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RACHEL REABE: MPR's Mainstreet Radio coverage of rural issues is supported by the Blandin Foundation, committed to strengthening communities through grant making, leadership training, and convening. We invite you to visit the Mainstreet website. Go to www.mpr.org where you can hear today's program at your convenience, as well as other Mainstreet reports. The address again, www.mpr.org.

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Good morning, and welcome to a special Mainstreet Radio show live from the Northeastern Minnesota town of Ely. I'm Rachel Reabe. We're broadcasting today from one of the busiest corners in town. We're set up on the green outside the Chocolate Mousse Restaurant in Piragis Northwoods company. There is a steady stream of cars and vans, many of them topped or towing canoes passing by us on Sheridan Street, Ely's main drag.

This town sits on the edge of the Boundary Waters Canoe area, the most heavily used wilderness in the United States. And this is the busy season in canoe country, the last part of July in the first weeks of August. The black flies are gone and the frost hasn't arrived just yet. We'll talk about the Boundary Waters with representatives of the US Forest Service this morning and a couple of local canoe outfitters. But first, a look back.

20 years ago, Congress passed the Boundary Waters Act prohibiting logging, mining and most motor use inside a million acre wilderness in Northeast Minnesota. The act lit protests among local residents who saw their livelihoods threatened. Many in Ely still feel the law was shoved down their throats by an overzealous environmental movement. But the 1978 law was by no means the first fight over what to do with the Boundary Waters. Conservationists and developers have been at odds in this territory since the '20s. Mainstreet Radio's Leif Enger reports.

ZSOLT DEMARCOS: We planned to go up North as far as I think, Basswood Lake. Yeah, paddle up on the river, stay there, relax, and then come back.

LEIF ENGER: Zsolt DeMarcos says there's nothing like this back home in Hungary, a place with lakes so clean, you can lean down and drink. Zsolt is a four trip veteran, one of 200,000 canoeists who will paddle into the Boundary Waters this summer.

ZSOLT DEMARCOS: That's the place where people can really be out of time. You can hide yourself. There is no time here. And when we go back to the city, we just are surprised that the whole weekend is gone.

LEIF ENGER: A canoeist gliding through the BWCA might see moose, loons, bear or beaver. What he won't see is clear cuts, mining trucks, roads or resorts. All were here. All are gone. Tourists don't see the 60 years of environmental lobbying, the sometimes sneaky politics or the painful cost of preservation. Canoe outfitter Bill Ram, long retired, remembers a wilderness fast going to ruin.

BILL RAM: Resorts were popping up all over within the Boundary Waters. Back in the late '20s, they had proposed a road from the Fernberg to the Gunflint right across the middle of the Boundary Waters. And of course, there would have been side roads and everything else. It would have been ruined.

LEIF ENGER: In fact, in 1923, developers wanted a road to every lake in the wilderness, a plan routed by the Izaak Walton League and emerging conservationists Sigurd Olson and Aldo Leopold. It was the first idea in what would become a half century of incursions and retreats and ebb and flow of noise and silence. Hydroelectric dams were proposed and defeated. Logging and mining, two basics of the local economy, were restricted.

By the late '40s, says Bill Ram, even wilderness tourism was threatening the wilderness. A profusion of fly in resorts had made Ely the busiest inland floatplane base in the world. When environmentalists fought for a ban on flights into the Boundary Waters, many locals were fed up with wilderness advocates like, Sig Olson and Ram himself.

BILL RAM: Sig, after the air ban, he was hung in effigy at one time in Ely. They blocked our whole street.

LEIF ENGER: Logging trucks?

BILL RAM: Logging trucks. They blockaded our street. So our customers couldn't get in the store. They had signs. Run the bum rum out of town. I'm a local here, born and raised here.

MIKE HILLMAN: We don't use the word environmentalist here, because that kind of puts flags up for people.

LEIF ENGER: Mike Hillman's family has been in Ely four generations. His great grandparents were among the first miners to arrive in the late 19th century. He remembers the Boundary Waters of the '50s and early '60s as a quiet place after the air ban, a place used mostly by those who lived on its edges.

MIKE HILLMAN: You've got to realize that in 1967, Ely was still a mining community. There were so few regular visitors. 1968, Bill Ram went on a canoe trip. Argosy Magazine proclaimed him the canoe king, all over America, these magazines. You could come up on a canoe trip no rules, stay as long as you want. You could get complete outfitting for something like $7 or $8 a day. You could eat like a king. You could catch as many fish as you possibly wanted. They came by the thousands.

LEIF ENGER: Suddenly, Hillman says, you can hardly find a campsite in the Boundary Waters. By the mid '70s conservation groups were pushing for a new law, one to reduce motor access to the wilderness, prohibit mineral exploration and end logging altogether. Again, Ely residents bridled at the prospect of restrictions from Washington. There were more effigy burnings and this furious protest during a visit from pro wilderness politicians just before passage of the 1978 Boundary Waters Act.

Frank Salerno was Ely's mayor at the time. He says the Boundary Waters Act still frustrates him not simply because of its restrictions, but because local residents had no voice in its passage. He says they were simply steamrolled by an autocratic and well-funded environmental lobby.

