Supreme Court to hear NOVA case

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Washington Off Highway Vehicle Alliance ORV funds lawsuit will go before the Washington State Supreme Court.

Olympia, Washington – 13 February 2012

The Washington Off Highway Vehicle Alliance (WOHVA) and Northwest Motorcycle Association (NMA) lawsuit against the State of Washington to block the transfer of over 9.5 million dollars in offroad vehicle funds from the Nonhighway and Offroad Vehicle Activities (NOVA) account to State Parks will advance to the Washington State Supreme Court. Attorney James Buchal will be representing both organizations.

In 2009 the Legislature passed House Bill 1244, which transferred the money out of the NOVA account. The NOVA account money comes from the gas tax paid by offroad vehicle users and the license tab fees on offroad vehicles (ORV).

According to the Washington State Constitution gas tax collected must be used only for roads. To comply with that the state allows refunds on gas tax paid for other uses.

In 1972 the offroad vehicle community supported passage of legislation that waived their right to a direct refund of the taxes they paid for ORV fuel in exchange for having those same funds “refunded” into a dedicated account to promote and protect their sport. Later on, their ORV license tab money was added to this account too. The NOVA program was established to administer these funds.

All the money went to State Parks where it was not spent on offroad vehicle recreation. This was not a legitimate refund for the benefit of these taxpayers.

The NOVA funding is normally distributed by the State Recreation and Conservation Funding Board in the form of grants. These grants are awarded to governmental agencies such as the United States Forest Service, the Washington Department of Natural Resources and various counties. It is the primary source of funding for offroad vehicle recreation and for law enforcement on public lands in Washington.

If this funding is not returned to benefit the taxpayers that paid for it, families and their children throughout the State of Washington will lose the healthy outdoor recreational opportunities they were promised and for which they paid their taxes and ORV tab fees, as the trails they have enjoyed together are closed. Additionally, public employees throughout Washington who maintain and patrol those trails will lose their jobs.

The Washington Off Highway Vehicle Alliance and the Northwest Motorcycle Association are nonprofit organizations dedicated to protecting and promoting off highway vehicle and offroad motorcycle recreation.

Tod Petersen
Political Action Committee Chairman – Washington Off Highway Vehicle Alliance
Legislative/Land Use Coordinator – Northwest Motorcycle Association
P.O. Box 61161
Seattle, WA 98141
tod701@aol.com
www.wohva.org
www.nmaoffroad.org

Thank you for all your hard work. We all need to rally together. Say, do you know where the Forest Service is on the Okanogan/Wenatchee National Forest Road Plan is? They've had there public meetings, but on-line I don't see any updates. I know they have to draw new lines after years of study and it's been 15 years instead of 10 since they last closed a bunch of Alpine (the local rangers here are really great about sharing info) however, I have not heard if any final decision has been made. I'm sure it was made a long time ago, but at least any info released to the public along with new maps of closed roads do not appear to be on the horizon. I have a few more people I can bug about this, but any thoughts would be appreciated.

DEisenhard wrote:

Okanogan/Wenatchee National Forest Road Plan is?

I know that the wheels of "progress" are still churning, but have not been tracking it close lately.
I'll check with some of the NMA guys that are watching in more closely.