| Vi Grasso 4/16/91 DPS Chair, 1981 |
It was during my year as Chair that the insurance crisis burst upon the outings sections of the Sierra Club. Relatively few of the (DPS peaks were affected by the prohibition on taking ice axes, crampons, or ropes--five of our peaks are 4th class or above and eight more are 3rd class, and some people might want a rope on one or two of the latter. But the section felt strongly about the issue and we spent much time on it, conducting surveys, coordinating letter-writing effort, and helping to form GROPE (Grass Roots Outings PeoplE. That coalition effort to elect supporters of ededuate outings insurance Knudtson, Barbara Reber, and R.J. Secor to the Sierra Club National Board involved lots of telephoning facilitated by Rick Beatty's bank facilities) and letter-writing. We also encouraged Randy Bernard's preparation of the DPS Road and Peak Guide and the first edition of the Guide did come out by the end of my term.
DALE VAN DALSEM, 5/89 to 5/90
The main thing we did during my tenure as chair was to pull our heads out of the sand on the Desert Protect ion Act, with the following objectives: 1) Spell out exactly which routes to which listed peaks were affected, and by how much extra gain, mileage, & time. 2) Seek out new routes, such as Carbonate Canyon for Old Woman, and the North aproach to Whipple, that were not affected.
3) Support the bill, despite profound personal reservations, so as to not polarize various factions in the Section, and belatedly become a part of the process, to try & reshape the bill to our liking. 4) Work behind the scenes to get some roadhead relief for those peaks most critically affected.
Objectives 1 & 2 were accomplished. The 1991 Senate version of the Desert Protection Act, S-21, is now in committee. It remains to be seen how effective we may have been with objectives 3 & 4!!
-Dale, 4-91