FRANK SALERNO: They were beating us to death with dollar bills. I mean, to go to Hollywood, California, to people who are living in a fantasy world and tell them, you've got to help us save the wilderness in Northeastern Minnesota, then have the Robert Redford's and others write checks and have fundraisers and everything else because they don't know the first thing about Northeastern Minnesota or what's going on here. But they're well, it doesn't run dry.

PAUL SMITH: Seeing the nest there. There's egg shells in there now. So we may see the young around if they, in fact, survive.

LEIF ENGER: Retired US Forest Service Officer Paul Smith is out this afternoon checking a loon nest near his home on the edge of the BWCA. It was his job to help enforce the new regulations to confront those who had motored in illegally or paddled in without a permit. Though many locals hated the new law, Smith says they were consistently treated unfairly in media reports characterized as six pack bumpkins anxious to wreck the wilderness.

PAUL SMITH: Ely is only 100 years old. People did what they wanted. It was a hard life. They worked hard in the mines and logging. They drank hard. They lived hard. It was a hard life. And they were used to doing what they wanted to. A lot of them came from the old country where they were suppressed, and they'd had enough of that. I mean, we all rebel when we get to a certain point of, hey, I've had enough of your regulations or rules. There's a loon and the young one.

LEIF ENGER: Rebellion or not, the Boundary Waters Act brought change. The government bought out resorts within the wilderness. It ended logging, phased out snowmobiling, and reduced motor access. It through a curve at outfitters like Gary Jochnick, who supplied motorboats and snow machines for a living.

GARY JOCHNICK: It was like chopping your arms off when it happened. It just boom, you couldn't do that anymore. And you've been doing it for many years. And my father was doing it for all of his life. So you have to go out and find a new customer base.

LEIF ENGER: But Jochnick has found his new customer base and gradually much of Ely has done the same. The BWCA is now one of the most popular wilderness areas in the country. Northwest Airlines flies daily all summer between Ely and the Twin Cities, so you can get on a plane in Miami in the morning and be fighting the deer flies by sundown or shopping for mukluks or drinking cappuccino or buying up real estate. Some tourists forgo the Boundary Waters completely and just stay at the New Holiday Inn.

All this growth, some say, has taken the sting from the 1978 law that set aside the BWCA wilderness, though there are still regular flare ups about motor regulations, or how many canoeists should be allowed in one group. The bigger problem locally has become how to handle the new prosperity, how to grow wisely. Ely historian Mike Hillman says most people here have come to understand they can't go back, but it doesn't hurt to wish.

MIKE HILLMAN: For some people, they believe that there's going to be a Polka Ghost Dance profit that is coming here, and that if they close the curtains on the bar and if they religiously and fervently dance all night long, that come the morning will open up the curtains and everybody will be gone and it'll be 1957 again.

LEIF ENGER: Ely historian Mike Hillman. This is Leif Enger for Mainstreet Radio.

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RACHEL REABE: I'm Rachel Reabe and you're listening to a special Mainstreet Radio broadcast from Ely. My guests this morning are John Waters and Gary Jochnick, two of Ely's canoe outfitters. John runs Canadian Waters just up the hill from where we're sitting today. Gary Jochnick has wilderness outfitters a block down the street from us. We also have Barb Soderberg and Mark Van Evrie representing the US Forest Service. Good morning all of you and welcome.

JOHN WATERS: Good morning.

RACHEL REABE: Could we have picked a better day to do a live broadcast from Ely. Outside, it is 70 degrees, sunny and beautiful. Our phone lines are open for your questions and comments this morning. You can join our conversation by calling 1-800-537-5252. The number to join our discussion this morning again, 1-800-537-5252.

John and Gary, let's start out by talking about the wilderness experience. You two have been outfitting canoeists heading for the Boundary Waters for decades. Has the wilderness experience changed? John, let's start with you. Has it changed? And if so, how?

JOHN WATERS: I think it's changed in a number of ways, mostly just because of the change in regulations and things like that. As the lead in part of the program talked about there, at one time, there were virtually no restrictions on going into the Boundary Waters. You could camp anywhere you wanted to with this larger group, as you wished, stay as long as you like. Those kind of things have changed. There are quotas now, as we know, and there are limitations on where you can go, how many people can be in a campsite.

And the National sort of trend has changed, I think, in terms of vacations. Years ago, people took longer vacations and less frequent vacations. Today, folks are on a tighter frame sometimes. So vacations tend to be a little shorter, but they also tend to be more frequent. What this does, of course, is instead of a five or seven day canoe trip, a person might take a three or four day canoe trip.

RACHEL REABE: This is life in the '90s, where we speed everything up, and it happens in the wilderness as well.

JOHN WATERS: And fast forward. That's right.

RACHEL REABE: So you say, yes, it's changed. It's changed quite a bit. Gary, has it gotten better or worse, from your point of view?

GARY JOCHNICK: No, it's probably gotten better. You need to do some-- years ago, you could just drive up here and go into the woods. And now you have to do some long range planning to take some commitment ahead of time, a few months down the road and you pick a date.

And if you're going to use an outfitter, you call them. And we try to design a trip that meets your needs, your length of stay, and if you want to stay in the Boundary Waters or go into the Canadian side. And the equipment has gotten so much better. The canoes, the camping, the tents, sleeping bags, your food, everything is much lighter. You can travel faster, whether it's fishing or photography or whatever you want to do.

