The chairman of the Valles Caldera Trust board told a congressional committee this week he supports transferring management of the 88,900-acre preserve near Los Alamos to the National Park Service.

Raymond Loretto, a veterinarian who chairs the Valles Caldera Trust, testified before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee in favor of a bill (S. 564) introduced by New Mexico's U.S. senators, Jeff Bingaman and Tom Udall, to have the Park Service take over management of the former private ranch in the Jemez Mountains.

Bingaman chairs the committee. The Valles Caldera Trust is a government corporation that has managed the preserve since Congress approved its acquisition in 2000, with management by a nine-member board that includes seven presidential appointees.

Gary Bratcher, the trust's executive director, said he didn't know the board was going to support the legislation. "I was not advised by anyone on the board," he said, "and I don't think that anyone on the staff was advised that this was going to be their testimony."

Loretto said a majority of the four presidential appointees currently on the board decided to support S. 264, but didn't vote on it until after the last public meeting held April 19. "We only found out we were to testify before the committee last week," said Loretto, a former governor of Jemez Pueblo. "We had to make a decision."

The superintendent of Bandelier National Monument and the supervisor of Santa Fe National Forest also serve on the board. Three of the presidentially appointed board seats are vacant.

Turning over management

The bill directs the Park Service to retain many of the existing mandates put in place when Congress approved the purchase. The current law requires the trust to protect the extensive natural and cultural resources of the lush meadows and forests within the remains of ancient collapsed volcanoes. The trust also was to expand public access to the preserve, operate a "working ranch" and become financially self-sufficient by 2015.

Under the proposed legislation, hunting, fishing and cattle grazing could still continue, but the preserve would no longer have to be "financially self-sufficient." Bingaman said the bill also increases protections for American Indian cultural and religious sites within the Valles Caldera.

The senators introduced a similar bill last year, but it failed to pass.

The Valles Caldera Trust was seen as an "experiment in land management," one many believe was doomed from the beginning. The idea was to have private money — through various user fees — pay for the public preserve's management and reduce the annual appropriation of taxpayer money.

A self-sufficiency mandate

Bingaman and fellow Democrat Udall, a former Northern New Mexico congressman, supported the original Valles Caldera purchase legislation, which was championed by then U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M. Congress approved $100 million to buy the former Baca Ranch and establish the trust.

The trust recommended a variety of activities to increase revenues from the preserve. Many were shot down by public opinion or legal restrictions.

In 2010, revenue from activities in the Valles Caldera more than doubled to equal 20 percent of the trust's budget. The preserve also increased public visitation by 59 percent during 2009. Aside from grants for science programs, the preserve's biggest source of revenue for the least cost came from hunting, which brought in $276,944 last year.

"In the past decade, the Board of Trustees made an honest effort to take the necessary steps to achieve (self-sufficiency)," Loretto told the committee. "But ... it has become clear that capital improvements to make the preserve financially self-sufficient are either too costly or unacceptable to the major stakeholders in the region."

An unproven model

Bratcher said he serves at the will of the board, but as a former executive in the private sector, he believes the Valles Caldera Trust model is still worth a try, especially in an era of shrinking federal budgets. He said last year the board proposed changes to the legislation that would have made it easier to meet the mandates.

"I had really hoped during this amount of time we would get changes in the original act and get a good recovery in the cost for the public," he said. "Even the way the legislation is written, we were making inroads. We were improving public access and reducing the amount of public taxpayer funds needed. If this bill passes, the whole model remains unproven."

Loretto said the trust staff has done a great job, but with the trust destined to dissolve in 2015 without further congressional action, "we need to start transitioning, regardless of which agency it goes to. It comes down to an emotional decision we had to make."

Tom Ribe, head of the watchdog group Caldera Action, said that organization favors management by the National Park Service rather than the U.S. Forest Service. "We don't want to see it go to Forest Service where it will be overrun by cows, people and off-road vehicles," Ribe said.

Ribe said the Park Service, like other federal agencies, is sustaining big budget cuts. "But even with the cuts, the Park Service does a much better job of public land management with a low budget than the Forest Service," Ribe said.

Contact Staci Matlock at 986-3055 or smatlock@sfnewmexican.com.