Didn't the parks get about half their annual budget in the "stimulus" giveaway last year?
Oh, and the increase in entry fees is pointless if there is nobody at the gates to collect it. (This has happened to me several times, where at the entrance there's a sign that basically says "We'll get you at the back side, which they usually don't) Since the parks get the same amount of money regardless of what they collect at the gate, it makes more sense to deploy their people where they feel they're more needed. Just a single example of the brilliant management of our natural resources.
We like to think of our parks as apolitical. The buffalo in Yellowstone and the bears in the Great Smoky Mountains don’t think too much about what happens on Capitol Hill. But the guy in charge of protecting these animals and their environments does have Capitol Hill on his mind, and he has one thing to say: Give us (or rather, the parks) the money.
Tom Kiernan, president of the National Parks Conservation Association, wrote last week in the Huffington Post:
“…despite President Obama’s 2008 campaign pledge, this Administration’s current budget does not address the funding shortfall national parks are facing. Due to years of inadequate funding, national parks such as the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone face a $580 million operating shortfall and have accumulated a $9 billion backlog of deferred maintenance work.”
Kiernan goes on to say that although the Park Service budget is just one tenth of 1 percent of the overall federal budget, the national parks support an estimated $13.3 billion of local private-sector economic activity and 267,000 private sector jobs. Every federal dollar invested in national parks, he writes, generates at least $4 in economic value to the public.
As the National Park Service approaches its 100th birthday in 2016, the NPCA is working on key areas—from wildlife to clean air–to make sure the parks are healthy and well-cared for. But despite the 5 percent park visitation increase since the recession began, and while the NPCA has been advocating to hire more park rangers to meet the needs of more families and school groups, underfunding will prevent the Park Service from continuing to invest in those key areas.
That’s bad news for the animals and the rangers—and for all of us planning to hit a park this year.