RACHEL REABE: We're going to our phone calls. We have somebody from Bloomington on the phone with us now. Go ahead with your question, please. Yes, go ahead. Our phone number this morning, 1-800-537-5252. Be patient with us. If you would like to call us and tell us about your experience in the Boundary Waters, we would love to hear that.

Barb and Mark, if we had not put the restrictions in '78, and actually we talked about all sorts of restrictions this morning in Lacey's piece, what would the Boundary Waters look like if there were no regulations, if there had been no regulations put in?

MARK VAN EVRIE: Well, as we all know, the Boundary Waters is a very special place, both to the folks here in the local area as well as nationally. And even as we learned in our piece, there are people who come from other countries as well. And our challenge is to manage that resource so that it will be there for people to enjoy not only today, but 10 years from now, or when our children are grown and have their own children.

And so one of the challenges we have it is such a popular place and a special place. We need to manage those resources in a way that protects them for future generations and for all of us to enjoy for a long time to come. And as the popularity and the numbers have increased, the impacts to those resources have also increased. And so the regulations allow us to continue to have people enjoy the wilderness and be able to use it while at the same time protecting those resources.

RACHEL REABE: We have Chris from Minneapolis on the phone. Chris, Good morning.

CHRIS: Good morning. I just wanted to make a quick comment. I was in the Boundary Waters 20 years ago when I was 16 on an Outward Bound trip. And if I never go back up there again, I will gladly pay taxes to keep it protected at all costs. I think it's extremely important. That's it.

RACHEL REABE: Chris, what was the best thing about that trip? What are your best memories about it?

CHRIS: I guess just the quiet, watching the northern lights, hearing loons and not seeing anybody except for our group, and just the wildness. It was beautiful.

RACHEL REABE: But you've not been back in 20 years?

CHRIS: No, I dream about it quite a bit. Actually, I was planning a trip for this fall, just a short trip. Hopefully, it'll work out. It's a beautiful area.

RACHEL REABE: Thanks so much for your call this morning. We go now to Inver Grove Heights, where James is holding on the line. Good morning, James.

JAMES: Good morning. Hello. I'd just like to say, it's nice to hear Ram's Rom's voice. And I outfitted with Bill Ram back in July '66. It was 32 years ago yesterday that we left from Moose Lake and we took the guided price on a circle trip. We had a wonderful time. I had a wonderful experience in the Boundary Waters. I've been back different times since. So that's how-- I'd just like to comment. I love the Boundary Waters and the quietness of it.

RACHEL REABE: James, let me ask you this question. You first came in 1966. Have you seen-- in these 30 some years, have you seen it change quite a bit? Are you-- have you been seeing more people when you're out in the Boundary Waters or less, or any change at all that you could share with us?

JAMES: Well, I think I've seen more people in recent years. My last trip was in 1990 from Seagull Lake, filled in campground area. But after 1972-- after 1971, we began taking trips in September. So that gives the family people more time and more room in the summertime, children. I didn't have any children, so my brother and I went alone together. And then after a while, I went alone. He quit going. So I went in September after the schools were back in session then. It was not so crowded anymore.

RACHEL REABE: And do you plan to come up again?

JAMES: I would like to. Yeah. I haven't been up in the Boundary Waters canoeing since 1990. I have a little health problem now.

RACHEL REABE: Thank you for your call this morning, James.

JAMES: Thank you.

RACHEL REABE: Our phone number this morning, 1-800-537-5252. You can join our show simply by calling us at 1-800-537-5252.

Mark, before we went to the calls, we were talking about wearing out the wilderness. And people need to remember this isn't Disneyland. We can't close it down and refurbish Tomorrowland and then open it back up, and it's as good as new, even better than new. This is something that's finite and wears out.

Do you have a system where you move campsites or try to move people around so you spread it out? Like James was talking. He goes in September now. Do you try to encourage people to come in on the shoulder seasons and have you been successful at that?

MARK VAN EVRIE: Sure. I think I'll let Barb address that question. She deals directly with that issue.

BARB SODERBERG: Yeah. The quota really hasn't reduced use overall in the last 10, 15 or even 20 years. But what it's done is it's spread use out over time. As one of the callers mentioned, they now come in September and people who are looking to have more of a solitary kind of experience tend to come more in the shoulder seasons. I think probably either Gary or John can tell you that people are coming more midweek.

Before, people used to try to come on weekends because that's when their vacation started. So we're spreading use out over time. We're also spreading use out geographically. Some of the entry points that weren't as well used before, now when some of the most popular entry points get full, particularly at certain times of the year, people will choose alternate routes. So it's certainly done that. The quota system has been successful that way.

RACHEL REABE: So when you help people realize there is life beyond lake one, maybe you can get them to go back there?

BARB SODERBERG: Right.

RACHEL REABE: Is all this working or is there still a real usage problem? Are campsites still wearing out and are there still too many people that we're encountering when we're in the Boundary Waters?

BARB SODERBERG: Well, I think you'll get real mixed messages on that. It depends. When people go time of year, it depends on where they go. And our quota is based on average use for all the people that go in on that entry point. But for instance, and let me just use Lake 1 as an example, where people might normally go on to Insula or maybe get off some of the main travel routes or whatever, the quota is set so that people tend to travel on and do things in the average.

