ACCESS TO GIRL SCOUT HOLE CLOSED?

[Fishhead]

I just read about the access to my favorite area on the Sandy river has been closed. The reason for this is unknown to me, but if it has to do with pigs leaving trash I always pick up after others when it comes to my favorite hole. Now someone has screwed this up and I don't know if there is a way to fix it.Even if I had to pay like at the Hospital hole on the Trask I think I would. If any of you guys have the pull or the know how of getting this open to the public again it would mean a great deal to me and alot of others who love this section of river. I always thought it was part of Dodge park or the right of way for the Water District or P.G.E.or maybe it was part of the Metro land purchase. Those who fish this area have been fishing there a long time and would like to continue fishing there! This area runs from Dodge Park bridge to Oxbow Park and has many good holes. As far as I know the only way to fish this area is to walk in from the bridge. Fishermen unite and keep this access open!!! THANKS-- Fishhead Vic

[Deleted User]

Fishhead, this was due to property abuses from what I heard. I think there are ways to fix these kind of situations. Ask for help from the Sandy River Chapter of Northwest Steelheaders Association. Our member "Sandysteel", Eric Neiwert, is very involved with them; I think may even be chapter president. If you and a crew of "steelheaders" propose to the land owner a cleanup project and making weather durable signs of proper conduct to post around their property in return for some regulated fishing opportunity back again, it may just work out. - RT

[Osprey]

Just by looking at the topic http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/rolleyes.gif......No I won't even go there....thats why I'm not Boy Scout anymore...... http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/shocked.gif

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Row quietly and fish a Cataraft !!---
Release all Wild Fish --<'))>><

[fishbait]

Fishhead, Tell me more. Are you talking about access from Dodge Park. Hiking in past the turn off to the pipeline hole? Or are you talking about access from the other side of the river actually through the GS camp? How much access has been restricted?

[Deleted User]

Os-

Last I knew it was illegal to do that when yor are Boy Scout age, too. http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[Fishhead]

It looks like we need to form a group of guys to get this issue taken care of. I see some of you are interested, And the area I'm talking about is on the west side of the river below Dodge park bridge or the opposite side from the Girl scout camp.Please let me know if there is a meeting and at what time! We do need to get together on this to get it done!!!!!!!!!PS its all closed off the pipeline and the girl scout hole!!! Fishhead Vic

[jkfrabel]

Its both sides of the river. I have been talking to anglers since last year about getting together with the guy in question,to see if we could come to some sort of compermise. If you guys are willing let me know. Maybe we could discuss some ways on how to confront the guy,to explain what we want to do...Jeff

[Ramstrong]

Fishhead, I think the straw that broke the camels back was some perv flashing the girls. I'm sure that we could work something out with the owner. Such as having access when there's fishing to be had and closing the area down in the summer when the girls are there. this would allow everyone an opportunity to enjoy the area, and the only fishing that would be missed would be some summer steelheading. Maybe shut it down from the June 15th salmon closer until the September 1st opening. Then arrange a cleanup in June just before turnover. I'm sure there has to be some mutual agreement to reach here, that is just some fantastic water, and I've been missing it lately. If there is ever anything that needs bodies, just fire me an E-mail, and I'll be there if humanly possible.

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-Ryan
www.xprt.net/~ryandsar (http://www.xprt.net/~ryandsar)
ramstrong@hotmail.com

[SandySteel]

I just wanted to fill everyone in on this topic and let eveyone know what is happening on the legal side of things.

If you are used to fishing the hole that lies below the pipeline on the Sandy you need to be aware that the land that the trails cross after passing the pipeline are private property owned by the Campfire boys and girls. If you ever used these trails you have trespassed. Only in the last year have they been posted.

The campfire girls and boys is within its right to restrict access to the river via the trails that cross their property.
However, you can access the spot via a boat. This is where it gets tricky.

If you access a fishing spot by travelling the beds and banks below the mean high water mark on a river you have every right to be there. For instance you could float in on a boat or walk in from public access. (public walking access on the beds and banks to the "girl scout" hole is impossible) But if you travel across someone's property to gain access then they have every right to kick you out or even have you cited.

