Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s 2022 – 2023 OHV Trail Grant funding award recommendations have been approved for $6.23 million to fund 60 trail projects across Colorado. The grant funding represents over 90,000 trail crew hours and comes from Colorado OHV registrations and the federal Recreational Trails Program.
“This is literally OHV dollars going right back into the trails,” said CPW State Trails Program Manager Fletcher Jacobs. “This year we funded 33 maintenance trail crews across the state, 27 of which are Good Management crews, which allow our federal partners at the United State Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to get much needed consistent funding for trail crews. We were also excited to fund 19 weeks of youth corps crews that helps us to not only protect resources, but also allow young adult corps members to be exposed to careers in natural resources.”
Highlights From This Year’s Award Winners
OHV Statewide Trail Crew 2023
Funds will be used for the operations of a four-person Good Management crew who perform land stewardship work on multiple-use motorized trails on U.S. Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, and state-owned land throughout Colorado. The crew will perform multiple trail maintenance and travel management tasks including constructing trail and drainage structures; installation of signs to inform and educate; building gates and buck-n-rail fences to regulate users and prevent resource damage; and performing visitor contacts to provide education, assistance, and enforcement of rules and regulations.
Stay The Trail Education & Stewardship Alliance
Funding to continue and enhance the Stay The Trail Campaign throughout the state to promote responsible OHV recreation through educational programs, stewardship projects, direct user contacts, and resource protection/mitigation. The campaign will also work in bordering states in an effort to target and educate the many out-of-state trail users who visit Colorado.
Donner Pass/Lookout Mountain Rehabilitation
Volunteers with Northern Colorado Trail Riders will perform restoration and maintenance of the Donner Pass Trail System of the Arapaho Roosevelt National in response to the Cameron Peak Fire. Work will include removing dead and downed trees, installing drainage structures to mitigate run-off/erosion issues, replacing trail kiosks and carsonite markers destroyed by fire, and repairing fire damaged bridges.
North Zone OHV Crew
A motorized OHV crew will patrol, maintain, restore, and improve motorized routes on the North Zone, which includes all National Forest motorized routes within the Canyon Lakes Ranger District and Pawnee National Grassland. The two-person North Zone OHV Ranger Crew will coordinate work with the Larimer County Four Wheel Drive Club, Big Thompson 4-Wheelers, the Northern Colorado Trail Riders (NCTR), and Colorado 4×4 Rescue and Recovery to schedule volunteer work days.
BLM Statewide (OHV) Law Enforcement
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) will conduct law enforcement details and/or saturation patrols in key areas and times of the year where OHV management is a priority. BLM law enforcement officers will patrol areas, contacting public land users and OHV operators, focusing efforts on public education, monitoring, public safety, reporting and enforcement of OHV regulations and registration requirements.
The Grant Process
The Colorado State Trails Committee is responsible for the review process for the trail grant applications and makes recommendations to the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission regarding funding for grants.
The OHV/motorized trail grant selection process follows a four-tiered review and approval protocol. All grant applications are first reviewed by CPW wildlife field biologists and regional CPW staff. This process allows CPW to flag potential wildlife issues prior to the review by the subcommittees. While concerns may be flagged during this review, CPW’s field staff attempts to resolve these concerns prior to the subcommittee’s review. Next, applications are evaluated by the OHV Grant Review and Ranking Subcommittee to score and rank the OHV competitive grant applications in order of their recommended funding priority. The ranked applications are then passed to the Committee to evaluate the applications in ranked order and recommend funding strategies to the Commission. The Commission provides the final approval to the funded projects. This process invites public review and comment at four separate stages: upon submission, before the subcommittees, before the State Trails Committee, and before the Commission.
Visit the Colorado Parks and Wildlife website to learn more about the Recreational Trails Program.
Written by Travis Duncan. Travis is a public information officer for Colorado Parks and Wildlife in Denver. He has lived in Colorado for nearly 20 years and loves the outdoors.