But just as an example, if there is a radio program or a newspaper article saying the biggest walleye in the state was caught in Lake 3 last week, then people aren't going to travel on that average pattern. They're all going to want to go to Lake 3. So if somebody went into Lake 3 at that particular point in time, they're not going to find a campsite, or if the wind comes up so that people don't travel or if in that week you happen to get people who, none of them travel through, you still will run into crowding at certain times.

But I think there are also places in the BWCA that you can go at certain times and say, where is everybody? There's all kinds of sites available. So on the average, hopefully people are getting the experience that we're managing for, but there certainly on both ends of the spectrum.

MARK VAN EVRIE: And we constantly are monitoring or attempting to monitor that use. And as that monitoring shows the need, we may make adjustments in the number of permits we issue for a particular entry point or at a particular time of the year.

One of the things that we found, and Barb kind of alluded to, it is that people have certain favorite spots that they like to go to. And once you get into the wilderness, you have the option of traveling basically anywhere in the wilderness you'd like to go. And sometimes, we're finding that people aren't able to get their preferred entry point, but they're able to get an entry point nearby, and they may still travel over to that favorite lake.

RACHEL REABE: Still find that favorite campsite.

MARK VAN EVRIE: And what we find is people coming from several different entry points all converging on the same lake at the same time. And that does create a very localized problem with available campsites.

BARB SODERBERG: I'd like to add, too, especially since we've got a number of listeners here, that there's a lot people can do to help alleviate problems of crowding. And the big one is to start looking for a campsite early in the afternoon, because if you wait till 6:00 or 7:00 o'clock at night and all the campsites on a particular lake are full, you're a lot less willing to move on to the next lake.

The other one is, we tend to think in our everyday lives that we want to get from here to there, and we want to take the shortest route from one spot to another. And generally, if you take one portage off the main travel route, you'll find a lot less use as well.

RACHEL REABE: This is a busy corner in Ely. If you hear this traffic, it's because we are at one of three stoplights in town. We are right on the corner of Sheridan and Central and a lot of cars, a lot of vans, and lots of trucks going by this morning. We're going to Rick, who is patiently waiting on his car phone. And I hope you haven't driven out of range. Rick, good morning.

RICK: Hello. Hi.

RACHEL REABE: Good morning.

RICK: Yeah. I've been going up to the Boundary Waters for probably the last-- every year and sometimes more than once a year for the last 15, 20 years. And I've been up there in mosquito weather. And a couple of years ago, I did an eight-day winter camping trip.

And I didn't catch the first part of the show, but I guess you're talking about Boundary Water use. And I've seen quite an increase in people in the summertime and even in the winter time, just more people seem to be using it a lot. And I think it's great. I also know that the Forest Service is now you're required to watch a film about bears. And I find it personally kind of annoying, but I think it's a really good idea, especially there's a lot of new people going up there for the first time.

So I love it. I think it's really great. And i think, so far, things have worked out really well between, I think, the outfitters and the fishermen and the people that want to go up there on boats and those that want to go up and actually have a non-motorized experience. So I think it's been really-- the compromise has been good.

RACHEL REABE: Thank you, Rick. Our next caller is calling from Minneapolis. We have Carol on the line. Good morning, Carol.

CAROL: Good morning. I just wanted to call to speak about the treasure that the Boundary Waters is. I was born and grew up in Missouri and married a fellow from Minnesota, who had worked his way through school by being a canoe guide. I'd never seen a canoe until we started going into the Boundary Waters.

And over the years, I have grown to love it so much. We go at least once a year sometimes for just short trips. We were up just a couple of weeks ago for a day trip. And in that day, we only saw two other people. And we were just one lake from the main road.

I would also like to say that one of my special memories of the Boundary Waters, and this has just happened to me one time, we were staying and I heard the wolves howl. And I will never, ever in my whole life forget that experience. It was just wonderful.

Listening to the silence up there is a special thing that I wish everyone in the world could experience. And I feel so badly that there are politicians that would want to harm the area. I just-- especially politicians from Minnesota, who don't seem to be able to understand what a wonderful treasure we have in our state.

RACHEL REABE: Thank you for your call this morning. Gary, what percentage of your business approximately was motorized prior to 1978? Any idea? I know some of the outfitters have said and you said even on our produced piece that it's like cutting off your arm. They took out a huge chunk of business and you had to replace it somehow. Give us an idea of how many people were coming up here to go on motorized trips.

GARY JOCHNICK: It's probably 50%. A lot of people that lived here used-- it was a way of life. I mean, it was a recreational area for many years. If you worked in the area, you only had one or two days off and you wanted to get to your favorite fishing hole on Crooked Lake or Insula, you took your motor and it was your choice whether you wanted to paddle or use a motor. And that's the way many people cater to. And we cater to a lot of fishermen. We still do.

RACHEL REABE: So a lot of the motorized use were motors on square and canoes.

GARY JOCHNICK: Correct.

RACHEL REABE: So people who are thinking now, like ski boats, 17 foot Larsson, we're not talking about that. We're talking about a small motor on a canoe.

