[CommanderUSN]

I received verbal OK on the following policy and am posting it here. I will forward a copy to reviewers as well.

Dane County Parks Geocaching Policy

All rules and regulations of http://www.geocaching.com will be followed by geocachers placing caches in Dane County Parks.

In addition, The Dane County Parks Division has the following restrictions when hiding a geocache in a Dane County Park:

Micro-caches are not allowed. Geocaches that are presently in place in Dane County Parks that are micro-caches will be grandfathered in place until January 1, 2016. After that date, the cache will need to be replaced with a small (4×4 container) or larger cache or archived. New geocaches placed after May 1, 2015 will be small or larger if they are physical geocaches.

Earth caches are welcome in all Dane County Parks using available signage.

No geocache may be placed within 250 feet of any historical feature, park building or playground.

No geocache may be placed within 250 feet of any campground.

The following areas are also specifically restricted from geocaching placement.
Mowed areas
Disc Golf Course
Adjacent to a deposit tube.

Geocaching in Dane County Parks may not violate Ordinance 53.03(8) of the Dane County Code of Ordinance which states the following activities are prohibited:

Defacing, destroying, vandalizing, digging or removing any park property including soil, turf, trees, shrubs, flowers, wildlife or any archeological object including any man-made article or implement originating from earlier cultures, without written permission from the parks director

Any geocache may be withdrawn, with just cause, by Park Staff. If geocaching activities as a whole are found to have a negative impact on park resources or if safety of the resource and/or park patrons is negatively affected, the Parks Director may ban said activity from certain areas or the entire park system. The Parks Division reserves the right to modify this policy if conditions warrant.

Thanks,

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

Woodlandnomad wrote:

Commander Thanks again for working on this. I know that you have spent a lot of time on this issue. As someone with several micro size containers placed in several Dane County Parks I am a little concerned about the size restriction. I understand the concern about the damage to the environment with extensive searching in an area for a needle in the haystack. I think I have been responsible with my cache placements and they have gotten a lot of positive feedback. My understanding is that this suggestion came from the caching community and not from the Parks Department (I take the concern as a very positive example of the caching community trying to self police itself and a very positive indictor of our responsibility). However, I am wondering if there is another way we can address this concern. This would be a much stricter policy than the DNR has. I am not a big fan of nanos, but it seems to me that it is a big difference between a nano stuck on a sign in a parking lot and one placed in a sensitive natural area. I am also a little surprised at defending another of my lest favorite caches–35mm film canisters in sign posts. But I can imagine a nice multi built around such containers place in, on, or at the bottom sign posts leading one around a park. I am all in favor of the goal of limiting damage to natural areas and would agree to error on the side of caution, but I am wondering if we can achieve this goal with out such a large brush.

Jay…I see your point BUT…Micros were initially envisioned as urban hides only and only over time have they become THE cache to hide. With each Dane County park being several acres at a minimum…there surely will be some place to hide a small or larger container. I, personally, don’t appreciate hiking a half mile or a mile one way to find a film canister in a pine tree. Your caches would generally fall into the “Other” category as the container holding the log may be a micro but what is holding the container is definitely NOT a micro.

I’m going to contact the county again tomorrow to see what more needs to be done.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

Good call. I will throw a quick definition of a small being at least as large as a 4×4 lock and lock or able to hold a log book and a travel bug. Any other suggestions let me know as it is still a work in progress but it is getting there.

[CommanderUSN]

Just a preview of the policy statement we are working on together. THIS IS NOT THE PRESENT POLICY BUT WHAT IS PROPOSED AND IS SUBMITTED FOR INFORMATION OF THE COMMUNITY ONLY. Although it may become policy soon.

Dane County Parks Geocaching Policy

All rules and regulations of http://www.geocaching.com will be followed by geocachers placing caches in Dane County Parks.

In addition, The Dane County Parks Division has the following restrictions when hiding a geocache in a Dane County Park:

Micro-caches are not allowed. Geocaches that are presently in place in Dane County Parks that are micro-caches will be grandfathered in place until January 1, 2016. After that date, the cache will need to be replaced with a small or larger cache or archived. New geocaches placed after May 1, 2015 will be small or larger if they are physical geocaches.

Earth caches are welcome in all Dane County Parks using available signage.

No geocache may be placed within 250 feet of any historical feature, park building or playground.

No geocache may be placed within 250 feet of any campground.

The following areas are also specifically restricted from geocaching placement.
Mowed areas
Disc Golf Course
Adjacent to a deposit tube.

Geocaching in Dane County Parks may not violate Ordinance 53.03(8) of the Dane County Code of Ordinance which states the following activities are prohibited:

Defacing, destroying, vandalizing, digging or removing any park property including soil, turf, trees, shrubs, flowers, wildlife or any archeological object including any man-made article or implement originating from earlier cultures, without written permission from the parks director

Any geocache may be withdrawn, with just cause, by Park Staff. If geocaching activities as a whole are found to have a negative impact on park resources or if safety of the resource and/or park patrons is negatively affected, the Parks Director may ban said activity from certain areas or the entire park system. The Parks Division reserves the right to modify this policy if conditions warrant.

[CommanderUSN]

I have it on my calendar.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

Ostermi wrote:

Awesome! It is really nice to see what WGAers can do! Just out of curiosity, will this plan start on January 1st, or is there some other “magic number” (the beginning of the “DNR Year”, per se)?

