Special Uses

The Department is adopting amendments to regulations governing the use and occupancy of National Forest System lands to streamline and make more efficient the process for obtaining special use authorizations, to provide for the use of one-time payments for easements as presently used in the market place, to limit certain liability requirements to amounts determined by a risk assessment, to clarify definitions of certain terms, and to clarify requirements related to renewal of existing special use authorizations. The intent is to improve service and reduce costs to proponents and applicants for and holders of National Forest System special use authorizations, to expedite decisionmaking, and to permit more ``user-friendly'' administration of such authorizations by removing certain requirements deemed unnecessary and outdated.