GARY JOCHNICK: Yes. Up to six horse, eight horse, maybe a 10 horse.

RACHEL REABE: What happened to those people? Were they converted over to the non-motorized?

GARY JOCHNICK: Some quit coming and some changed with the times. Just like myself, we had a change. And it's been very hard. There's still a lot of bitterness in this community, and there still are in lakes in the Boundary Waters today where you can still use a motor boat.

There's maybe, what, 10 lakes that are still motorized, where if you enjoy that type of use-- and to those people, they get just as much thrill as going on that canoe trip as somebody else. That's their wilderness experience, taking the boat and going with their motor or doing what the canoeists are doing.

RACHEL REABE: John, what percentage of your business would have been motorized prior to '78?

JOHN WATERS: Ours was a lot less. I was just sort of surprised to hear Gary mentioned the 50% level. I would say probably no more than maybe 15% of our business was motorized use. But Gary and his firm did specialize or do a lot more into as far as fishing trips into Basswood Lake than we did.

RACHEL REABE: Do you still have people that come and say, I want to go into the Boundary Waters, have this wilderness experience, and how big a motor can I get, or most people really, they know what the regulations and the rules are now?

JOHN WATERS: I think most people know what the regulations are. We really don't have a lot of people today who are surprised to find they cannot take a motor into the Boundary Waters or that they're very limited. And this has come from education, from the Forest Service, from the outfitting industry, who promotes canoe trips, our chamber of commerce, things like that. The information is pretty well publicly known now.

RACHEL REABE: Nada from Minneapolis is on the phone. Good morning.

NADA: Hello.

RACHEL REABE: Good morning.

NADA: Good morning. I just wanted to share that I have really enjoyed my experiences in the Boundary Waters. My husband and I have gone up there almost once a year since 1987. And actually, I should say that there have been a couple of times where we didn't have a good experience. But I think that people that have gone up there several times have-- can vouch for that also.

RACHEL REABE: What sort of bad experiences? Brought on by other people or just rain or bugs or both?

NADA: Both. Actually, bugs, you just have to tolerate. But I mean, that's always an experience in the summertime. The first time we went up, it was weather and people. The wind was very strong for about three days when we were up on the Canadian border in Lac La Croix. And we had to-- we took like two, three days to get back down against the wind. And we had to do some bushwhacking and pulling the canoe on the shoreline to get back out. And it was kind of scary. But being that was my first time--

RACHEL REABE: But it didn't keep you from coming? It didn't keep you from coming back?

NADA: No. And there were also some people up there that were shooting off a gun and being really creepy coming up to our campsite and acting very strangely. So we left campsite in the middle of the night. But mostly, I should say, we've had a good time. And yes, we go back. We haven't gone now for a couple of years because we have a new child, and I'm not ready to take her out into the wilderness yet.

RACHEL REABE: Thank you for your call this morning. We go now to Becker, where Alice is standing by on the phone. Good morning, Alice.

ALICE: Good morning. Thank you for discussing this because the Boundary Waters is a special place in our family's life. We used to go camping in maybe the '60s and '70s and we would-- out of Sawbill Lake. And there was canoeing in one of the cul-de-sacs. Well, one of the bad experiences that we remember is the oil slick on this cul-de-sac going into a Portage.

And so I really-- the awesome quietness and spiritual power that we as a family got in our wilderness camping. I appreciate all of the people that have worked so hard to keep this pristine and clean so that our future generations and our grandchildren and great grandchildren can experience this same spiritual power that we as a family felt in the '60s.

RACHEL REABE: Thank you so much for your call this morning. We have Michael from Coon Rapids on the line. Good morning, Michael.

MICHAEL: Yes, good morning. Thanks for taking my call. I'd like to pose a question to those of your guests who are actual residents of Ely there. On the one hand, I'm sure, especially those of you who make a living related to the Boundary Waters and to the tourism, are very appreciative or thankful of those outsiders who appreciate the Boundary Waters area as a recreational area.

At the same time, I imagine trying to put myself in your shoes that there would be some leftover resentment, especially regarding the amount of control that outsiders, politicians or, those who live outside of your area who seem to be able to exert a tremendous amount of control over that area. And I'd just like to hear any comment you may have on that.

GARY JOCHNICK: Well, I think growing up in Ely, what I would like to see in future management planning is that the people that live in the area also have some local input into the management phases. That's just like me saying something about South Dakota or Montana. I have never been there. I don't know what's going on out there. I don't know the type of use and I would just like to see future planning in the future done here like that.

RACHEL REABE: With weighted input is what you're essentially saying, Gary.

GARY JOCHNICK: Basically, yes.

RACHEL REABE: John, how do you feel?

JOHN WATERS: I guess, I have a little different opinion about that. I was one of the-- my brother and I were one of the few people in Ely who voiced a strong support for the 1978 legislation. We paid a fairly heavy price for that back in those days, but things have changed since then. The town is a lot different than it was in 1978.

Yeah, I can understand the desire for people to have some influence on a local level, but we have to realize this is a national resource. It's part of the Superior National Forest. It's not a state forest, it's not a County forest or a regional forest. It's a National Forest. And the Boundary Waters is a national resource.

