The White Mountain National Forest is seeking public comments on its proposal to increase the cost of daily and annual recreation passes, and eliminating weekly and household ones.
The goal is to realign fees to be more consistent with other sites offering the same services and facilities and enable more revenue to be used at recreation sites. Part of the plan calls for eliminating fees at nine trailheads.
The Forest Service is proposing to increase the cost of a daily recreation pass from $3 to $5 and an annual pass from $20 to $30.
Over 90 percent of the forest passes sold are daily passes. Realigning the White Mountain Pass lowers overhead and operating expenses, freeing up more funds to support recreation facilities.
Comments are accepted until Sept. 30.
All new fee proposals will be presented before the Eastern Region Recreation Resource Advisory Committee, which represents a broad array of recreation interest groups. The committee will review the proposals next year. If approved, fee increases will be implemented in the spring of 2017.