MOUNTAIN VIEW — Valley residents consider the Badlands southeast of Mountain View their own area and were adamant they didn’t want the area turned into a state park or highly advertised to bring in hordes of people from outside the area.

This seemed to be the general consensus of the many speakers at the meeting at the Mountain View Town Park recently.

The proposal, according to SWOT (Southwest Off Road Trails) president Mark Tesoro, was an effort to set up the guidelines to protect the area, establish trails and get a heads-up on the anticipated increase in use of the area as he said, “They will come.”

The site being proposed as a state park and a trail riding area would include approximately 60 acres in the area of the Badlands. A lot of Valley residents and others already use this area and were concerned how the change would affect local use and those who already use the area.

Jon Conrad, WHD 19, summed up the tenor of the meeting when he said there was “overwhelming evidence that we as a community are not in favor” of the proposal to turn the Badlands into a state park or create off road trails in the area.

Tesoro noted several times during the meeting, the meeting was a discussion. He also cited several Internet and web sites, which already push the Uinta County area as a great place to recreate. He said several times, there are already people who are coming and as the word gets out, more will come.

According to Tesoro, SWOT had worked the past three years on the idea of the off road trail system, had advertised county roads for this use, and this change would also bring more people to the area, which in turn would help develop the economy as they spent money in local areas by eating, buying gas, perhaps staying in a motel and other ways.

Those, who spoke at the recent meeting in Mountain View, basically said they didn’t want more people coming to the area of the Badlands and increased use of Uinta County Roads. Landowners questioned how the impact would affect their property. Teresa Kellum said she “owned land right up next to the road on the other side,” and has already had problems with vandalism as people had cut her fences, let her horses out, burned wood pallets on her ground and other problems. Others questioned how the change in the area would translate into problems for those who had grazing rights in the area. Karen Henry noted the area would not stay the same and grazing rights would be affected.

Tesoro said SWOT had worked with other counties, and they had looked at the economic benefits that would help local areas. He said Lincoln, Fremont and Carbon

Counties had already approved the use of all of their county roads. Sweetwater was also working on approving their county roads for off road use.

Tesoro said the Uinta County Commissioners had already approved the use of 22 of Uinta County’s 89 roads that ATVs and side-by-sides can utilize. He said SWOT had created signage to signify which roads these vehicles could utilize. There was signage “on about 110 miles of roads already,” Tesoro said.

Tesoro reiterated the meeting was a discussion, but the idea of doing something in the area was as “…a way to protect it for you, for citizens of the Valley for future use.” He repeatedly noted during the meeting, the outsiders were already coming and there would be a growth in numbers of people coming to the area.

There was also a discussion on the time frame and how long it would take to turn the Badlands into a state park, and according to state officials it would be a long, on-going process. Initially, the state would have to receive a letter from BLM requesting the state take over management of the area.