RACHEL REABE: You're listening to a special Mainstreet radio broadcast from Ely. MPR's Mainstreet radio coverage of rural issues is supported by the Blandin foundation, committed to strengthening communities through grant making, leadership training and convening.

Let's take a look at weather across the state. Mostly sunny skies across Minnesota today. Chance of thunderstorms and storms in the southwestern portions of the state. High temperatures 75 to 82 degrees across Minnesota. Tonight, clear to partly cloudy skies. Temperatures in the 50s and 60s. And for Saturday, statewide, we can expect mostly sunny skies, warmer temperatures and humid high tomorrow, the 80s and the 90s.

The Boundary Waters Canoe area stretching along the Northeastern border of Minnesota has been a creative inspiration for artists, photographers and writers. One of the best known is the late Sigurd Olson, who lived and worked here in Ely. Let's listen to an excerpt from his book, Wilderness Days. The chapter is entitled The Way of a Canoe.

SIGURD OLSON: The movement of a canoe is like a reed in the wind. Silence is part of it. And the sounds of lapping water, bird songs and wind in the trees is part of the medium through which it floats, the sky, the water, the shores.

In a canoe, a man changes and the life he has lived seems strangely remote. Time is no longer a moment or has become part of space and freedom. What matters is that he's heading down the misty trail of explorers and voyagers with a fair wind and a chance of a good camp somewhere ahead. The future is other lakes, countless rapids in the sound of them portages through muskeg and over the ledges.

When he's traveled for many days and is far from settlements of his kind, when he looks over his cruising outfit and knows it's all he owns, that he can travel with it to a new country as he wills, he feels at last that he is down to the real business of living. And he shed much of what was unimportant and is in an old polished groove of experience.

Life, for some strange reason, has suddenly become simple and complete. His wants are few. His confusion and uncertainty gone. His happiness and contentment deep. There is a satisfaction in reaching some point on the map in spite of wind and weather and keeping a rendezvous with some campsite that in the morning seemed impossible of achievement.

In a canoe, the battle is yours and yours alone. It's your muscle and sinew, your wit and courage against the primitive forces of the storm. That is why when after a day of battle, your tent is pitched at last in the lee of some sheltering cliff, the canoe up and dry and supper underway, there is an exultation that only canoe men know.

RACHEL REABE: We've been listening to an excerpt from Wilderness Days, a book written by the late Sigurd Olson. I'm Rachel Reabe. We're continuing this conversation on the Boundary Waters area during this live Main Street broadcast from the corner of Sheridan Street and Central Avenue in downtown Ely.

My guests are Mark Van Evrie and Barb Soderberg from the US Forest Service and Ely canoe outfitters, Gary Jochnick and John Waters. Our phone lines are open for your calls, 1-800-537-5252. And let's go back to the phone lines. Glyndon from Saint Cloud is on the line. Good morning.

GLYNDON: Hello. Yes.

RACHEL REABE: Yes.

GLYNDON: I was struck by the early comment about Sigurd Olson and the fact that he was once hung in effigy there. And then the excerpt that you just read. And this kind of relates to what the previous caller was talking about that is that, what is it that people there would like in terms of controls or regulations put on or wouldn't they want any. There's a great deal of ambivalence, it seems to me, in this issue.

Many of your people on the program have talked about the commercial aspects of the place and restrictions on motors and all of that kind of thing. And it seems to me, you can't have it both ways. If you're going to preserve the quality of the place that attracts people and makes people want to go there, there certainly needs to be some kind of control. And it seems to me government is the only agency that can do that.

RACHEL REABE: Comments about that.

MARK VAN EVRIE: Well, that's really a challenge that we have, is trying to balance. Our responsibility is to manage the Boundary Waters according to the laws that Congress has passed. And we attempt to balance out a variety of experiences that people seek.

As Gary and John have both mentioned, there's people that seek a canoe type experience and we provide that in the Boundary Waters. But the law also provides for motorized uses and states how those uses can occur. And we manage that as well. And it's kind of the crux of the debate over the wilderness is that there's lots of different people who seek different kinds of experiences. And our challenge for the Forest Service is to try to balance out those various interests within the limits of the law.

RACHEL REABE: We're going down to Lakeville now where Tim is waiting on the line. Good morning, Tim.

TIM: Hello.

RACHEL REABE: Yes, good morning.

TIM: Thanks for taking my call. See, since we have the Forest Service and the Ely outfitters there, I was wondering if you guys could let us know about the truck portages that are open now, I hear. And if you could give us any insight on how those trucks are going to be run or who's going to run them or how the laws are shaping that situation for us.

RACHEL REABE: There is always at least one hot issue going on in the Boundary Waters at any one time. And this would be it, wouldn't it, Mark?

MARK VAN EVRIE: Yeah, it sure would. Just for a little bit of background for folks, there was recently some legislation passed as a part of the transportation bill that did provide for the opportunity for motorized vehicles to be used to haul boats across two of the portages. And those portages are Prairie Portage and Trout Portage. And in the legislation, it does not specifically state that motor or motorized vehicles have to be used, but it does allow for them to be considered.

RACHEL REABE: So that's the language of the law. It allows for them to be considered.

