A plea from Free our Forests

Free Our Forests has recently begun a new effort to take the battle over Fee Demo to our opponents. We are setting up a new fund to challenge Fee Demo in the courts, being dubbed the Fee Demo Legal Challenge Fund.
A professional lawyer has devoted her time and services free of charge in this effort.

For years now, much of what we accomplished was in reaction to efforts by the recreation industry, Congress, and public lands agencies to permanently authorize Fee Demo. When we first started organizing, this was all we could do considering we were a handful of volunteer activists opposing the efforts of numerous full-time, paid lobbyists and
government officials.

Recently, the balance of power in this fight has shifted increasingly to our side. Only two years ago, the public lands agencies and the recreation industry denied that wide-spread public opposition to Fee Demo existed. Last year they started admit that "strong, localized opposition" existed. Today, they are holding meetings on how to deal with us, and so many people have written to Congress that lawmakers are trying to tweak Fee Demo to make it palatable to the public.

But we are not going to let them "improve" the program so as to make it a permanent part of public lands policy.

We are now engaged in efforts to put an end to Fee Demo before they can "improve" it and make it permanent. Our efforts will entail supporting the appeal of convicted Fee Demo violator Terry Dahl. His trial provides the best vehicle yet for arguing that Fee Demo does not apply to non-recreating users of public lands. In addition, Free Our Forests
will be unveiling an effort later this Spring which will involve a direct legal challenge to Fee Demo. These efforts will be funded by the newly created Fee Demo Legal Challenge Fund. More information on this fund, incuding its bylaws and background, can
be found at http://www.freeourforests.org/legalfund.html

To make these efforts succeed, we will need to raise money for the fund. Even though no one is being paid to bring these court challenges, it still costs money to make the challenge. Costs include: filing fees,
transcript costs, clerical fees, research, expert witness fees, and travel costs for the attorney representing our cause.

However, we are not asking for large contributions (though we would not turn them down). All we ask is a single dollar ($1.00) from each and every individual opposed to Fee Demo; and there are at least thousands of us out there. Please contribute your one dollar (or more) donation by cash, check, or money order, payable to Free Our Forests and send it
to:

Fee Demo Legal Challenge Fund
c/o Free Our Forests
P.O. Box 411
Ojai, CA 93024

Unfortunately, donations are not tax deductible.

Donate today, and be a part of the solution: putting an end to Fee Demo. If you've wanted to help before, but never had the time to do so, this is the perfect way for you to lend your support.

Again, the website for the Fee Demo Legal Challenge Fund is:
http://www.freeourforests.org/legalfund.html

Getting the message out is another essential component of making this effort a success. Please distrbute this message widely.

-MZ

--
Michael Zierhut
zierhutm@ojai.net

Free Our Forests
http://www.freeourforests.org

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Sign our online petition against user fees on public lands at
http://www.petitiononline.com/feedemo/petition.html
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