They do not have any right to kick you out if you floated in or gained access from public access. This is where everyone's help is needed.

If you have been in a conflict on any stream with a land owner because you have floated in and are anchored or have stepped out of your boat or have have walked in from public access ALONG THE BEDS AND BANKS BELOW THE MEAN HIGH WATER MARK we would like you to let us know. In particular we would like to know about the Sandy river and John Day. I understand that some anglers are even getting kicked out on the west bank near the Troutdale bridge when they access the river by travelling the bank from Glen Otto park going under the bridge and fishing on the bank from the downstream side. If this has happened to you we would like to know about it.


The Sandy River is undergoing a navigability study to determine if it qualifiies as navigable so that river users can continue to access the beds and banks of the river.

Over the last several years the Northwest Steelheaders has taken on the fight for river access. Some folks are aware but many are not that the simple right to fish your favorite stream may be vanishing as land owners lock down their property and attempt to lock the public out of the beds and banks of the rivers. I encourage everyone who enjoys fishing to join the steelheaders as we are one of the only organizations who is taking on this fight. If you have any questions please don't hesitate to contact me.

P.S. R.T. I am only a lowly secretary for the Sandy River Chapter. http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif

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Eric Neiwert
<A HREF="http://www.teleport.com/~neiwert/nwsteelhd/" TARGET=_blank>
Secretary
Sandy River Chapter Northwest Steelheaders </A>
Portland OR
http://www.teleport.com/~neiwert/nwsteelhd/pictures/logo.jpg

[This message has been edited by SandySteel (edited 12-21-2000).]

[OneLastCast]

SandySteel

Until the courts have determined that the Sandy is a "navigable" stream (which probably would be likely if it went to court) then it would be false to say that "if you access a fishing spot by travelling the beds and banks below the mean high water mark on a river you have every right to be there". At this time it is dependent on what the deed says, what the court says, and possibly what the federal government says. But it is a little early to make blanket statements about rightful access.

My wife says it is obvious that I am never going to have any friends.

OneLastCast

[Deleted User]

Sorry about this reply Olie (OLC): Eric and his friends are non-river front property owners and you are. Easy to understand your different takes. My suggestion above all else is to treat any property with proper respect. Also first ask permission to properly cross their posted property to fish, and if granted then clean up trash that may be there as a jesture of good will and a good thing to do for our river environment. If they won't give permission then I agree with the Steelheaders stance that it's within your rights to walk in from public access points along the river beds below the mean high water mark to fish in front of private river property of rivers likely to be legally navigable (most of them?). If an irrate owner tries in vain to kick you off they are only an annoyance; until they threaten you with physical harm or touch you in which case you are allowed to defend yourself accordingly. I have seen some property owners point guns at fishers that were likely legally fishing as described. It is probably only a matter of time before one of the gun pointers gets shot or cited. If they call the local police and they do come out, then explain to the officers your understanding of the law. If the landowner asks for you to be cited and the officer abides, they will have opened up a court case that will likely put their property into the public limelight as now being determined to be open season for LOTS of fishers that properly access it. The smarter owners will not push it too far. They will just have to go steam over their selfishness of thinking the world's rivers can be bought for only the select. And as I've said before, I want the law to come down very hard on true property abusers or literbugs. Just my opinion and .02 worth take. - RT

[rags]

Fishhead,
Are you Vic that is a friend of Gerald Halls? I know you two loved to fish the girlscout hole. John

[OneLastCast]

No apology needed RT, no offense taken.