MARK VAN EVRIE: Yes. Specifically, the legislation says nothing in this act shall be construed to prevent the operation of motorized vehicles to transport boats across the portages. And so our next step-- this goes into effect January 1st of 1999. So it's not currently in effect at this point. We plan this fall to work with a variety of folks to get their input and developing some evaluation criteria, which will be used to select someone to operate those Portage services.

And because the law is not specific, we will consider both motorized and non-motorized operations in the evaluation. There will also be several other criteria that we will be developing, hopefully with input from folks from the local area as well as other places. But certainly, we'll be looking at the service that will be provided to the public, the cost for the public, and also impacts to the resources within the wilderness.

RACHEL REABE: Mark, I think the question is, if there were viable ways to move boats across the portages without a non-motorized sense, why hasn't that already been done? Why the need for the legislation? I saw Congressman Jim Oberstar quoted in the local paper saying no. When they said provide, that means mechanized. Yes, mechanical portages will be coming back and I'll be talking to the US Forest Service. Why now this discussion of maybe trucks, maybe not trucks?

MARK VAN EVRIE: Sure. The first part of your question, why not do it by non-motorized means? The two portages have had non-motorized portage services on them. Currently, there is one on Prairie Portage. That's a non-motorized service that carries boats across the Portage. And in the past at Trout Lake Portage, there has been. So we know that it's possible. There are some limitations to that and some challenges with that, of course, but it does occur.

Basically, the reason that we are looking at both is because we don't feel that the legislation requires us to look at only motorized. And in fact, there are people who feel that we need to look at both from both sides. So we, again, find ourselves caught in the middle between these differing interests and desires for what should be available within the Boundary Waters.

RACHEL REABE: We have a fishing boat that's parked across the street from us here on central avenue, and a large sign that says trucks will, underline will, be back on Trout and Prairie. And that seems to be the consensus, at least in this town. Gary, would you agree with that?

GARY JOCHNICK: Yes, I would. Can you hear me? Yes, I would. Well, that's a sign and a boat being raffled off by CWCS, which is an organization that fought very hard to try to get those trucks back on the portage, which was taken away in 1992 by the courts.

RACHEL REABE: Did you think that this compromise legislation that was passed a couple of months ago was ambivalent, or to you, was it perfectly clear?

GARY JOCHNICK: I think it was perfectly clear that the trucks would be returned to those two portages.

RACHEL REABE: John?

JOHN WATERS: I think quite obviously, the local hope was that it returned. I'm not a lawyer, but just having read the excerpt from the legislation, it is not clear cut that they will be or will not be. I think as Mark has said, it's something the Forest Service is going to look at and try to make a determination. I'm glad it's their determination, their call, not mine.

RACHEL REABE: My colleague Leif Enger is here with us today on the Green outside the Chocolate Moose in Piragis Northwoods Company. Leif?

LEIF ENGER: Hello. I'm here with Nancy McCready, who is a lifelong resident of Ely. She's also the secretary for a group called Conservationists with Common Sense. And Nancy, this whole BWCA issue since the '60s is a very emotional one for you.

NANCY MCCREADY: Yes, it is, because for a long time, Ely was a very peaceful town where people came to and enjoyed the area without any kind of battling over whose area it was. We just all enjoyed it together.

LEIF ENGER: You're an advocate of multiple use in the Boundary Waters.

NANCY MCCREADY: Yes, I am. I've been involved with getting the trucks returned to the portages.

LEIF ENGER: Let me ask what the Boundary Waters would look like if you wrote the laws.

NANCY MCCREADY: If I wrote the laws? I tell you, it would be-- I would return the trucks to all three of the portages so that there were five portages in the Boundary Waters that allowed access for all people in this country. In a way, these portages have provided handicapped access without even really realizing it. And they were taken away after a court decision on the definition of the word feasible.

LEIF ENGER: I've talked with a couple of gentlemen here today who are local residents, older gentlemen, who say they're no longer able to get in. They feel locked out of the BWCA.

NANCY MCCREADY: In a way, that's true, because some people just don't-- even buy for the permits because it's too hard for them to push their boats and their motors and their gear across these portages.

LEIF ENGER: And you don't feel that something in the wilderness would be lost, something of the wilderness would be lost if it were the way that you would like to see it.

NANCY MCCREADY: It would be lost with the return of the trucks in the portages?

LEIF ENGER: Some of the wildness.

NANCY MCCREADY: No. I mean, there's motors on both sides of those portages. Why would anything be changed just because of the way a person is accessing that wilderness? These are 18 or so dozen lakes that are motorized on the periphery of the Boundary Waters with 1,100 lakes that are paddle only.

LEIF ENGER: Rachel?

RACHEL REABE: Let's continue our conversation. Let's move from the mechanized portages to users fee, because that's something that is brand new this year. For the first time, if you want to go into the Boundary Waters Canoe area, it's going to cost you. And not cost you just for the reservation, which is what we've gotten used to the last number of years, we have to pay now.

MARK VAN EVRIE: Yes, that's a new program this year. It's something that we thought long and hard about. As we talked at the beginning of the program, we have a lot of use in the Boundary Waters. We've, in recent years, went to designated campsites out in the wilderness, and we have over 2,000 that we maintain and take care of.

We also have over 160 miles of portages that we take care of. And of course, those are the places where we see the most impact from all those people. The impact is not particularly on the water, but when they're actually on the ground using those portages or the campsites.

