above. As to the remaining areas, decisions would be made on ecological criteria, rather than on the desires of pressure groups which often lead to a pseudo "compromise" and then result in "oversight" hearings. We are realistic regarding ORV use and nowhere in official statements as your chairman have I indicated that the Club should take any other policy than the one they have. Unofficially, I hope BLM can learn from the mistakes that the National Park Service and the Forest Service has made regarding vehicle use and campground siting on our public lands. The end of next month terminates my tenure as conservation chairman of the DPS for this year. This does not mean that I will "lay down my guns" so to speak, but I will continue to work In the field of conservation with the organizations with which I am affiliated. By all indications, this coming year is one in which many decisions and changes will be made by the BLM. The Sierra Club must continue to establish policies which will assure that the desert can benefit the most people and still remain ecologically sound. Members of the DPS should be alert to the changes that may take place, voice their opinions and help in setting policy, lest we find that because of land swaps by BLM we are cut off from an access to a peak we wish to climb or an area which we wish to explore. I want to thank the DPS management committee for allowing me to speak and write as a conservation chairman and not just as a figurehead doing lip service. I also want to thank the many DPS members who are interested in preservation of our desert areas, who supported my views and offered help and suggestions. I hope they will be as generous with future conservation chairmen as they have been with me. To that small minority of the members who are less than enthusiastic in their attitudes toward Sierra Club conservation, I ask that they be less critical and more understanding toward those members who are working in the conservation movement. Remember that these people are volunteers and not paid. Even though some conservation chairmen may work with a budget, much more comes out of their own pockets to further the cause of conservation. Their time, effort and money is not spent just for their own personal benefit, but for the benefit of all people whether or not they are members of a conservation organization. An old Indian saying says it very well: "Do not criticize your neighbor until you have walked a mile in his shoes." It is one thing to criticize policy; another to criticize an Individual. In closing, I leave the membership this thought with a passage by Edwin Way Teale, naturalist and Pulitzer prize winner, from one of his books. "THE WAY TO BECOME ACQUAINTED WITH AN AREA INTIMATELY, TO APPRECIATE IT BEST, IS TO WALK OVER IT. AND THE SLOWER THE WALK THE BETTER. IT IS NOT HOW FAR HE GOES THAT COUNTS; IT IS NOT HOW FAST HE GOES;. IT IS HOW MUCH HE SEES. AND IN DEEPER TRUTH, IT IS NOT JUST HOW MUCH HE SEES. IT IS HOW MUCH HE APPRECIATES, HOW MUCH HE FEELS."

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