered a series of events that led to the area only being managed for limited uses through the use of restrictions and closures. As is almost always the case, motorized access became the target for closure.
Black Sands Beach fell within this Conservation Area, and just a mere 3.5 mile stretch was left open for motorized use. In July of 1997, the BLM completely closed Black Sands Beach to all motorized use through a follow-up planning process. BlueRibbon Coalition, along with many other interested parties, brought suit to stop this closure.
BlueRibbon Coalition argued that per the Rehabilitation Act, closure of the Black Sands Beach discriminated against disabled individuals who relied on motorized transport to enjoy the exact same recreational activities as everyone else. The Rehabilitation Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability in programs conducted by federal agencies. BlueRibbon then engaged a disabled gentleman who had enjoyed use of this beach for many years and provided many reasons as to why this closure was devastating for both him and the rest of the disabled population. Despite this, the Court sided with the BLM because allowing motorized vehicles only for disabled individuals would fundamentally alter the nature of the beach and management’s goal of maintaining it as “pristine wilderness”. Keep in mind that this area was never designated as Wilderness by Congress, which is why we often refer to efforts to restrict lands through other designations as wilderness laundering.
The Court also decided that the BLM did not partake in any discrimination, as an access ramp was constructed by the BLM to allow for disabled people to have access to the beach. This completely disregarded on-the-ground testimony that declared the ramp insufficient access, as the actual path down to the shoreline was loose rock and gravel which made it impossible and a hazard for any disabled individual to traverse down it.
While this case was over two decades ago, these exact same problems arise today with no meaningful progress towards relief for disabled individuals on our public lands. This is an area of law that is completely broken, and at BlueRibbon Coalition we’re determined to fix that.
If you think the BLM has gotten any less tone deaf since 1999 when the BLM built a wheel chair ramp to a beach of sand, loose rock, and gravel, this post from earlier this year shows they still think all they need to do to meet the needs of disabled Americans is to build special parking spaces and wheelchair ramps.
While there is nothing wrong with improving access to facilities – it is legally required after all – we constantly hear from our members who experience some form of disability that they feel discriminated against by motorized access restrictions. But the BLM doesn’t consider motorized access restrictions to be discriminatory.
This is what BLM Manual1626 – the current internal guidelines for conducting travel management planning – has to say about the relationship between motorized access restrictions and the need of Americans with disabilities:
This is the kind of policy you would end up with if you asked an amoral lawyer to design a policy to authorize and encourage active discrimination against disabled Americans. Let’s break it down. First, a “federal program,” which for our purposes could include a resource management plan, a travel management plan, or even a Congressional wilderness designation, can’t be denied to disabled Americans solely because of his or her disability. It stands to reason that if an able-bodied person can access benefits from a federal program that a disabled person cannot, then this is discrimination pure and simple. Since all federal lands are located outdoors, it’s mind-boggling and insane that the official BLM policy for mobility devices requires that these devices must only be suitable for indoor use. To not allow mobility devices suitable for outdoor use in the outdoors is discriminatory.
Many disabled Americans find substantial benefit in being able to access existing roads, primitive roads, and trails in OHVs, and providing this benefit doesn’t require additional funds, infrastructure, or amenities. All that would be required to provide this benefit to disabled Americans would be to abandon small-minded bigotry that is the result of prioritizing the interests of the wilderness advocates who are the ones most religiously committed to shutting down existing roads and trails. Even though courts and agency staff don’t recognize this, restrictions on motor vehicle use result in massive expanses of public land that can be only enjoyed by able-bodied Americans. Ultimately, discrimination should be defined by the one being discriminated against – not the one doing the discriminating. BLM’s longstanding insistence that its entrenched and systematic policies of discrimination aren’t discriminatory is a glaring flaw in the management of our public lands.
The good news is, this year Senator Mike Lee introduced the Outdoor Americans with Disabilities Act, which will require all federal land agencies to analyze the impact of their policies on disabled Americans by requiring them to adhere to a standard threshold of motorized route density on public lands. Seeking justice through the courts on this issue has been a dead end. Even though they’ve enjoyed decades of broad decision-making discretion, agency decision-makers have rarely – if ever – used this discretion to justify expanding access for those with disabilities. All they ever do is enact more and more closures and restrictions while hiding behind weak guidance in the Travel Planning Manual MS 1626.
With Senator Lee set to be the most powerful senator in the Senate when it comes to public land management, we want to make sure he hears from those who would like to see this injustice corrected. For years we have been collecting stories of disabled Americans who would like to see expanded motorized access on public lands. If you haven’t added your voice yet to this project, we would love to hear from you!
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The First 100 Days of the next Administration are crucial for advancing top legislative priorities. This is why we are working to raise $150,000 dollars during the month of December, so we can start strong next year and not miss a short window of opportunity!
