[GeoStL] St Peters geocaching policy update

  • From: "Susan Ring" <susanmring@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <geocaching@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 1 Sep 2004 22:51:15 -0500

-
Hi everybody,
Oh boy, I've been dreading spreading the word on this one.  When I got back
from vacation there was this lovely email from Jeff the parks guy in St
Peters:

Susan, it was decided that to allow geocaching on city property we will need

a Certificate of Insurance and issue a permit to the organization or user.

With this information, I would recommend that you remove the caches on St.

Peters property. I look forward to discussing this activity with you again

when the insurance requirements can be met.



I replied to him that I would request that all  caches be disabled while we
considered our options.  Right now I don't think that just appealing to the
parks people again would be very productive.  I sought the advice of those
wise geocaching gurus RGS and Brawny.  Here's roughly what we came up with.
I have emailed the owners of SP caches asking that they voluntarily disable
their caches as a sign of good faith and cooperation with the city. I have
disabled my own caches with a note briefly explaining the situation.

I encouraged the cache owners and now am encouraging any cachers who are
RESIDENTS of SP to contact their elected officials (aldermen), introduce
them to geocaching and make the point that we pay the taxes for the parks
and yet are not being allowed to use them.  Also that our hobby is an
individual activity, not unlike rollerblading, running, sledding, etc.  All
these activities are allowed without restriction in the parks and if an
individual belongs to a skating club, cycling club etc,  that club is not
required to provide insurance for the individual  activities of its members.
Still, the main point to me is that I pay taxes and my hobby is far safer
than a lot of what goes on in the parks, but we're being singled out because
geocaching is new and takes some effort to understand.

This might sound bad, but I would also discourage anyone who is not a SP
resident from contacting the city.  SP gets pretty darn defensive against
"outsiders" and it just wouldn't be helpful at this point.

Anyway, guys, I've done about all I can do for now.  I forget who I've told,
but I'm taking a class this fall for the first time in 20 years.  It's a
very demanding class and also very important to the future of my career.  So
my meeting with any alderman is going to have to wait for quite a while.  If
anyone wants to pick up the crusade and run with it, that would be
wonderful,  but I just don't have the mental energy or time to deal with it
now.

Sorry it turned out like this.  I guess for future reference, this may be
important to  think about when we approach other land use managers.  I
really didn't anticipate this obssession with liability.  Well, let the
SP-bashing begin.

Susan








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