Most Western States have a lot of US Forest Service lands. Arizona's no exception. The Verde Valley is basically surrounded by Forest Service land and numerous large pockets of public land exist with the valley itself. The Verde River long ago provided a natural boundary marker with which to divide various Forest jurisdictional boundaries. Four National Forests--The Coconino, The Prescott and the Kaibab and the Tonto technically each have a chunk of some portion of the Verde's geography. The "Coke," as it's called and the Prescott (pronounced Press-KIT) are the two major players. Two Ranger Districts vie for Top Dog of the Verde. One is the Sedona-Red Rock District and the other is the Verde District.
Our own personal career became involved with the Verde District way back in 1981-1982. By the time 1989 rolled around we actually had an official agreement to use a small portion of the maintenance area for an office of the Verde NRCD. We worked for years ON the Verde District property without ever being an official Forest Service employee. Dear Friend Tom Bonomo was the District Ranger all of those years. Tom retired a few years ago and a Dee Hines took his place. Well, Dee moved over to the Apache-Sitgreaves earlier this year and the powers that be finally got around to naming his successor. She's Celeste Gordon who's most recently of the Coronado National Forest. A story about her is available here.
We're interested in the new Ranger because she will be working closely with Dear Friend Dexter Allen who's the Wild & Scenic River Ranger for the Verde River. Dexter has his warehouse there on the Verde District even though his actual office is over in Sedona. Hopefully, the new Ranger will be very supportive of Dexter's program. We thought it would be useful to put up the article about her here for future reference.
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