Questions for Candidates- Disabled caches

[Ray]

The list of disabled caches in wisconsin is now hovering at about 200. Some of these have been disabled for several months. What are your thoughts of cleaning this list up?

[K0rpl]

I beleive that several months is a long enough time. If the Cache owner does not fix the problem, and get it back up and running, It should be archived so that someone else can use the area. I know, there were several in the Green bay area that sat disabled for in excess of four months before they were finally archived, and some of them were at really nice parks. I am in the process of trying to adopt two caches in the Green bay area from a team that moved out of state, and it is like pulling teeth.

My .02

Justin

[Team Deejay]

Well, this really has nothing to do with my candidacy, but I make it a practice to send one of the approvers a GPX every two months of all inactive caches which have been disabled for more than 3 months with no approver or owner activity during that time. (I also filter out the caches which are closed seasonally where the owner has clearly stated when he will reinstate the cache.) This allows the approvers to take action without having to do the legwork of chasing down which caches are highest priority to shutdown.

The first time I did this, there were over 100 caches meeting the criteria. The last list (ran on January 1) was only 35 caches. I think the approvers are doing a good job making progress on this. (So if you got a nastygram from the approvers, you can blame me for bringing your disabled cache to their attention.) A lot of the currently disabled caches are down for winter and hopefully will be back up in the spring. If not, well, they make my list and get flagged to the approvers.

The long disabled caches tend to fall into 3 categories:
1. Owner doesn’t understand that it is his job to archive the cache.
2. Owner isn’t maintaining the cache at all, usually completely out of geocaching, cache might have been disabled by approvers.
3. Owner is somehow too busy to honor the commitment he made when placing the cache. Surprisingly, category 1 is the most common.

Note that I could easily reduce the “grace period” of three months in this list. When I first started this, the number of disabled caches was larger, so I arbitrarily set 3 months because it kept the number manageable for the approvers.

[Buy_The_Tie]

@Team Deejay wrote:

…Note that I could easily reduce the “grace period” of three months in this list. When I first started this, the number of disabled caches was larger, so I arbitrarily set 3 months because it kept the number manageable for the approvers.

Ummmm. 3 months is not arbritary. See this posting.

[Cheesehead Dave]

I can’t speak for Brian, but from my end, the current procedure seems to be working as-is.

[rogheff]

I know down here along the Cheddar Curtain, the local cachers usually take care of this issue. There are very seldom caches which are disabled for very long before the owners are nudged along.

My opinion is for everyone who caches: See a cache disabled for a long time? Then ask the cache owners why, how, when and if it will be reinstated.

I don’t think it’s the responsibility of a BOD member from Superior to monitor caches in Pleasant Prairie.

[Cache_boppin_BunnyFuFu]

First.. I want to thank you for creating & having the list available. So far it seems the current methods are working well.

What I would like to see… thought I don’t know the difficulty if this, but I can’t imagine it would be too bad….but having a “Winter or Weather Related Disabled” cache list, separate. I say that because I know there and a number that are disabled due to the locations inaccessibility due to snow or usage, (i.e. hunting.) I currently have one that is disabled due to moisture and being frozen into place, there for it can only be done above freezing, as strange as that sounds.

Having two lists would make the Disabled listing shorter and more manageable for the reviewers and they wouldn’t have to waste time on those that are truly only temporary or over the winter, etc. Though, hopefully those of us who disable do REMEMBER to re-enable.

[zuma]

Regarding disabled caches:

Is this really still an issue? After reviewing the disabled caches within 100 miles of my home coordinates, it does not seem to be much of an issue an longer. A year ago, when T&TB and others brought it up, it was an issue. But now with the program that Tie has implemented, it looks like a problem mostly solved, at least to me. I also note that Surfer Joe is following pretty much the same procedure in Minnesota, so this is not a unique Wisconsin issue.

So, at this point, I dont think it is an issue an longer. There are always going to be a few disabled caches out there for any number of reasons, but mostly the problem has been cleaned up. Thanks to the leadership of the current WGA BOD for addressing this, and particularly thanks to Tie for implementing the policy.

zuma

[Ray]

@zuma wrote:

Regarding disabled caches:

…Is this really still an issue? After reviewing the disabled caches within 100 miles of my home coordinates, it does not seem to be much of an issue an longer…

You are right, within 100 miles of your home, there is little cause for action. As a member of the BOD, my concern is for matters State-wide. Take a look at disabled caches in SE Wis, within 100 miles of Milwaukee and you can see the problem. Disabled caches left neglected may become geolitter. Or at least a thorn in the side of cachers running PQs to set up a days searching.

[zuma]

Thank you for pointing out that the problem is still with us. As a result of your post, I looked a little more, and read through the disabled list that you have. Looks like about half are disabled for a good reason, such as seasonal issues, or have been recently muggled and the owner has not yet replaced.

It looks like the other half (about 100 caches?) are just gone, and the owner has lost interest, for whatever reason. I continue to support the current policy of owner notificaton of impending archival after 3 months, followed by actual archival. I also think the post that Tie leaves is well written, to the point, and quite polite for what could be a very sensitive topic.

And while it does seem this problem does still exist, it is certainly much better now than it was a year ago, and I think it reasonable to thank the current BOD for their (your) leadership in this area, and note that Tie has done a lot of leg work in decreasing the number of disabled caches in the state. So thank you to T&TB and thank you to Tie.

zuma

[rogheff]

I’ve noticed more of a problem from archived caches still hanging around in the woods than problems from disabled caches. I stumbled across 2 last week myself.

I’d like to see a better system of getting that geolitter picked up, especially since there’s no way of getting notice that a cache is archived unless it happens to be on your watch list.

[GeoPink]

The list of disabled caches in wisconsin is now hovering at about 200. Some of these have been disabled for several months. What are your thoughts of cleaning this list up?

The WGA is not the Wisconsin Cache Police. If our members would like to assist others in helping maintain faltering caches, great! Is this the job of the WGA? No. Should the WGA help our members? We certainly do! I would encourage communication through the forums and Private Messages to help other members with their caches.

[AuntieNae]

I have to say, after geocaching in other states, we are doing a much better job than these other states are in cleaning up disabled/ missing caches. I also do not see WGA as the cache police but would like to get the word out as to how to help keep caches active in your own neck of the woods.

I personally went out after a geocache that was placed in a SNA that was archived. I watched this cache and a poor travel bug sit there for a couple of months then went for it. The owners have yet to contact me to return their cache container which I had offered to do.

I can see it as a task to double check that archived caches have either been declared missing or picked up. The current disabled list was a great feature, Tie working hard to clean up the disabled caches was great, and the cache rescue program also is great. I can see this continuing.

AuntieNae
Renee

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