PLEASE RESPOND | Rush Lake Fencing & Recreation Survey
Posted: Fri Jun 16, 2023 1:12 pmHey everyone!
Rush Lake is back with a vengeance, and the Utah Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has been receptive to our renewed initiative to find a long-needed solution to the dangerous barbed-wire fencing privately installed across Rush Lake's public water.
As anyone who has encountered the fences in the water knows well, they are an "unreasonably dangerous condition to the public lawfully using the public water" as expressly prohibited by Utah's Public Waters Access Act (PWAA). Fortunately for our wind sports community, the Utah Supreme Court just recently upheld the PWAA, which protects the "right to float" on public water, including over private property, so long as the public water was otherwise accessed legally (via public BLM land at Rush Lake), and any private bottom is not touched (except to "incidentally touch private property as required for safe passage and continued movement").
The DNR has suggested we collect historical recreational usage data (of any kind) for Rush Lake since 1982 to help demonstrate the long precedent of public recreation there.
If you would like to see SAFE recreational access restored to Rush Lake (and preserved for the future), please take a moment to complete this short survey - https://forms.gle/LHLBUZ7fyySnMLC46
Please include any photos, videos, webpage links, etc. you may have. They are especially helpful at demonstrating the rich public recreational heritage of Rush Lake!
Rush Lake is back with a vengeance, and the Utah Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has been receptive to our renewed initiative to find a long-needed solution to the dangerous barbed-wire fencing privately installed across Rush Lake's public water.
As anyone who has encountered the fences in the water knows well, they are an "unreasonably dangerous condition to the public lawfully using the public water" as expressly prohibited by Utah's Public Waters Access Act (PWAA). Fortunately for our wind sports community, the Utah Supreme Court just recently upheld the PWAA, which protects the "right to float" on public water, including over private property, so long as the public water was otherwise accessed legally (via public BLM land at Rush Lake), and any private bottom is not touched (except to "incidentally touch private property as required for safe passage and continued movement").
The DNR has suggested we collect historical recreational usage data (of any kind) for Rush Lake since 1982 to help demonstrate the long precedent of public recreation there.
If you would like to see SAFE recreational access restored to Rush Lake (and preserved for the future), please take a moment to complete this short survey - https://forms.gle/LHLBUZ7fyySnMLC46
Please include any photos, videos, webpage links, etc. you may have. They are especially helpful at demonstrating the rich public recreational heritage of Rush Lake!