Pomme De Terre's Finest

[Claybuster]

Got a little present while we were out having some family fun........Lightfoot ramp was a mess to say the least !!! Parking lot full..... Two slots of the ramp unusable....... Now I'd like to take a poll.......

If a person owns an annual pass to one corp of engineers lake "Smithville" shouldn't this said pass be good for any corp of engineers lake??? Park ranger Jared says "NO"

Now given the amount of $$$$ that most boaters have invested in equipment, boat, truck, licensing, fuel, maintenance........ Do you think a 3$ day pass is going to deter a person from using a boat ramp???

I simply forgot to fill out the pass and got this gift on my windshield!!!!

Won't be back in Hickory county for a while!!!!

How many times do I have to pay the MAN!!!!

Income tax

Sales tax

Personal property tax

Real estate tax

I think I made my point

[REDSOXWSCHAMP]

I got one of those at cedar ridge one time, called jeff city gave them the ticket number, and my pass number, THEY SAID OK, disregard the ticket then. try giving them a call, see what they say.

[Ranger Dave]

It is my understanding that an annual pass is good at all Corp owned and operated ramps. My pass does not indicate any particular lake or ramp. It simply states it is a Corp Annual Pass.

[Claybuster]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that Smithville lake is operated by "clay county" but owned by the Corp of engineers!!! My Smithville pass doesn't look like the lovely C.O.E pass that I had to purchase....... Hmmmm,,,,, I r so confused <)))))<

We did manage to catch a few fish and had a fine day of tubing with the kids, so with that said pomme is still a great lake.

[MOPanfisher]

The Annual Pass for Clay County is not valid anywhere else but those parks run by Clay County. If you had an annual pass for COE managed areas then you would be golden (sounds like you have one now). FYI there is no one at Jeff City who has any thing to do with the COE Annual Passes, only the Project Offices or the KC District Office.

[Claybuster]

Hmmmm,,,,,,, so if my truck is licensed in clay county is it illegal to drive it on HICKORY Co roads,,,,,?

[MOPanfisher]

Nope, it is licensed in the State of Missouri, and the licensing is recognized by other states as well.

[zarraspook]

The other thing about State Parks ( at lakes ) DO NOT recognize the CORPS Golden Passport..... You pay the full fee if you want to camp on STATE Grounds on a CORPS lake !!!!!

[fishinwrench]

I got one of those from Pomme once. I forgot about it. Nothing ever happened.

Several others have done the same and the result has always been the same. I don't think they follow-thru on it at all and I am inclined to believe it is simply a compliance thing. Most folks get handed/delivered a "citation" and it freaks them out... "OMG I AM A CRIMINAL, I MUST CLEAR THIS UP IMMEDIATELY" so they fork up the dough ASAP.

It's a head game, and it IS working....isn't it? Otherwise you wouldn't give a crap about that meaningless piece of yellow card stock.

Nothing is binding there. Did you sign into a contract with them?

[MOPanfisher]

Normally the license is run for owner information, and a letter is sent, a few ignore the letter and a second letter gets sent, few ignore both. The third letter has a citation included it. Most folks just go ahead and buy the annual pass, because its cheaper at $30 than the citation at $75, plus they get something useful for a year. Its easier for us than writing a bunch of citations, and its better for the customer. Some will fall through the cracks, due to mistakes in writing down the license # and the reading of it, sometimes comes back "not on file", sometimes comes back to someone who doesn't even know where the lake is. My intent is to enforce it as fairly and consistently as possible. Not everyone will be "caught" who doesn't pay, but when they are they have the two choices. have only had one here make it to Federal court, lasted about one minute. Judge said is this your license number, was it there, pay the fine. I can gurantee you that field folks at the lakes did not want and still don't like the day use fee program, however that was handed down from Congress in the Omnibus Budget Act of 1993 and we didn't have any choice. The monies collected do not go back to the lake, or even the COE, they go to the General Treasurary of the United States to be distributed back out in the next budget package.