Treat national parks like the jewels they are
Published 9:00 pm Thursday, July 27, 2006
The director of the National Park Service, Fran Mainella, announced her resignation Wednesday. May she ride her proposal to have more snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles in our national parks into the sunset.
One of new Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne’s first actions, to his credit, was to scuttle Mainella’s recreation-heavy rewrite of the parks’ management policies. A new draft leaves out the increased snowmobile/ATV proposal.
With Mainella’s resignation, it’s time for the agency to return to its focus on conservation. It can start with administrative costs. The Associated Press reported that lawmakers who oversaw the Park Service budget called Mainella to Capitol Hill in March 2004 after records showed she and other agency employees spent $94 million on travel in two years. Yes, $94 million. While our national parks are suffering under a budget and staffing crisis, Mainella and other federal employees spent $94 million on travel.
Mainella defended the costs, saying she was the first director to visit many smaller and lesser-known national parks. But visiting parks doesn’t do anything to help them. Especially when the visit is to essentially determine where the ATV rental shop could go. (A study released Thursday shows how climate change will dramatically affect the parks … can we let the idea of introducing more pollution go?)
Our parks do need help. In April, the federal Government Accountability Office released a report that investigated park spending from 2001 to 2005. While funding increased slightly, the researchers found, inflation and rising costs outstripped any gains. Concerns about “deteriorating conditions” in the 390-park system were valid, the report concluded. Parks have reduced services and cut visitor center hours, educational programs, custodial duties and law enforcement operations.
A June report by the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees found the same problems when it surveyed 37 national parks.
It’s true for Washington’s 13 national parks, including the big two: Olympic and Rainier. Some 10 million people visit the state’s national parks each year. They suffer the same symptoms noted in the reports: Not enough rangers, frequent visitor center closures, fewer nature talks and poorly maintained trails, roads and bathrooms.
It’s time to reverse this embarrassing neglect. The 394 parks are our nation’s treasures and deserve to be treated as such. It’s time for Congress to fund our parks adequately and hold the National Park Service, and its director, accountable for the stewardship of our tax dollars and our parks.
