Shooting at Table Mesa Arizona

[ynotAZ]

Well BLM is finally unveiling their plan to all but stop shooting at Table Mesa. While we are still trying to convince them how woefully lacking their newly designed ranges around Lake Pleasant are, they are moving ahead using their same theories for Table Mesa.

They sent me the following communication which implies, while they can be 3 months late in getting it out but give us 3 weeks to digest it and make comments:

"My name is Chelsea McKinney, and I am a Project Manager for the Phoenix District, Bureau of Land Management office. I have been on a detail in Boise, Idaho and was not available for this project the past three months. I have returned to the district, and I am sorry but I am playing catch up with the projects I'm assisting with. That being said I am not certain if Dale or Irina has sent you the link to the draft Table Mesa Recreation Area Environmental Assessment and draft FONSI, so I want to make sure you have the link and are aware you can provide comments until August 31, 2023."

Here is a link to read about, review maps, and comment on the project:

https://eplanning.blm.gov/eplanning-ui/project/2023480/570

Here is a link, another of our group found, to planning BLM started last year. Demonstrates the obvious lack of public information:

Table Mesa Meeting

Read More

 

[AMproducts]

Been playing footsies with a few public agencies like this recently, usually the best way to go is delay whatever action they are planning until that person is replaced. If you need to involve your local elected representatives, do so, but I tend to think of that as a nuclear option just short of filing a lawsuit.

 

[ynotAZ]

Yeah, but there seems to be a pervasive attitude. I'm not sure the change in one person will cure it. Needs to come from the very top.

 

[nvshooter]

Maybe offer the BLM dates and times to allow freaky LGBTQ types to have events during which they swing their manly hydraulics in the faces of six year-old boys. You'd be offering so much Diversity, Inclusion and Equity that they couldn't say No-- and that would keep the area open for shooting...

 

[ynotAZ]

My ESG rating is too low to be allowed into an event like that. I'm a Laggard

 

[nvshooter]

My ESG rating is too low to be allowed into an event like that.

I wouldn't want to go to an event having grown men twerking their crotches and swiveling their hips in front of six-year-old boys. No doubt attendance would be good among bio-males who can't decide which bathroom to use...

 

[AMproducts]

A plague of frogs on them.


So before I sht talk this subject anymore, I was reading through the docs, public comment period is open and it looks like they received fewer than 80 comments during their previous open comment period. I'm unfamiliar with the area or the specific issues. But I would be happy to lend my support, and write some comments if it will help you out.

 

[ynotAZ]

All comments will help. While the shooting ranges they are building are nice they fall drastically short of what outdoor shooters need. The reason there are so few comments is because they don't widely publicize these changes and unless you are already heavily involved you get notice like the one I got, 3 months late and only 3 weeks to comment.

Even if you watch closely, they play a shell game, i.e. the ranges I'm talking about, they published in the federal registry that they will only impact 529 acres, OK, but that was for native habitat animals. They closed over 5,500 acres to just recreational shooting surrounding these all but useless ranges.

According to their plan for this area they are making some of he improvement we suggested like allow our targets so we can sight in rather than just their steel plates that go way too long before painting with no downrange access for shooters to repaint. Only some ranges will have RSOs, and they are volunteers and not allowed to represent themselves as any part of BLM, having no authority but to call police to remote desert, response time minimum 1 hour and in many cases unavailable.

The entire idea, as implemented is stupid. Then consider each of the existing ranges is surrounded by a chain link fence with posts set in concrete every 10' going up the side of 1,000' mountains at 60-degree slopes around the top and back down. Both me and a friend owned construction businesses, the cost of the fence would be $1 million easy.

This is just an effort to close public lands to outdoor shooting, and they say it is a prototype for the rest of the country if it succeeds.

 

[Sunky Heribeck]

While I agree the Church Camp Road recreational shooting site is crapola, I would say that the few shooting areas on the westside of I17 at Table Mesa are horrendous. They are a littered mess, dangerous with too many shooters on the honor system.

I rock crawl the Jeep and off road in the Polaris there quite a bit and have been down range of idiots shooting down and across roads/trails on more than one occasion.

The east side is mostly State Trust Land and therefore, disallows target shooting but I still find a few morons over there popping off occasionally.

I believe if they decide to ban shooting on the westside at TM, the "No Shooting" signs will just become targets, as the ones in that area are already.

