I live in Utah and I am taking time today to write to my legislators and express how horrified I am about restricting access.
One of the great things about this state is the wilderness access, including rivers. I talk to many people who came to live here for that very reason.

Sounds like the United Kingdom of Utah. Seriously any navigable waterway should be open to the public from if you are within the defined river channel. No one should be able to own the river bottom. Action like this could lead fishing down the road that hunting is on now. Everyone with a stream running through there land could not only lease land for hunting but fishing rights as well. Slowly some people seem to have a desire to push both sports to where only the entitled will have access.

I personally have a cabin in Utah with a spring fed pond that is stocked with rainbows, brooks, browns, and tiger trout. We stock it just enough so that the fish can naturally reproduce and have plenty to eat. We flyfish barbless hooks and always practice catch and release. When Utah passed the law that people could wade in a stream surrounded by public land, it threw us into fits. We had people go from East Canyon River, and follow our outlet stream right onto our land. They would walk up our tiny outlet stream, which can hardly even be considered a body of water at all, duck our fences and NO TRESPASSING signs and gates, and walk 800 yards up to the dam of the pond and fish. We pulled up one day to a jackass with a can of worms, and a 5 gallon bucket full of our beautiful and expensive fish (all dead). He apparently figured that he could get his limit of fish at our expense. He was not even below the high water mark like the law specified. He was standing right on the earthen dam. People just used this law to gain access to our private pond, and then got out of the creek. That is why the law was changed. Too many people were doing things like this, and being inconsiderate of private lands. They wouldn't stay below the high water mark, they used the streams as a means get into private lands, and when they thought no one was watching, they would climb out of the stream. That just goes to show you, the true measure of a man is his actions when no one is looking. Apparently there are not enough men of strong moral fiber in Utah. You would think Utah of all places would have better moral fiber with all of us Mormons. Don't get mad at the legislators, get mad at your fellow sportsmen who have inconsiderate tendencies. I would surely be on the other side of this argument if I had not seen first hand how the law was abused. It sucks when a couple of @$$ holes ruin it for everybody.

UPDATED - here is where you are able to download a copy of the bill.

http://le.utah.gov/~2009/htmdoc/hbillhtm/HB0187.htm

the folks in UT should start kicking and screaming and fight ANY proposed legislation to restrict the access that their courts have ruled they have. Living in MT, i can tell you that stream access is the great equalizer for those who utilize the rivers. the gazillionares can own the land and have their stream-side cabins (read mansions) but us peons can still fish the river.

I live in Utah. I sent an email to my State Senator concerning this bill and received a reply back from her today. Her reply was that she was going to vote against this bill. Hopefully sportsmen here are taking time to make their feelings heard.

I agree 100%. That's your land and property. If it's public then so be it.
And, I don't want to sound like a a**hole here. But, landowners rights go back to the settling of the west, where landowners had to fight off the cattle-drivers from using their land to graze their cattle.

Here in MT, the law works exactly because of the ethical practices used by the vast majority of river users (Blackfoot tubers aside). It also works because trespassers are prosecuted, or greeted with warning shots, when they abuse the law. At my cabin on the East Fork, I set up picnic tables and put a sign up asking that people pick up litter and such in exchange for allowing access above and beyond the law. My frontage is always left completely clean and natural.

Stream access is just one facet of Montana's science based and populist common sense fisheries policies. One that gets less attention but has been even better for the rivers is the focus on restoration of habitat for clean, clear, cold, and connected waterways, instead of farming and stocking.

Whether or not these common sense laws would work in Colorado or Utah I don't know. Maybe the ethical sportsmen are just outnumbered in some places. Maybe McLean said it best: "The world is full of a$$holes, their numbers greatly increasing the further you get from Missoula, MT".

If the water access rights law is overturned, this will be a huge step in the wrong direction.

Some of us can't afford to pay thousands of dollars to get private access.

I bet Donny Beavers of the Spring Ridge Club sure approves of this law. Heck, he's probably thinking of moving his operation out to Utah now.......

It makes me sick