And one of the challenges is to be able to manage that heavy use in a way that protects those resources. And we felt that we did not have the personnel or the funds we needed to do a good job and to be able to protect those resources. And our choices were to seek some other source of funding to do that work or to look at limiting use.

RACHEL REABE: So it costs how much?

MARK VAN EVRIE: Well, we, this year, have a budget of about $1.7 million. And then with the user fees, we'll be on top of that, depending on how much money actually comes in from those user fees.

RACHEL REABE: What's it going to cost me to go into the Boundary Waters? What is the user's fee?

MARK VAN EVRIE: The user fee is $10 per person per trip. So if you went for a weekend or for two weeks, it would cost you $10. There's also a reduced fee for children 18-- or under 18 and for senior citizens that qualify for a Golden age passport.

RACHEL REABE: What are you expecting to take in this year?

MARK VAN EVRIE: We projected approximately $1.2 or $1.3 million. And at last count, we'd collected approximately $800,000.

RACHEL REABE: Is there some concern, Gary and John, about how that money is going to be used? I'm sure if you two could split it up and figure out how it's going to be used, you'd have some ideas. What needs to be done there with this one point something million dollars that might come in through users fees?

JOHN WATERS: Well, I think the legislation mandates that at least 80% of the funds be spent on maintaining the resource. This money cannot go to Washington to buy more desks or something like that. Then I think that's good. My firm, I believe probably Gary does too, I think most of the outfitters support a user fee. It's one way of assuring the fact that there is some money available to maintain the resource.

Left to my own devices, I would send as many people out in the woods, as I possibly could with very little regard to what might happen out there because I'm in a competitive business. The user fee, the quotas and permits, these are things that are mandated and they are administered equally to all of us. None of us have an advantage over the other person.

RACHEL REABE: Gary, is it going to stop anybody from going at the $10 per person per trip level? Will that deter people?

GARY JOCHNICK: I don't think it has.

RACHEL REABE: Were you hoping that it would deter people?

GARY JOCHNICK: Most of our customers, they're happy to pay it. Once you explain the reason for it, they haven't complained.

BARB SODERBERG: We've had very few negative comments on the user fee. But lots of positive comments, people agreeing with it.

RACHEL REABE: That they would like to see the money go to maintain the resource.

BARB SODERBERG: Right. And just the fact that there is a user fee, I think, with the feeling that people may appreciate something more if there is a value placed on it.

RACHEL REABE: Let's go to our phone calls. We have Kelly from Osio on the line with us. Kelly, good morning.

KELLY: Good morning to all five of you. I have two questions today. First one mainly goes out to the Outfitters. And the second question is for everyone. First question is, what percent of your business is from elsewhere in the US, meaning outside of Minnesota, and how much of it is international business? The second question--

RACHEL REABE: Good question, Kelly. Let's take that question first, Kelly. And I know the Forest Service keeps very good track on those things. In fact, you kind of came up for me a profile of the BWCA user, what he looked like, how old he was. But let's talk in terms of national, international, what have you got? Just give us some estimates.

BARB SODERBERG: Well, actually, over half the use is coming from people in Minnesota. And then going beyond that from the rest of the US, it's still predominantly the midwest, but there are people coming from every state in the US. And we know that international use is increasing somewhat, but it's still a relatively small percent of the use.

RACHEL REABE: Your next question, sir.

KELLY: OK, wonderful response. My second question is, can the Ely area and the BWCA handle larger crowds? Is it overcrowded now? And if so, what, if anything, should be done?

RACHEL REABE: What do you think in terms of the 200,000 people that come? And actually, the usage in the Boundary Waters, when you look at the long-term charts, it has not changed tremendously. It's not like something that's doubled since last year. It's doubling again next year. It's remained not precisely the same, but very much the same.

BARB SODERBERG: Really, the BWCA can handle more use. We hope that we're protecting the area by implementing the quota system, and we think that's happening. So as long as we stay under the quotas, we should be protecting all those values that people are seeking. And actually, if you look at the use compared to the quota availability, right now we're only using 65% to maybe 70% of the quotas.

So there is room for more growth, but there very likely is not room for growth on the last week in July, the first couple of weeks in August, probably not on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, probably not on some of those key weekends, probably not on overnight motor use to Basswood Lake. Those quotas are all full, but there is room for growth on other days of the week, other seasons of the year, and at some of the less popular entry points.

RACHEL REABE: We are out of time this morning. Callers, for those of you that have waited so patiently on the line, I'm sorry we were not able to take your calls this morning. We are halfway through this Mainstreet broadcast from Ely. Gary Jochnick, John Waters, Barb Soderberg and Mark Van Evrie, thank you for being with us.

Next hour, we'll turn our attention to the town of Ely. When the legislation passed 20 years ago restricting motorized access to the Boundary Waters, some people predicted the biggest victim would be the town of Ely. It hasn't happened. Instead of drying up, Ely is enjoying a remarkable Renaissance. Why does change make some communities, but break others? It's all ahead, as we continue our Mainstreet special after the news.

SPEAKER: Listen for the lighter side of auto repair from Click and Clack, The Tappet Brothers on Car Talk Saturday and Sunday morning at 11:00 on Minnesota Public Radio.

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