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Meet The Press: National Park Service Director Addresses National Press Club

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National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis addressed the National Press Club on Monday, touching on a wide range of issues, from sexual harassment problems in the parks to the Zika virus.

National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis expects to hear of more incidents of sexual harassment or misconduct from his agency once a hotline is set up to receive reports.

"Once they see that we are taking action, I expect the numbers of reported incidents to increase. Not that there are more cases, but I think that employees now are feeling more empowered to speak up and step up," he told a gathering of the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on Monday. "I expect that to occur not only in the National Park Service but in other agencies that are seeing what’s happened to the Park Service and are following our lead.”

The director addressed the situation with sexual harassment and misconduct during an hour-long appearance before the press club. Half of his talk was devoted to questions from the audience.

Last month Director Jarvis outlined to his far-flung field staff of roughly 20,000 employees a "zero tolerance" policy that was being implemented in response to a sordid chapter of sexual harassment that last for years at Grand Canyon National Park.

"Some have asked what it means for the National Park Service to have a zero tolerance policy for sexual harassment," the director wrote in a memo emailed system-wide. "I want to clearly state that this means that when incidents of harassment are reported, I expect NPS managers to follow up on those allegations. Specifically, in situations involving alleged harassment, including sexual harassment, I expect NPS managers to initiate an investigation of the allegations and to act promptly to ensure that the harassment, if confirmed, does not continue. I also expect appropriate disciplinary action to be taken if any allegations are verified. To ensure that this can happen consistently across our organization, I have asked a leadership team in Washington, with input from regions, parks and programs, to develop a roadmap that will guide these efforts."

During his talk Monday to the National Press Club, Director Jarvis said that a survey to be taken later this year of NPS staff would help managers determine how best to approach, and tackle, the problem of sexual harassment and misconduct.

"First and foremost we need to establish a baseline of how prevalent this is in the National Park Service. I honestly don’t know, and we’re not going to know until we do a well-crafted survey of all employees that’s done with protection of anonymity," he said. “Once we establish that baseline then we can understand more specifically how to take action. We are jumping on top of any, obviously, reports right now, and I’ve set a standard with my senior leadership of what I expect how to implement a zero tolerance policy in terms of quick action, protection of the victim, and zero tolerance for this work for this horrible component."

He assured the press club audience that the hotline would be designed to permit employees to file complaints about their immediate supervisors, if necessary, and not suffer consequences on the job.

During the Q&A period, Director Jarvis touched on a wide-ranging number of topics:

* The Park Service's $12 Billion Maintenance Backlog

"We understand our maintenance backlog at sort of an excruciating level of detail. We really, really know this down to the brick," he said. "So about half of our backlog is in what I would call the transportation side. So that is the roads-and-bridges piece. That is not an easy thing to raise philanthropic money for. That’s something that is the responsibility of the (congressional) appropriators, and we do get a significant amount of funding out of the transportation bill. And there is now a five-year bill to address high priority roads and bridges in the National Park System.

"The other half, which I would call non-transportation assets, about half of that are what I call high priority assets; these are those that are directly related to the visitor experience, or of high significance value. The Lincoln Memorial, for instance. A nice little asset that you might consider a high priority asset of the National Park Service. In some cases, those we can raise philanthropic dollars for, and certainly all of you know that we have had significant contributions from individuals like David Rubenstein to repair those as well.

"And we have a campaign with the National Park Foundation to address many of those issues. But we are also going to need a steady supply of federal appropriations, and we have asked the Congress to respond to that. We have centennial legislation before them that would give us greater flexibility with our existing revenues, such as fees, and generate some new revenues that we could address the maintenance backlog.”

* On Recognizing Sponsors And Donors To The National Parks

“First of all, we have always had relationships with corporate America. From the very beginning of the national parks," said Director Jarvis. "It was the railroads that built most of the major lodges, the old historic lodges, like the El Tovar (at Grand Canyon). And throughout my 40 years we’ve had long-term relationships with corporate America without selling out. Without renaming, or, 'This park brought to you by...' We just don’t do that. We sit down with corporate America and say, 'What are your goals?, these are our goals. This is an area you can’t go, and we’re not going to allow that.'

“I think you should trust us that we are protecting these assets from branding and labeling. It is not the direction we’re headed. What we’re trying to do is sort of modernize our philanthropic capability for the Service, for the National Park Foundation, and all of the friends groups that raise money for us.”

* On Congress's Love-Hate Relationship With The National Park Service

"I’ll probably get in trouble for telling this story, but when I go on the Hill regularly to meet with members of Congress, there has been, historically, bipartisan support for the national parks. A long tradition of great support, both sides of the aisle," he said. "Sometimes different priorities. When I go and testify before a committee, there’s a lot of sort of finger pointing and accusations made about the national parks, but when I go into the offices of certain individuals, they pull down the shades and they get out their park pass and want me to sign it.

"And they tell me their latest national park trip story. So part of the issue, in my estimation, is that there is a sort of a political agenda around that nothing in government is good, and it’s hard to admit that, if you say that, that there is this aspect of government that they actually like, which is the national parks."

* On "Overcrowding" Some Parks Are Experiencing

“We are experiencing record levels of vistiation, as a result of the centennial, the Find Your Park campaign, our outreach, the media coverage, all of that. This past year, 2015, the last year we kept record, we surpassed 312 million visitors," said Director Jarvis. "Let me put that in perspective: That is more than all of Disney, more than all of national football, national baseball, national basketball, soccer, NASCAR, combined. And we do it on a budget (equal to) the city of Austin, Texas.

