Whereas the Province of British Columbia promotes tourism and encourages the use of the variety of outdoor touring experiences available on British Columbias Crown land base to stimulate rural job growth and the rural economy but many of these Crown land recreation areas are becoming more difficult to access or rendered inaccessible due to the closure or reduced maintenance of resource roads; And whereas resource roads are also important for non-resource related agricultural, commercial and educational activities on public Crown lands as well as being important for emergency management access and evacuation purposes: Therefore be it resolved that UBCM ask the provincial government to work with communities and stakeholders to identify key resource roads that are no longer required for industrial use and designate these roads as recreational roads that require provincial oversight and funding for ongoing maintenance in support of the back country recreation tourism industry and other critical agricultural, commercial, educational, and emergency uses.
Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations Rural Development Government shares the goal of many local governments to improve the maintenance of resource roads Forest Service Roads managed by the Ministry to further support backcountry recreational tourism. The Ministry uses a funding model for its road maintenance and capital improvements roadbridge works that is generally based on public use. The Ministrys Engineering Program funding policy prioritizes resources based on public safety, type of user, highest public use and environmental protection in the following order: 1. Roads Accessing Communities 2. Roads Serving Rural Residences 3. Roads Accessing High Value Recreation Sites 4. Environmentally Maintained Roads and Deactivation