Hybrid Trail Crew
The U.S. Forest Service - Ketchum Ranger District (KRD) has more than 400 miles of single-track trail built for hikers, mountain bikers, equestrians, dirt bikes and everything inbetween. The KRD lacks the appropriate annual funding to adequately finance a trail crew for routine maintenance and new trail projects. Without predictable federal funding, the Forest Service struggles to keep up with the constant workload and backlog of trail maintenance.
This is where the Wood River Trails Coalition comes in. One of our focus areas is supporting our local land management agencies’ trail crews so they can worry less about money and more about digging in the dirt. Our goal is to give our land management agencies the financial security to plan for years in advance with trail projects, routine maintenance and hiring crew members. Check out the video below that showcases our partnership!
How we do it
The WRTC and the KRD employ what we call a “hybrid trail crew” model. Due to lack of funding and various federal hiring issues, the KRD cannot field a full crew from year to year. To solve this issue, the WRTC hires the crew members and the KRD manages the day-to-day operations of the crew. They effectively work as a single crew on KRD trails, the only difference is the logo on their shirts. The ratio of KRD employees to WRTC employees on the crew changes from year to year, but our goal is to always have a fully staffed professional trail crew maintaining your trails every year.
The WRTC also has a Collection Agreement with the Sawtooth National Forest – Ketchum Ranger District to fund federal trail crew member positions as needed on a year-to-year basis. This allows the KRD to hire trail crew members as USFS employees if needed, with the WRTC reimbursing the costs of crew members.
This system gives us multiple way to make sure the KRD crew is always fully staffed, and ensures you have a professional crew maintaining the trails you enjoy and love!
Click the links below to view the Ketchum Ranger District Annual Reports.