From what Darren told me…it will commence with the calendar year. So far there has only been one new cache and I’m not certain about that one.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

I was CCed on the following e-mail. I am continuing to work on removing all administrative hurdles but Darren wants to have a “transition” period. At least I have gotten the fees removed for 2015.

The Commander.

Hi Chris,

Thanks for your question. Yes, we have been in discussion with a representative of WGA, Steve Biedermann. Dane County Parks will be waiving our permit fee (as a test) staring in 2015 based upon input from WGA and/or it’s volunteer representatives. WGA representatives will provide oversight for geocaches that will be located on Dane County park lands. The official application process will be through WGA with approvals from Dane County Parks and the WGA Geocache oversight person for this area. If there are any problems or issues WGA volunteer representatives will handle any issues that may arise.

I have attached our application for prior approval of a proposed geocache site for Dane County park lands. Dane County Park Rangers will then monitor the Wisconsin Geocache Association related Dane County Parks.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Darren
Darren Marsh
Parks Division
Dane County Land and Water Resources Department
Rm. 234
5201 Fen Oak Drive
Madison WI 53718
(608) 224-3766
Fax (608) 224-3745

From: Parks Mail
Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2014 7:57 AM
To: Marsh, Darren
Subject: FW: Geocache Permit

From: Chris Scharlau [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2014 6:04 AM
To: Parks Mail
Subject: Geocache Permit

Hello,
I noticed that the 2015 fee schedule doesn’t list a cost / price for the geocaching permit in the DCP system. Has this been revised or will the annual fees continue to be the same as 2014?

I know there was some discussion with the WGA on the topic awhile ago and was curious if anything has changed.

Regards,
Chris Scharlau
Edgerton, WI
608.290.2572
[email protected]

Sent from my U.S. Cellular® Smartphone
GEO CACHE PERMIT APPLICATION Fee Removed 2015.pdf

[CommanderUSN]

Note…the above was answered in RED text to my paragraphs so you need to discern which paragraphs are mine and which are his.

Sorry.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

[CommanderUSN]

@labrat_wr wrote:

A little concerned about how much Darren seems to be relying on WGA.
the Reviewers would receive the Off Limits locations and nix anything in sensitive areas prior to publication (I would assume) but to hold WGA “responsible” for maintaining a list of caches and review sites seems a bit much. please realize that once (if) this gets the fees dropped and the placement of caches on Dane County properties begins to increase, not every Cache Placer is going to be a WGA member and be privy to this arrangement. While we wish to work with Dane County, the “WITH” part does should not mean WGA must be the GeoPolice in the matter.

Thanks Steve for getting the ball rolling on this though it does look to be some additional work to be ironed out.

He doesn’t understand the workings of either geocaching or the WGA. I will NOT get us embroiled in some legal MOU and will explain to him exactly what you said…that not all geocachers are members of the WGA and we are NOT the geocache police. Thanks for your note and hopefully I will get this resolved shortly.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

No public response but I agree with just the question.

[CommanderUSN]

[CommanderUSN]

I’m the Grandpa who loves to be with kids. I have seven grandkids and they live all over from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

@CommanderUSN wrote:

For those of you that can attend…following is information about the meeting tomorrow.

The Commander

The Dane County Park Commission will hold a public hearing on the proposed 2015 Parks Permit Fees at their meeting on Wednesday, September 24, 2014, 12:15 PM in Room 354, City-County Building, 210 Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. Madison, WI 53703. The public hearing will begin at 12:30 PM. If you are unable to make this meeting, the Park Commission will be accepting feedback until their October 1stmeeting. Feedback, and/or questions may be sent to [email protected], or mailed to the Park office at 5201 Fen Oak Drive, Room 208, Madison, WI 53718.

I attended the hearing and I had invited Woodlandnomad to attend as well and he did.

There were no Geocachers present with the exception of Jay and myself. So when it was my turn to talk, I introduced myself and gave a short background of geocaching. I then stated my purpose was to remove the fee for placing caches in Dane County Parks and provided convincing reasons to remove the fee: Only county collecting a fee…initial reason for placing the fee was now invalid and the hindrance it caused to people wanting to place a cache. I then opened myself up for questions.

The Commission had many questions which I answered for approximately a half of an hour. The vote on fee increases and hopefully fee removal will not be until the October 1st meeting. The feeling I was getting in the room was that they didn’t want to change the fee without a corresponding change in policy. I am planning to recommend to the Parks Director that we lift the policy directly from the State Parks caching policy and implement that as the policy for Dane County Parks.

Will keep you all posted but I think we will be successful.

The Commander

[CommanderUSN]

For those of you that can attend…following is information about the meeting tomorrow.

The Commander

The Dane County Park Commission will hold a public hearing on the proposed 2015 Parks Permit Fees at their meeting on Wednesday, September 24, 2014, 12:15 PM in Room 354, City-County Building, 210 Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd. Madison, WI 53703. The public hearing will begin at 12:30 PM. If you are unable to make this meeting, the Park Commission will be accepting feedback until their October 1stmeeting. Feedback, and/or questions may be sent to [email protected], or mailed to the Park office at 5201 Fen Oak Drive, Room 208, Madison, WI 53718.

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