 

[ynotAZ]

I agree about Table Mesa being BAD. I haven't gone there to shoot in at least 20 years because it is dangerous. They may do something up there that will put restrictions on areas for people to shoot and make it slightly less dangerous for other activities for shooters however, I doubt it will be less dangerous.

Shooters will be confined to a smaller area with no law enforcement. We were at church camp when a ghetto car rolled up and parked next to us, while we were in the parking lot. When they opened the door, we got a good high from the MJ smoke that rolled out so we sat to watch. One passenger carried his loaded min-draco to the firing line and did a belt-loop full-auto mag dump, then walked back to the car for another mag while another guy did his sideways Glock 30 round mag dump. 2 families packed up and left. I sent a text to the BLM LEO I rode along with, one of only 2 covering hundreds of thousands of acres, he said he was not available and neither was the other guy.

Oh well, federal offense MJ and guns on a BLM range, totally unsafe, nobody to question them and even if, nobody to back a volunteer RSO up.

We've seen other very unsafe instances but that one is my favorite.

The biggest issue for us is they did the required public meeting, ignored all of the input, had some out-of-stater design what looks like indoor shooting ranges outside and addressed none of what we need when shooting outdoors, and safety. Ignoring all of that, they didn't even address common courtesy. We brought our wives out there and some guy walked up in the next lane with a high end 1911, dumped his 8 round mag quickly pelting my wife with brass, she walked away I looked at him and said WTF dude, he turned and just walked away. Apparently, that's all he wanted to do, was to see if it went bang.

 

[Sunky Heribeck]

I say, let them make more ranges like this to contain the low IQ crowd and keep them from looking for more shooting areas, which may lead them to discover mine.

I am usually running select fire (full auto) and suppressors, so I don't need the guys showing up with the, "Hey, what is that? Where did you get that? Can I try it out?" questions.

 

[ynotAZ]

That is exactly the point we're trying to make with them. Do your ranges but don't close the desert and say: "well we gave them ranges that they don't use".

They are also dealing with National Forest service so that effectively covers all the open public land in the country.

We don't want to shoot next to FUDDs that buy and AR and have to run out and blast something, or the guys from the hood. Attract that type to your ranges, less trash dumped where we shoot and less idiots.

I will share the presentation we are planning to give them after we present it to them. It will be good.

 

[AMproducts]

FS and BLM are different organizations, FS is under dept of Ag, BLM is under Dept of Interior. FS usually sells lumber, or some other product that's grown on the land. DOI usually sells mineral rights, or things that make up the land. There are sometimes weird purposes, such as recreation, and watershed issues that come into play.

In some ways, it seems what they probably need is a concessionaire to come in and actually develop a range in the area. A number of public shooting pits near Los Angeles were closed and people were pushed into established ranges. Generally this kind of stupidity isn't eliminated, but it's at least kept somewhat in check. I get that over-using a limited resource tends to result in a tragedy of the commons, but the best way to prevent that kinda thing is to make someone responsible for it. And it sounds like this current effort is to make someone responsible for it, without giving them any authority to actually take responsibility purely for cost savings.

LA Times recently did a story on a FS turned DOI area in the Angeles National Forest that I have quite a history with:

Trash heaps and wild parties: Blight invades a beloved L.A. escape

Nine years after President Obama created the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument, park officials struggle to cope with hordes of visitors.

www.latimes.com

Yea, it's often been an over-used resource for decades, and the people who use it dump trash everywhere, and no one wants to take ownership of a trash heap without the ability to do something about it.

 

[ynotAZ]

Yep FS and BLM are different, but they formed some type of relationship for law enforcement for the ranges near lake pleasant. FS is watching the results of what BLM is doing to save some money and stop shooting on public lands.

 

[rawkexpress]

any open BLM or other agency land that you can shoot 500 - 1,000 yards, I've been in AZ for about a year now and have not found an area. I would appreciate any help.

Thank you,

 

[ynotAZ]

Your question is a tough one.

When people find those spots they protect them like a ton of gold. If they don't folks bring microwaves, flat screens, ovens and washing machines out for targets and honestly, feed the BLM lust to close more land to shooting.

Even when they bring friends out who are sworn to secrecy, they bring other friends and next it's a trash heap.

 

[rawkexpress]

That's the reason I'm asking, they keep it like they own or work for BLM LOL

 

[Sunky Heribeck]

@ynotAZ WORD