Three rescue efforts have been launched already this month in the federally controlled land adjoining the Heavenly Mountain Resort -- straddling the California-Nevada line south of Lake Tahoe -- after skiers exited the resort through gates in order to ski the backcountry.

A Douglas County statute prohibits bypassing a man-made barrier designed to prevent skiers from leaving the resort, but, "We are not saying anyone who goes out into the backcountry is in violation of the law," said Douglas County Sheriff's Sgt. Tom Mezzetta, clarifying matters for The Associated Press this week. "If they don't intentionally bypass a man-made barrier, then they are not in violation."

U.S. Forest Service officials appear to be taking an even more laissez faire attitude. "We do not consider it a crime to leave the permit area," Forest Service spokesman Matt Mathes said Monday. "It goes against our grain to close the national forests. Our guiding principle is that national forests are public lands and we should not restrict access to the public's lands. If someone wants to leave the ski area boundary and ski into the backcountry, that's their prerogative as a citizen. We do not consider it a crime."

Pardon us if we seem a bit breathless. Mr. Mathes' remarks are as refreshing as one of those frosty forest fairylands they're always showing in the breath mint commercials. Did he actually say, "Our guiding principle is that national forests are public lands and we should not restrict access to the public's lands"?

Many in the West have prayed for this day, of course. But are we really to believe the Forest Service and other federal land management agencies will now stop excavating huge pits -- or placing enormous boulders between concrete stanchions -- to block access to roads and trails that the public has been using for a century and more to access the backcountry in Nevada and elsewhere in the West?

Is Mr. Mathes really authorized to guarantee us the default setting is now changed? That instead of ticketing hunters for pulling their vehicles a few feet off the track to glass an area for game -- contending this constitutes "unauthorized off-road travel" -- our Western federal land managers now take the attitude that, "We should not restrict access to the public's lands; if someone wants to (enter) the backcountry, that's their prerogative as a citizen"?

No more "permission slips" required? No more ban on perfectly safe target shooting in the uninhabited box canyons off Lee Canyon Road? No more citations for "unauthorized camping" if a tired hiker caught out at twilight unrolls a sleeping bag and waits for dawn beside the trail in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area?

It would be a wonderful day if all this were true. If only it were true.