I understand totally the desire to increase access. As it happens my deed reads to the "ordinary high water line" so the navigability question doesn't pertain to me. The problem as I see it is that until a court decides what River or what portion of the river is navigable then that property is still in essence private property owned by someone who pays taxes on it, maintains it, etc. To flagrantly stand on it and taunt the Land Owner is not going to help resolve any of the issues. If someone is arrested, a lower court is not going to decide what is navigable. If it was that easy those decisions would already have been made.
I have spoken with many of the Northwest steelheaders at the Sportsman shows and some of them are very educated regarding the subject. Unfortunately when comments like the above are made and misconstrued by an uninformed fisherman then conflicts arise. Some people can not recognize the line of mean high water and think that all the banks are theirs for the walking. These people will stand and argue the facts as supplied by the Northwest steelheaders without knowing that those facts do not apply in all particular cases.
I have seen deeds where the State of Oregon has deeded the property between the ordinary high water and the ordinary low water to a private party. And even on those rivers considered navigable there are definite boundaries on what portion is navigable and what isn't. Indicating that a portion of the bed of the stream is privately owned. If you were to stand on that property you would be trespassing. There are a lot of different scenarios and possibilities that are not apparent to the guy in waders standing on the bank.
So please use some discretion and intelligence when provoking a landowner. To say that it is probably only a matter of time before one of the gun pointers gets shot or cited is a little scary. I would hate to see the motto be Kill to Fish and Fish to Kill. Remember the scent of blood can really spoil a batch of eggs.

OneLastCast

[SandySteel]

Onelastcast
You are correct that navigability is the test. However, in the legal wrangling of things it may not be necessary for the Department of State Lands to rule (or a court to rule) first that a river is navigable for a stream to actually be open to public access. There are many streams that meet the federal navigability test that have not been studied by the department of state lands or the courts.

Let me first agree wholeheartedly with RT and yourself that all of the public must treat private lands and their owners with respect. This issue of respect is a large part of the reason we are in this mess.

I will quote here verbatim from our river rights coordinator.
Who owns Oregon's navigable waterways? You do, I do, we all do. The citizens of Oregon own the bed and banks up to the normal high water line of navigable waterways in Oregon and have since statehood in 1856. On an equal footing basis with all other prior states, the federal government passed along to Oregon the ownership of all rivers, streams and creeks that meet the federal test for title navigability. (Navigability used here is a term relating to title ownership as contrasted with that used by the United States Coast Guard or the Army Corps of Engineers.) If this is true then what's the big deal and why do we have to talk about it? For the public which includes boaters, fishermen, rafters, canoeists, kayakers, swimmers, and others who use our waterways it makes a big difference who owns the submersible lands.

There are many waterfront property owners whose deeds run out into the water and they may have been paying county taxes on these lands. A large number of these folks want to exclude the public from what they consider their personal domain. So who really owns this submersible land? Is it the state or the private property owners? According to literature from the Oregon Division of State Lands (D.S.L.) „...a deed can only convey interests actually owned by the seller, and since the beds and banks of all navigable rivers were given to the state at statehood in 1859, situations may exist where the state is the only true owner regardless of what a deed may say. The state's right to ownership is a prior existing right and is frequently mentioned as such on deeds and title insurance. What makes a river title navigable? On Oregon's Chetco River the Federal Court ruled the river navigable based upon the historic use of Indian canoes and the contemporary use of drift boats for recreational fishing. A river's condition at statehood is very important and navigability does not apply to many unnatural conditions such as man made irrigation ditches or above the normal high water line during flood stage. Since Oregon has not asserted it's ownership on most rivers, due to unwillingness over the years by the State Legislature to resolve the ownership issue, conflicts continue to occur throughout Oregon.

An example of this is steelhead fisherman Ray Dezellem of Arlington arrested for trespass near Service Creek on the John Day River on Sept. 26, 1998. This case has been dismissed. This is for being on the bank below the high watermark of a river that state records show meets federal standards for navigability. If a waterway meets the federal test for navigability, it is navigable, and falls under the Public Trust.

Citizens should not be arrested for being below the normal high watermark of such a waterway. Many County District Attorneys understand this and will not prosecute. Others might and therefore conflicts will continue until the Oregon Legislature takes appropriate action. In the meantime users should avoid conflict where possible, stay below the normal high water line, don't litter, and show respect for others including the waterfront property owners. It's a good idea if you are not certain to ask permission first and avoid conflict. For more information contact D.S.L. in Salem at (503) 378-3805 or the author in care of the Association of Northwest Steelheaders in Milwaukee (503) 653-4176.


