From the Sept / Oct 2009 issue of Marsh Rider:
Feds still don't have it right for sportsmen's use of Big Cypress National Preserve
By BARBARA JEAN POWELL
Everglades Coordinating Council
Congress created the 575,000 acre Big Cypress National Preserve in 1974. As the first unit of the national park system to carry the “preserve” designation, Big Cypress was considered by Congress and the Department of The Interior to be a new breed of cat in which activities not normally permitted in a national park would be allowed, including hunting, fi shing, trapping, and the use of swamp buggies and airboats to get around. The enabling legislation actually listed protection of recreation as one of the purposes of the preserve, along with the natural, scenic, hydrological, floral and faunal values of the area.
Gladesmen were integral to getting the legislation passed in order to protect South Florida’s prime hunting lands from development, and Gladesmen had to call in a lot of favors and twist a lot of arms to convince Congress and the state of Florida to support the project.
Gladesmen were not sure that the NPS, with its anti-use philosophy, would be able to handle an outside-thebox, multi-use management concept, but federal acquisition was the only way to pull off such a huge and costly acquisition. Besides, congressional testimony made it clear that our traditional uses would be protected.
Within a few years Gladesmen’s worst fears were realized when the NPS imposed rules restricting traditional access and use: eliminating dog hunting, reducing hunting season days, banning ORVs and airboats entirely from some units of the Preserve, and forcing Gladesmen to compete for limited vehicle permits for the rest of the Preserve.
With the acquisition of the 146,000 acre Big Cypress National Preserve Addition in 1988, Congress seized the opportunity to strengthen and clarify provisions for recreation traditional to Big Cypress, mandating that: “Federal agencies shall cooperate with the state of Florida to provide recreational access points and roads, rest and recreation areas, wildlife protection, hunting, fi shing, frogging and other traditional opportunities in conjunction with the creation of the Addition “ These provisions are to apply to the original Preserve as well as the Addition.
Congress also provided a standard Wilderness Act provision....
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