Upset anglers on Capitol Hill chanted “Let me fish Utah’s public waters. Let me fish Utah’s public waters.”
“Access, access, access,” they yelled in unison.
They went to Salt Lake City Thursday to oppose House Bill 187, which would ban fisherman from walking on many streambeds that abut private land. The Utah Supreme Court ruled last year that anglers can walk on riverbeds on private land where they would have been trespassing in the past.
The court decision stemmed from a case that involved a group of rafters in Morgan County who were charged with trespassing for standing in the Weber River near the Summit County line. They were fishing when they encountered a fence stretched across the river by landowners trying to keep people out.
Where riverbeds are considered private property, the public has the right to touch the beds while recreating, the Supreme Court ruled last July.
But the ruling has heightened tensions between ranchers and fishermen, which spurred Rep. Ben Ferry, R-Corinne, to sponsor HB 187 to clarify the new public easement.
His legislation would make many streambeds off limits anglers and would require people to stay 500 feet from homes near the river to avoid a trespassing charge.
“So, if you are fishing the place your grandfather took you and now you’ve got a starter castle there, what do you have to do? You have to get out of the water and become a trespasser,” Utah Rivers Council Executive Director Ted Wilson said. “Then you have to go find your car, drive around the starter castle some way, and then find a public easement to get back to the water.”
Park City resident Bob Dibblee, president of the Trout Unlimited Utah Council, said the bill would ban fisherman from walking on private streambeds they access from public land along East Canyon Creek, Beaver Creek and Chalk Creek.
“We think legislators have overstepped their power in what they declared in that bill,” Dibblee said in an interview. “[Ferry] said, he thinks [the Supreme Court] stepped out of line, and that they were not constitutionally right to do what they did.”
Trout Unlimited has spent thousands of dollars restoring streambeds in Utah, he said.
“Trout Unlimited would like to have a chance to show the farmers and the landowners what we could do to improve their river easement and riverbed, like they’ve done in Montana and Idaho,” Dibblee said. “Their land values have gone up since they opened up the waters to fishing.”
The state has spent millions of dollars restoring stream habitat, Wilson added.
“You will now be precluded from those very waters,” he told the crowd.
Meanwhile, allowing anglers to walk on private streambeds boosts fishing-related tourism in the state, said Parkite Dusty Grabowski, a professional fly-fishing guide.
“We make a living on it,” Grabowski said in an interview at the Capitol. “That’s how I put food on the table. That’s how I put gas in my truck.”
Each year anglers in Utah spend about $708 million, Wilson claimed.
“This does not count the boaters, the boating guides and river runners,” Wilson said. “The Legislature is doing the equivalent of telling us to cut out and close a bunch of our ski resorts because they don’t want us on the hill.”
A committee was slated Friday afternoon to debate a substitute version of HB 187.
Snyderville Basin resident Dave Tripp is a landowner along East Canyon Creek who attended Thursday’s rally.
“I’m not opposed to fishing, as long as they respect my property rights,” Tripp said in an interview at the Capitol. “It hasn’t been a problem.”
Tripp, a past president of the Park City chapter of High Country Fly Fishers, is against HB 187.
“We’re not seeing people going through yards. We’re not interfering with family matters. We’re not breaking down their fences or chasing their cattle or leaving their gates open,” he said. “The way this bill is right now, is if you step in the river bottom, you’re trespassing. It is against essentially all of the rights the Supreme Court said belonged to the public.”