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Eric Neiwert
Sandy River Chapter Northwest Steelheaders (http://www.teleport.com/~neiwert/nwsteelhd/)
Portland OR
http://www.teleport.com/~neiwert/nwsteelhd/pictures/logo.jpg

[This message has been edited by SandySteel (edited 12-22-2000).]

[OneLastCast]

SandySteel

I am not at all disputing the public ownership of navigable waterways. Provided that they are navigable, the particular stretch of waterway has not been deeded by the state or is not a result of avulsion. And DSL is correct in stating that a deed can only convey interests actually owned by the seller (you can’t sell what you don’t own). And the public has a right to access within that portion owned by the state. No argument. And a large percentage of our waterways are “navigable”.

However my concern is the statement that “…it may not be necessary for the Department of State Lands to rule (or a court to rule) first that a river is navigable for a stream to actually be open to public access.” Is it the position of Northwest Steelheaders that the question of navigability can be determined by any fisherperson standing in the river at one particular moment? Does it matter what stream they are standing in? Or what portion of the reach of the stream they are standing? Does it not matter what a land owners deed might say? I realize that many deeds arbitrarily went along the thread of the river but is it possible that some people might actually have a deeded interest? What about an avulsive action that would not have moved original boundaries in which case a private party would own the riverbed? What about early land patents from the federal government? “Where one has acquired title to the center of a nonnavigable river from the United States, a state cannot later declare it to be navigable by statute so as to gain title to the riverbed where the riverbed had been nonnavigable in fact” United States vs Champlain Ref. Co. 1946. In that cases navigability of a particular stream may have to be determined at the time of the original patent.

Again, I am not disputing public access I am just worried about an organization sending out partially informed fisherman to commit potentially illegal acts that can only further exasperate the problem. The very fact that the courts have flip flopped back and forth regarding this issue should give us pause before we are allowed to “defend ourselves accordingly”.

Someone has to determine navigability. And it won’t be easy. No matter what happens the lawyers are going to be making money.

OneLastCast

[Deleted User]

Good points Olie (OLC, I like to give guys with long monikers shorter or easier to say nicknames; let me know if there is another you prefer to Olie); and your points are well taken. However, please try not to exagerate my message of defending one's self in proper accordance. I didn't mean to stir up undue trouble. I only meant to encourage fishers to stand up for their rights; first and foremeost in a respectful and friendly manner. It's only when someone gets way out of line with threats or gun pointing, which I've have wittnessed and heard about in other cases, that a fisher has the right to defend himself. The property owners that harshly confront a respectful and properly acting fisher that is fishing below the mean high water mark are out of line; they should only consider if they want to call in the local police. If I owned this property I wouldn't call them in until I had taken pictures of the fisher litering or comitting some other property abuse. If the fisher has accessed by other than crossing the private property to land that is essentially both state owned riverbed and God given rivers to all people, and treats the land properly, they should be allowed to fish without undue confrontation. I will ask you Olie, and other riverfront property owners, why they would be adamant about trying to chase away properly behaving fishers from fishing out in front of their property?!? It's a different story with the abuser or literbug; they should be cited and removed no doubt - and as far as I'm concerned have their fishing rights/licenses taken away for a couple years while they pay a large fine off. They are at the root of the problems that have occured; with overly selfish landowners a secondary cause. - RT

[OneLastCast]

RT:

No problem if you want to call me OLC or Olie or even some of the other things you've alluded to. Unfortunately my fathers name really was Sven so I can foresee alot of Sven and Olie stories. Oh well..write slow so I understand.
As far as your comments go I pretty much agree. If the fisher has access other than private property and was not abusive, there should be no problem. I do not chase away anyone who has the right to be there. In fact it is difficult to remember that last person I did chase away. I was going to make a snide comment about the "overly selfish landowners" but upon a little introspection I realize that I am a little selfish. But just a little. It is difficult to keep emotions out of any thing that has to do with property rights or property ownership. That goes for inland property or riverfront property. It is just that it is riverfront property that people want to use.

