Anticipated Responses to a Fee Program: The Key is Trust

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Abstract
Anticipated responses to a proposed recreation fee program were examined through the use of focus groups and self-administered questionnaires. Varied communities of interest (based on ethnicity and recreation activity groups) and communities of place (based on residency within a National Forest boundary and greater geographic proximity) were targeted for the study. Conditional acceptance, and in some cases outright disapproval, were expressed during the group discussions. Social trust was revealed as the most significant predictor of anticipated impacts of new fees, general attitudes towards the recreation fees, and amounts respondents were willing to pay for daily and annual passes. Age, ethnicity and income were less helpful in understanding public response to fees, even though there were distinct differences between the communities. The importance of social trust to understanding the responses of these selected communities suggests the need for greater consideration of trust in agency/public exchanges.