The U.S. Forest Service is working diligently to see that the issue of who owns a 1460-acre parcel in the San Juan National Forest near Mancos is resolved.
That’s the message that Dolores District Ranger Nicholas Mustoe is trying to get out to the public.
When a group calling itself the Free Land Holder Committee claimed that it owns the parcel, and then put a barbed-wire fence around it, their actions triggered a landslide of concerns.
The site in question is in the middle of the popular Chicken Creek area, used regularly by hikers, horseback riders, cross-country skiers, and other recreationists. Many were shocked to find wire crossing the area, although there were some gaps left in it to allow continued access.
On Oct. 9, local residents convened on the land and took the fence down.
But that also raised concerns and questions about why the fence had been allowed to be put up in the first place and who should have been handling the situation.
“There are a lot of people who use this area,” Danette Dillon of Mancos told KSJD that day. “It’s part of a whole network of trails.”
Montezuma County Commissioner Gerald Koppenhafer was helping take down the fence because it crossed land where he and Bruce Tozer have a grazing permit. Koppenhafer said the wire – which he described as so cheap and flimsy that heavy snow could cause it to stretch and break – had cut off a calf from its mother. He was critical of both the Forest Service for letting the fence go up and Montezuma County Sheriff Steve Nowlin for having been in contact with the Free Land Holders group off and on for some time.
“He’s legitimizing this by talking to them,” Koppenhafer said.
Nowlin and a half-dozen sheriff’s officers stood by on Oct. 9 as the fence was dismantled, making sure the event was peaceful.
Nowlin pointed out that he doesn’t have jurisdiction over federal lands except in cases involving violent crimes such as assaults.
“I’m spending taxpayer money on this when the Forest Service should be dealing with it,” he said.
“I do not have the authority to enforce any federal laws,” he reiterated later that day at a gathering in Mancos’s Boyle Park. “This is not a criminal matter, it’s civil.” He said it needs to be resolved in court.
Mustoe told KSJD the Forest Service, which does have its own law officers, did not know ahead of time about the fence going up.
“It wasn’t clear to us what the claims of ownership were until the same day the fence came down.”
He said the agency informed the group on Oct. 9 that the fence needed to be removed.
“Our interests all throughout this have been not to raise tensions and not to put any person at undue risk,” Mustoe said.
He said there is a different interpretation of a federal person being on the ground in a situation and an ordinary member of the public being there.
The Free Land Holders group maintains they own the land because of a claim dating back nearly a century ago and involving the Homestead Act of 1862, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, and a number of other historic documents and technicalities.
Mustoe said the United States government has held title to the land since 1926 and the parcel has been administered by the San Juan National Forest since 1927. “There hasn’t been a dispute about this from 1927 through most of 2024,” he said.
KSJD could not reach Patrick Pipkin of Mancos, who has acted as a spokesperson for the Free Land Holders, for comment.
Mustoe said during his time with the district, which is not quite a year, the Forest Service had tried to contact Pipkin on other issues. “We never had our mail picked up,” he said. As far as he knows, no one from the group has come to the Dolores District office.
On Monday, Mustoe told KSJD nothing has been filed in court so far regarding the disputed claim.
“We are working through every legal and administrative avenue we have to bring this to resolution,” he said. He said the Forest Service is working with other agencies to collect “the things we need to prove our case if we’re going to be in litigation.”
“I know this community has a lot of concerns and questions,” Mustoe said. “We have been working on this nonstop since we were made aware of this. We’re committed to seeing this through and settling the issue.”
Mustoe said he has tried to be as accessible as possible to the community to answer their questions.
He said he wishes he had gone to the gathering in Boyle Park, but he thought it was going to be a protest, so he stayed away. When he learned it was a gathering of concerned citizens just seeking information, he was sorry he didn’t go.
“A long-term resolution of this issue is our goal,” he said.