To date, I have only had dealings with the Waushara County Parks Department Superintendant and my local DNR land manager as well as a little bit of email to/from the DNR land manager for Waupaca County.
Other than getting permission for cache placements, I have not had much need to interact with these departments though, I would not have any issues with doing so if my appointment to the BOD required so.

Many will remember the angst that we went through with the institution of a permit process at Milwaukee County Parks. During that time, I spent a large amount of time communicating with park personnel, hoping to get some changes to their process and keeping them informed of all the new caches being placed while the policy was being formalized. They did make some (but not all) of the requested changes, and I think we ended up with a reasonable permit policy that we can live with. Latest reports are that the permits are processed and returned fairly quickly, and I am only aware of one case where a permit was rejected (due to the cache being placed in a sensitive area).

I’m also in fairly regularly contact with the head naturalist at the DNR to manage earthcache placements in SNAs under the new policy. I will say that I have found Mr. Meyer to be a quite reasonable person, who seems to be open to further use of these areas in the future.

As I said in an earlier post, I also make it a point of stopping by park headquarters when I visit state parks. This is actually something we all can do. Most of these guys like to meet the folks visiting their parks and when we let them know that a lot of geocachers are visiting, they are much more likely to keep their parks “geocacher friendly”.

I’ve had some smaller contacts with Waukesha County Parks and Town of Brookfield parks, with Renee taking the lead on these situations. These contacts were related to those departments considering implementing a geocaching policy for their parks.

Finally, I have had the opportunity as a reviewer of dealing with park personnel who find caches placed without permission in areas where they are not wanted. Surprisingly, these people are usually still reasonable, looking to have a cache moved, rather than trying to ban them altogether.

Another question where I will have to answer quite simply none. Not from lack of interest, just lack of need. Happily things have been just a bit simpler here in the central part of the state. Of course if duties as a board member required contacts with land managers it really wouldn’t be an issue.

Looking at this from the geocacher perspective, I have tried very hard to be the “go between” with the Parks & Recreation Depts across the state and geocachers. So please, do not hold it against me that “I am one of them” because really I am also “one of you”. I want to be able to have fun geocaching in the parks too! This perspective has put me in interesting positions with various Parks staff at time. I know in a few cases, geocachers have felt they hit a “brick wall” asking a Parks person for permission .. when all I took me was a “hello” phone call to get permission and establish the connection.

As things started brewing with Milwaukee County Parks, I did contact Sue Black offering my assistance. A phone call, a few emails, and we had a copy of their pending policy that I shared with DeeJay. I really think we turned a potential problem into a workable solution there.

Yes, I am currently keeping in contact with Waukesha County Parks and Waukesha City Parks, both of which have a very “geocache” friendly policy. I am very happy to hear that geocachers are contacting them when placing caches (and no, I have not used the “insider” information to get an FTF either).

I have had nothing put positive contact with the State DNR when I have “placed” our EarthCaches.

In Spring 2007, I presented a geocaching 101 basics workshop for the members of the Wisconsin Park & Recreation Associations (WPRA) Parks Section Board members. This was a direct result of the Town of Brookfield’s “discovery” of geocaching.

In Fall 2007, I presented a session at the WPRA conference.
(Jeremy commented that the planning for a WGA event in a state park went very smoothly because a member of the parks staff had attended my session.)

From my previous post, I did a pre-conference WPRA workshop this past Fall.

This March, I will be presenting a geocaching session at the Tri-State (WI,IL,IA) Tourism Council.

I really feel that I can bring a different perspective to the WGA BOD and can hopefully continue being the “linky” between the various Parks Depts and geocachers.

Question: What experience do you have dealing with governments agencies and land managers?

Anwswer: I have talked to folks from the state parks, local nature center and the MN DNR. These contacts are always easier than I expected, and it is not that big of a deal, at least in the Eau Claire area.

I also worked on the generic notification form that is available on the WGA wiki, which is a useful tool to use in notifying land managers of when and where you place caches. I do feel that the responsible cacher will seek permission for cache placement, and the tool we wrote makes that possible in an easy way.

I do feel that the WGA needs to take the position that any move to make notification a time-consuming hassle or a fee for service by misguided land managers needs to be actively opposed by the WGA. I salute the fine folks up in Green Bay who put the kibosh to Brown County’s fee structure that the county had proposed. I remain opposed to the Dane County fee system. I feel that if the park is not charging for playing frisbee in the park, they should not be charging for geocaching either.

I also feel that the simple notification form available on our wiki should be adequate, and excessive red tape that is sometimes proposed by some land managers is more to protect their jobs than to protect the public lands.

In short, I have experience working with land managers in a cooperative manner and feel that most often this is the best course. However, I also believe that there are times to actively oppose choices that are made by misquided land managers and am prepared to do that as well.

zuma