Gov. Butch Otter has another alternative in his tool box for responding to the Idaho Legislature's refusal to raise taxes to meet the $240 million annual road maintenance shortfall.

He can reduce the size of the state's road system. That sounds like blasphemy, but hear me out.

When the U.S. Forest Service backlog on road maintenance ballooned to $10 billion over its 400,000 miles of roads in 192 million acres of national forest, the Clinton administration came back with the 2001 roadless rule. It banned new roads in 58 million acres of national forest.

The rule didn't solve the problem but it changed the debate. Most of the people who opposed the roadless rule were residents of rural areas in national forests who more regularly used the roads that frankly were getting a lot less use than the costs of maintenance justified.

One of the roads I think about is the South Fork of the Salmon River road to Yellow Pine. Taxpayers have spent more than $25 million over the past 20 years to rebuild the road that is not the exclusive route to the tiny forest hamlet.

Politics, not need, keeps that road open. Now I happen to be one of the people who uses that road sporadically and I've been glad it was there. But can we really afford it?

The roadless rule kept the Forest Service from truly addressing the problem because it gave them a political out. Prior to the roadless rule the agency had approved a long-term transportation policy that required the agency to determine what "minimum road system" was necessary to meet the needs of the agency and its forest users.

In 2007, former assistant Agriculture secretary for forests and conservation Mark Rey explained in a letter to Congress how the agency was adjusting to the fact that it didn't have the funding to meet its road maintenance needs.

The Forest Service "reduces availability of roads to public traffic and also reduces the standards of the roads that are made so available, to miles of road and levels of road service that are sustainable at current budget levels."

Otter could take one of the two approaches to the current state maintenance shortfall.

He and the transportation board could develop a "minimum road system," and take public comments on it. Or he can take Rey's approach and simply reduce the standards on roads so they don't have to be maintained at the current costly level.

So what would these two approaches look like? In our area there are two roads that take you to Lowman from Boise.

Decisionmakers can decide which road should get the highest maintenance and reduce the standards on the other road. When I was a kid the bridge on my country road washed out and it was several years before it was replaced. We all just drove the other way.

Idaho 21 to Stanley is a great road but hard to maintain in the winter. For years it was closed most of the winter. You can get to Stanley through Ketchum, it's just longer. Think of the savings.

North-central Idaho has a great road to Elk City. But now that the mill is closed there do we really need such a good road?

I think of all the roads I love in eastern Idaho's rural areas, say the road from Ellis to Howe up the Pasimeroi. Do we really need it paved? How about from Dubois to Island Park? Roberts to Menan? I could go on, but you get the picture.

If lawmakers are serious about saying we can't afford the taxes to pay for the road system they need to make decisions about what roads we don't need.

I suspect many of the people in the environmental community will offer some ideas. Imagine what it could do for open space.

I know many farmers would be satisfied to see some roads returned to gravel roads if it meant fewer people would come around. Maybe this will come up in the interim committee.

Rocky Barker: 377-6484