In recent years, snowmobilers in the Lake Tahoe Basin have had a tenuous relationship with environmentalists and other winter sport enthusiasts who accuse them of ruining everyone else’s fun with noise and air pollution.

Local snowmobilers, however, justify their sport as one not only for recreation but with a purpose.

Several point to the recent mountain disasters in Oregon as a cautionary tale, and one where those owning snowmobiles were called to help.

In the basin, a 2001 decision by the U.S. Forest Service led to a ban on snowmobiles operating on three quarters of Tahoe Meadows off of Highway 431.

Forest service officials said a similar prohibition in parts of South Shore is also slated.

Beyond search-and-rescue volunteerism, snowmobilers feel they give back to the environment more than many winter sports enthusiasts.

North Shore resident Bob Kellogg, who owns Eagle Ridge Snowmobile Outfitters, said he bankrolls upkeep of forest lands through licensing fees.

“Some of them (environmentalists, cross-country skiers, etc.) would like to have us out completely; they think their way is the only way to winter recreate,” said Wayne Fischer, president of the North Tahoe Snow Travelers Club, a local snowmobile group. “To me, that’s a little bit arrogant.”

Others do not agree.

A recently published report from the Winter Wildlands Alliance, a non-motorized winter recreation advocacy group, concluded that federal and state agencies need to further restrict snowmobile access.

“(T)he winter opportunities for motorized use on national forest lands in the West far exceed the winter opportunities for non-motorized use,” the report concluded. “It is time to bring management of forest lands back in balance.”

Snow Travelers Club spokesman Fischer noted other winter enthusiasts have opportunities to recreate in silence.

“There is more than enough areas to winter recreate in non-motorized areas,” he said. “A good example is the Marlette Lake area, where everything between Incline Village and Spooner Lake is completely off limits to us.”

Fischer also objected to claims that snowmobiles damage the trails.

“When you snowmobile over five feet of snow, you don’t cause any environmental damage because it all melts away,” he said. “You could have a million snowmobiles – or cross-country skiers or snowshoers – go down a single path without anyone noticing; the same isn’t true of a million hikers or mountain bikers.”