In a move not entirely surprising, U.S. Rep. Don Young of Alaska has proposed legislation to create a mechanism for states to take over management of national parks and other federal lands.
It's not surprising in that a number of states -- Utah, Colorado, Arizona, South Dakota, New York, and Tennessee -- stepped up last week to underwrite the costs of reopening parks in their states during the government shutdown.
As written, the legislation would require a state to put up at least 50 percent of the costs of running the national park in question to have its petition considered by the Interior secretary. If a state provided 55 percent of the costs of operation, it would receive 55 percent of the revenues that park generated. States would not be given title to the land.
States that gain such authority could relinquish it by writing the Interior secretary and asking to be relieved of its authority. The secretary also could void the agreement if the state defaults on payments or is found to have breached its agreement.
Introduced this past Tuesday, the bill has no cosponsors.
Comments
The wilderness should be managed as wilderness to begin with. In the Smokies, they are ramming fees down our throats despite overwhelming public outcry and the largest government infusion of stimulus funds, (4 times their annual budget) because they answer not to local stakeholders. The NPS operates without oversight and gives the states no say so in their operation. Another reflection of Jon Jarvis and his cronies and their "make them feel the pain" mentality. I've accepted that the NPS culture (at the top end) is irrevocably corrupt and not going to change. Dropping control back to individual states would have some perils in the form of protection from corporate entities and concessionaires. However, at the rate the NPS is going now, the public will have no access to the parks anyway, which is why they restrict backcountry use in the Smokies when backcountry use is on the decline to begin with. The NPS sees humans as the problem and seeks to reduce their numbers in these areas through fees. Local control would fix that problem here in the Smokies. I do not believe that the NPS is underfunded. I believe that they are overbloated on the salary end if you look at all the bureaucratic levels within the system. State parks have very little of that and respond to public input or some local politician will get skewered. Our republican delegation in Tennessee sits on their hands while one particular senator dictates what happens in the Smokies while his son runs a private resort that operates their own trail system in the park. Its business as usual in the NPS and if anyone within the agency complains, then they get Ranger Dannoed! Jarvis brought this on himself and I'm afraid I agree with the proposal.
SmokiesBackpacker, I must admit I agree that charging fees for hiking trails goes against my own bias or feelings about backcountry and wilderness use. I can see reservation fees, entrance and camping fees, but to hike a trail? The argument is that the user of the resource must help pay the freight, but it is a sliping slope. In any case, I know Smokies has a prohibition against charging entrance fees. A tough one to be sure.
Backpacker...
One large paragraph full of a bunch of absolute statements and emotional appeals. I'm not going to piecemeal them out and disprove your absolutisms - many have already been done in these pages. Let me simply state that your sweeping personal opinions are not universally accepted.
The salary range for the Tennesse State Park Director is $72K-$130K. The total acreage of the Tennessee State Park System is 166K acres. Ditmanson is in charge of more than 500k acres in two states and made $170k in 2012.
Twenty National Parks have an acreage of at least 500k. Only 6 states have more than 1/2 million acres in their state park systems. 23 states have between 100k-500k acres and the other 21 have 100k or less.
http://www.tn.gov/dohr/class_comp/pdf/alpha_comp_plan.pdf
http://php.app.com/fed_employees12/search.php
http://www.rff.org/RFF/Documents/RFF-BCK-ORRG_State%20Parks.pdf
http://leg.mt.gov/content/Committees/Interim/2011-2012/EQC/Meeting-Documents/January-2012/parks-admin-rocky-mountains.pdf
Sara,
Ditmanson's salary is significant, thanks for sharing. How about the salaries of the "backcountry specialist", chief ranger, assistant superintendent (who is, by the way, the wife of Ditmanson's boss, Gordon Wissinger in Atlanta) and dozens of other top heavy bureaucrats within the system? With a 20 plus million dollar annual budget (Obama stimulus funds notwithstanding) would the state of TN fund a shooting range, automatic rifles, riot gear and three dozen shiny new 4wd vehicles at 40 grand a piece? No. Because they would have to answer to someone, unlike the arrogant bureaucrats at the NPS. And the state of TN deed restricted Newfound Gap road to keep fees from occuring in this donated park. There is a lawsuit pending and if the federal judge doesn't dismiss this case against the federal entitity, many things will be illuminated as to the shady dealings of the NPS and Ditmanson's ilk in these parts. Fees are just a tip of the corrupt iceberg around here.
EC, Yosemite Park backlog maintenance dollars exceed 470 million. If you include the concession operated facilities, (owned by the NPS, like the Ahwahnee Hotel), the figure is 556 million. There maybe be those that question the numbers, but I can tell you there are significant infrastructure issues within the park. It gets quite complicated, as funding comes from many sources including the fee demo programs. Yosemite gets a huge return on fee demo dollars, as it collects both entrance and camping fees. One of the issues, as congressional appropriations continue to be reduced (remember the second round of sequestration is now hitting our parks), pressures mount to increase or find new fees or other sources of revenue. It is a very discombobulating cycle. Could go on and on, but the failure to invest in our parks (and nations) infrastructure needs is very poor policy, at least in my own view.
rmackie - Can you tell us where that number comes from and how it was determined. Is there a specific list of projects with dollar estimates to complete. Is that all maintanence or does that include a wish list of new endevours as well? And most imporatant, why isn't all this info in the public domain. I know that when I had a boss, if I had some project I wanted funded, I darn well would have a detailed analysis of the scope, cost and benefit.
Here's the total dollar amounts of deferred maintenance by park as of Sept 30, 2012:
http://www.ketv.com/blob/view/-/21184798/data/1/-/99vgs4/-/NPS-DM-by-State.pdf