Roxanne Quimby should be in the news again, but for some reason her latest “achievement” has been kept under the media radar. The wealthy Burt’s Bees founder, who is busy using her millions to buy up thousands of acres of Maine wild lands, has been named by President Obama to a directorship on the National Park Foundation (NPF).

Is this a big deal? Does the Quimby appointment hold ramifications for Maine?

Although the National Park Foundation has performed some good work over the years with respect to our wonderful national park system, it is, by its very nature, not an ally if you happen to be a Maine citizen who does not want our job-producing industrial forest immobilized and transformed into a federally managed National Park. Neither is Roxanne Qumby, for that matter, a friend of Maine. For, despite her apparent willingness to compromise some on allowing certain forms of traditional use on her 120,000 acres, there is no escaping the real Roxanne Quimby.

The woman is vehemently anti-hunting. Although Yankee Magazine recently speculated, in an article about Quimby, that she was trying to bring about a “thaw in her relations with sportsmen and Maine residents,” a review of her public pronouncements should leave no doubts about where she is coming from. Quimby told Yankee Magazine in 2008:

“To me, ownership and private property were the beginning of the end in this country. Once the Europeans came in, drawing lines and dividing things up, things started getting exploited and over-consumed. But a park takes away the whole issue of ownership. It’s off the table; we all own it and we all share it. It’s so democratic.”

Quimby is not only a shrewd, self-made businesswoman who knows how to get her way, she is, in all probability, a clever tactician who will do what she has to do to acquire more and more Maine forestland, including accommodating some Maine groups that she would rather not. Clearly she is an activist who will not rest until she sees her wealth turned into a federalized National Park in Maine. She once said, “I feel like my reason for being put on this earth will have been fulfilled because this ( a National Park in Maine) will live on after me. A park is a demonstration that there is something in America that I can love.”

That last sentence bears repeating and should give all of us insight. She said, “A park is a demonstration that there is something in America that I can love.” It is an outrageous but familiar refrain not so unlike the campaign utterance of Michelle Obama. Upon her husband’s ascent to the Presidency, she said “For the first time in my life, I am proud of my country.”

It is not hard to read between the lines. The common denominator in these pronouncements by Roxanne Quimby and Michelle Obama is that both of these kindred spirits have been ashamed of their country until something happened to exalt their own self worth: a presidency and a park. The ultimate irony is that, for all her wealth and land ownership, Quimby is a counter-culture type who is self-avowedly opposed to private ownership of property.

The peril for Maine is that money does talk. Quimby’s closest ally, RESTORE — the organization that is pushing for a 3.2 million acre National Park in Maine — is banking on the fact that opportunistic timberland owners will sell to the highest bidder, even if it is Roxanne Quimby. Given her enormous wealth, it seems logical that there is a lot of wheeling and dealing going on behind the scenes, much of which Maine citizens won’t hear about until after the fact.

So to repeat, is the Quimby appointment to the board of the National Park Foundation a reason for concern? Of course!

As outdoor blogmaster Tom Remington wrote,” This political appointment puts Quimby into an influential position along with other viros in the Obama administration to promote the agenda for a Federal takeover of rural Maine to replace private ownership and local government with Federal forced wilderness preservation.

Stay tuned.

V. Paul Reynolds is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal and has written his first book, A Maine Deer Hunter’s Logbook. He is also a Maine Guide, co-host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network (WVOM-FM 103.9, WCME-FM 96.7) and former information officer for the Maine Dept. of Fish and Wildlife. His e-mail address is [email protected].