"The way I view this is when the public comes to national parks, something happens. Yes, it can be somewhat overwhelming for our employees, which is the state of the art right now. But you are deepening that connection, and that connection translates into support, as a volunteer, as an advocate, through a variety of advocacy groups out there, friends groups at the local level, support to Congress, and so I think there is an upside to the visitation side. And it also is inviting a generation that perhaps didn’t know about these places. Our goal is not to just raise the numbers, but to increase the diversity of that visitation as well.”

* On The Threat Posed By The Zika Virus

“We certainly haven’t gotten to the point of considering closure (of parks), but we definitely feel that Zika is going to be a significant problem in the southern tier parks. The Eveglades, Biscayne, Big Thicket, a number of these areas, Dry Tortugas, these are all southern tier parks that have large mosquito populations," Director Jarvis said. "This particular species (Ae. albopictus) is not really a species that breeds in the water of the Everglades, it’s much more of a human contact species. But we have been working with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention specifically on information for the public and information for our own employees who work in those environments as well.”

You can watch his entire talk here:

Comments

D-2:  On #2:  The "Senior Leadership Team" ratings I was referring to is the one which was in place when the 2015 "Best Places to Work in the Federal Government" survey was taken.  This can be easily accessed on Tahoma's link.  The NPS was ranked 278 out of 318 "Agency components", well into the lowest quadrile (0-25%), and with a lower score from 2014.  Jarvis still has his job, but things will surely be better now that he has shuffled some chairs. 


It has been more than chair shuffling. The number 2 person in this agency who has been largely responsible for so many things being swept under the carpet for so long to protect the NPS, is now in one breath gone. Reynolds the well liked and highly capable AD problem solver has been handed the keys to the kingdom and told to "fix it." Several old guard folks waiting in the wings have been passed over for perhaps the number 2 superintendent spot in the system, in favor of a fresh face who is worshiped by most people who have worked for or with her. D-2 is spot on. And his depth of understanding of what has actually been occuring in the last few months is illustrative of someone who actually knows useful information instead of the usual knick knack paddywhack of disgruntled peanut gallery members.

Never ceases to amaze me how people can take lemonade and complain about the lemons in it.


Backpacker--As to the latest "Jarvis scam", there was already a maintenance backlog when I retired, long before Jarvis became Director.  I saw it in every park in which I worked.  Give it a rest.


I don't think Mike Reynolds can be given much credit for his work with HR with the information we have so far.  I'm not sure it is clear the changes are working or will work.  I guess time will tell.  The employee viewpoint survey index score for HR specialists under his watch are pretty low in comparison to other federal agencies.  Keep in mind employee engagement correlates positively with performance.  Index scores were not offered for HR Specialists until recently, so there isn't historical data to conclude that the scores dropped due to recent changes, or that they are actually rising from an even lower level.  Unless things have change dramatically since I left NPS, the kinds of problems within their HR program are unlikely to be resolved very quickly.

Many HR specialists will not agree to confidentiality without qualifiers, and it should never be assumed, regardless of employer.  In my experience, expecting and requesting confidentiality will limit what HR and management are willing or able to do about the complaint.  I would be unlikely to call the hotline I were experiencing some of the harrassment I've read about.  Instead, I would shell out some money to spend an hour or two talking to my own personal legal counsel first.  I haven't seen enough so far to convinence me an anonymous or confidential complaint will result in any real accountability, or whether or not the response to sexual harrassment within the National Park Service will be substantive or lasting.  

Personally, I believe sexual harrassment as a concern trumps climate change in importance. I don't doubt the science regarding climate change, and I believe it will have far-reaching consequences on the geopolitical stage.  The difference is that the negative consequences of sexual harrassment are not equally shared, while no one will escape from climate change.

As far as the maintenance backlog, I would like to see a policy with a sunset provision that NPS will not accept donor funds for new projects unless the project and its future maintenance is cost-neutral, fully funded through philanthropy and won't divert appropriated funds from the maintenance backlog.  Also, no new buildings, roads, trails or interpretive displays until the backlog reverses.


Thank you rebecca and d-2 for informed and well written post. I am with you both. 


D-2 claims the NPS's decade-long decline in BPTW scores are a poverty-driven "morale problem" rather than a clear sign of poor leadership.  Jarvis sees his 'another survey' response to NPS sexual harassment as a model for other agencies "...that are seeing what’s happened to the Park Service and are following our lead.”  

Welcome to the parallel universe of bureaucratic spin.


Ha h....a a survey done by Gary Machlis! For over how many years has never been seen at a aconference without being surrounded by bevy of interns........."mentoring."


Maybe I'm not quite as uninformed as a couple of commenters have assumed.  I have heard mixed things about Mike Reynolds.  His previous position was Associate Director in charge of Workplace, Relevance, and inclusion for about 2 1/2 years.  This would seem to have oversight into sexual harassment issues.  Ms. O'Dell, the Deputy Director who one commenter blamed for many of Jarvis' coverups, was indeed very abruptly sent into retirement.  I don't know why, but she was the highest ranking female in the NPS. 

I find it amusing that Director Jarvis claims to know every "Brick" which needs to be replaced in the maintenance backlog, but seems so unknowledgable about his own employees that, 7+ years into his tenure, he needs yet another employee survey to inform him how pervasive sexual harassment is in the NPS.  Interior Secretary Sally Jewell recently acknowledged that the publicized Grand Canyon scandal may be the tip of the iceberg.  I hope Mike Reynolds can and will turn this situation around, but we've heard similar promises before that were not kept.


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