President’s Message

by Jesse Applegate, Mazama President

It’s been a while since I’ve had an article published, and quite a few things have been happening since our two online town hall meetings in March and May. Here’s a quick recap. You may remember that we had a focused strategic assessment done in December that gave us eleven recommendations.

The board chose to focus on five of those for this year and they are: ■ Resolve finance and budget challenges ■ Focus on fundraising and developing new revenue sources to remain solvent ■ Improve communication organizationwide ■ Improve role clarity throughout the organization ■ Make the bylaws revisions necessary to remain a viable organization

Overall we’ve made progress on these, but there is still much to do.

On finances, we're working with our CPA to reduce redundant processes, redefining our budgeting process to be easier to use, and looking for ways to increase involvement by our committees. We hope to give committees more agency in the overall process. These changes are helpful, but we're still working through the learning process and expect them to pay off in time.

Greg Scott, Executive Council Secretary, and Kaleen have spearheaded a fundraising campaign, planned for FY23, for the lodge. This is a great start, as the lodge has some long-deferred maintenance. Restarting the Development Committee is still on the to-do list to facilitate fundraising activities beyond capital projects.

To improve communications, Gina has reestablished our social media presence, and initiated work on a Road Ahead page to help keep members abreast of progress on the five focused assessment points. Kaleen has been reaching out to various stakeholders in all our activities to both collaborate on solving day-to-day problems and solicit their input on changes.

For our current staff, there is an ever-present imbalance in workload vs. capacity that makes it challenging to keep up with daily tasks while trying to make progress on future changes. Each of our staff members wears many different hats, and although they may have particular specialties, they all currently perform at least three or more roles. The board continues to look for ways to mitigate this imbalance. While we have lots of ideas, getting everyone onboard with them and navigating our eternal demons (role clarity, responsibilities, and who can or should do what) continues to be a considerable challenge. However, we have the resources we need to change this if we choose to use them.

In July, the Mazamas learned that we could no longer operate organized climbs and hikes in the Gifford-Pinchot, BakerSnoqualmie, and Inyo National Forests. This situation is a big deal because, on the surface, it looks like we won’t be able to climb and hike in areas that are part of our soul. Greg Scott has contacted those forests and talked with other organizations about their experiences. In researching the history of our outfitter-guide permit for Mount Hood National Forest in our archives, Greg discovered that a situation like this has not happened in our 128-year history. Here are the summary points Greg found: ■ Giffort-Pinchot, et al., are requiring the Mazamas to apply for commercial outfitter-guide permits. □ A separate permit would be required for each Forest. □ Permit applications are yearly. Approval for the year is not guaranteed. □ All activities for the year must be listed on the application. □ The requirement for permits appears to be prompted from staffing challenges and larger factors within the USDA stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic and is not punitive. ■ Each Forest interprets the law defining outfitter-guide organizations independently. □ We operate in 17 National Forests.

Potentially, we would have to apply for a permit in each one every year. □ We have a long-grandfathered commercial outfitter-guide permit for

Mt. Hood. It requires substantial staff time to renew every year. □ Some forests don’t consider us an outfitter-guide, but this could change at any time. ■ The determination of outfitter-guide status is centered on whether we charge money for activities within the forest. □ Non-profit tax status does not matter. □ The amount of money charged for activities is not a factor. ■ Outfitter-guide permits would require fees from each forest for each application. □ We are uncertain what the cost per permit would be at this time. □ Given the workload to complete applications this effort would likely require a full-time staff person to manage.

This is a complex challenge no one was expecting. The board intends to reform an Access Committee, with representatives from our different activity groups, to explore solutions. The board has initially discussed some options that the not-yetformed committee can get started with once the committee is reestablished.

Option one could be to accept the bureaucracy and continue hosting climbs and hikes as we currently are, and charging for them. There would be some significant changes, however. Along with the cost of hiring a long time staff person to establish relationships with the Forests, and process the permit applications, all climbs and hikes would need to be submitted with the applications about a year in advance. This would make the climb and hike schedules ridgid without the ability to add activities mid-year. The extra permit fees and personnel costs would likely require substantial increases in climb fees. Best case, our climbing and hiking programs would be limited in scope and more expensive than currently.