National park managers should not be proposing higher entrances fees, according to U.S. Rep. Tom McClintock, who thinks the parks should boost traffic by offering "recreational opportunities" in the parks.

The Republican's comments were specific to a proposal by Yosemite National Park managers to boost their entrance fee by 50 percent, from $20 per week per carload to $30.

"Last year, Yosemite Park management sought to drastically reduce the park’s amenities that attract visitors and generate revenues. This year, it seeks to increase admission fees on those same visitors by 50 percent," the congressman said. "Raising fees in a stagnant economy makes as much sense as a shopkeeper raising prices in a sales slump. Contrary to assertions by park managers, tourists don’t go where they’re not welcomed, and the national parks compete for tourism with a vast array of other destinations. The National Park Service has apparently not conducted any economic study of the impact of this proposal on park visitation, but simply asserts that attendance is not dependent on price. Yet prices almost always impact demand, especially when consumers have a wide variety of other choices available to them.

"I am sensitive to NPS attempts to recover costs from park users rather than general taxpayers, but the appropriate way to do so is to increase the recreational opportunities within the park that attract visitors – not to impose arbitrary fee increases that discourage them."

On the other side of the country, U.S. Rep. Walter Jones, R-North Carolina, recently took a swipe at proposals by Cape Lookout National Seashore to tighten ORV regulations and institute permit fees for the vehicles.

"American's hard-earned tax dollars already pay for the operation of the seashore; they shouldn't be charged an additional fee to access it," Congressman Jones wrote to seashore officials in opposing the proposed management plan.

Neither congressman spoke of increasing the National Park Service's budget to avert entrance-fee increases.