But, like I said, my deed runs to the Ordinary High Water. I claim no further.

OneLastCast

[Deleted User]

Thanks Olie. My reference to the overly selfish was to the confrontational types that want everyone out including proper behaving fishers; not refering to you. Appreciate your contributions. And I still would like to wet a line from your property someday, but only when you are there to show me the holding spots; I'll be zipperlip about it http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif . - RT

[jkfrabel]

Eric,I've been running that stretch of river for the last five years in my pontoon boat. I havnt run into the guy yet but know of someone who also runs the river that has. As you already know you cant fish out of the boat in that stretch so you have to get out on the bank to fish. Well the manager of the land told him that he was trespassing and to get off of his land,the guy said hey I'm below the high water mark. Manager then replyed that he owned all the property including the property below the high water mark. The guy then reeled in, got into his boat and left. This guy is a real jerk, I've been told by relyable sources that he hates fisherman and wont compermise to anything...Jeff

[This message has been edited by jkfrabel (edited 12-22-2000).]

[Fishhead]

Ok, now that we know what the high water line means lets get back to the real topic. How do we get back to fishing the Sandy at the pipeline and girl scout holes? The only acces that we have is the acess road to the pipeline, then the trail that leeds down river past the girl scout hole. The reason for them is not litering as thought but the act of someone who did'nt have any right being down there in the first place. Being lued on the river was the act of one indivdual that has ruined us ever getting to fish that area in the near future. For the rest of us we need to show the owner that the fishers who do fish this area on a regular basis are responsible and can treat this area with the respect it deserves!!!!!---Fishhead Vic

[Fishhead]

Any new info on this subject would go along way in getting this issue resolved.

[wiser]

I left a message on this subject earlier or on another thread but couldn't find it. Maybe I've done something wrong and it got erased or maybe I just can't find it. Anyway, here goes again. The executive Director of Portland Campfire is responsible for the closure of the access to the Girl Scout Hole. Her name is Maggie Stone mstone@portlandcampfire.com . She has directed an employee at the Camp Namanu site to keep the access closed. Portland Campfire owns property on both sides of the river near the pipeline crossing. Metro has contacted Portland Campfire several times, trying to begin negotiations for a land purchase, using Greenspaces Aquisition bond measure dollars to purchase. The aquisition program is a willing seller program and the owners are have not expressed any interest in selling. That could change when the pipeline is removed after placement in an underground, and under river, tunnel proposed by the Portland Water bureau. In the meantime, Metro Aquisition program personnel are keeping their offer to negotiate open. Maggie Stone is also staying involved with the navigability issue, fighting any public ownership claims to the river banks and bottom.

[Fishhead]

Hey thanks young salt for the more detailed info!! So what is this Maggie Stones problem with letting us fishermen fish there in the winter when the kids are'nt around and keeping it closed the rest of the time? What is her problem? Is it that if they open it back up and something negative happens down there that they will be resposible? I know that down river there is a place where you sign in on a chalk board and after 7 or 8 guys sign in thats all thats allowed in there until someone leaves.That way they could keep track of who is down there if something negative where to happen. Well thats one solution. Maybe this Maggie Stone would be willing to try something more positive? I still think it's going to take me joining the Girl scouts to get access to that area.Let me know of further developments.....Thanks again-----Fishhead Vic

[letsfish]

Thank You Y.S. Perhaps we can work with Maggie Stone to make to River a better place for the Scouts and those who use the River to fish and recreate.Lets present ourselves as fishermen with an interest in the integrity, solitude and security that property affords the camp.When we are seen as people who can help preserve what they cherish, we can work out something that both parties will have something to cheer about.
Now where do we get started?

[Fishhead]

Thanks Letsfish for your input. I hope more guys who know this area get involed. Like you I don't know where to start. I bet the more guys we get interested in this, the closer we'll come to finding a solution. If any one has more info or can get a meeting set up with the Girl scouts, PLEASE let us know!!!!!-----Fishhead Vic

[Fishhead]

Does any one have any more info they want to share?