Middle Deschutes Wild & Scenic River Abuse
 

FANs has expanded its monitoring area to include the three mile Wild & Scenic River (W&SR) section upstream of Lower Bridge. What we have found is a lovely underutilized and poorly accessed riparian area along the river. But above on the rim within the roadless area, we found devastating abuse.  There are a myriad of unauthorized dirt roads into the area off of Lower Bridge Road.  Most of the native substrate has been replaced by sand from the tread of ATVs, cars, trucks and RVs. There is trash of every kind and encampments of semi-permanent residents.

When we found a “village” of campers along the rim with two RVs that appeared to be running sewage into the ground, we sounded the alarm with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).  They had law enforcement out that day moving folks and vehicles out. However, within days, another RV was parked in the same spot.  That vehicle appears to be abandoned, but calls and emails with photos to the BLM have failed to elicit a response.

There are no signs alerting people that this is a W&SR and not authorized for vehicular access. There are no big boulders blocking the unauthorized roads.  We have prepared a slideshow on all of our findings for presentation to the BLM. We have asked for a Zoom meeting several times in the past two months to no avail.

We have found such abuse throughout the remainder of the roadless area along the east side of the river, including graffiti, tree harvesting and bullet damage.  On the west side of the river, the very limited access to the roadless area within the W&SR corridor is not signed and has become the personal playground of property owners bordering it who have created their own roads.

In 2021, FANs will focus our volunteer efforts at bringing attention to these orphaned areas under the management of the Prineville District BLM. The unrelenting abuse can’t be allowed to continue.
 

Trash piles (top), graffiti (middle) and illegally parked RVs (bottom) are
some of the abuses in the Middle Deschutes Wild & Scenic River corridor.