President Trump's proposed budget for Fiscal 2018 was roundly criticized Thursday by the nation's environmental and conservation community, which said not only that it would "undermine" and be a "disinvestment" in public lands, but could lead to operational reductions across the National Park System. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, however, said it represents a "savings" for taxpayers.
"These cuts are extreme and will result in the degradation of park resources owned by all Americans. These cuts will impact economies of local communities and businesses as parks will be forced to close facilities and shorten visitor seasons," said a statement released by the Coalition to Protect America's National Parks.
The proposal calls for a 12 percent, or $1.5 billion, decrease in the Interior Department's budget. Interior Secretary Zinke, who last week reportedly said he didn't like the budget and would oppose it, issued a statement Thursday applauding it.
"America’s public lands are our national treasures and the President’s budget sends a strong signal that we will protect and responsibly manage these vast areas of our country 'for the benefit and enjoyment of the people'," Secretary Zinke said, adding that it would save taxpayers $1.5 billion.
How the Interior secretary would distribute the 12 percent cut across his many agencies, which include the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Reclamation, was unknown. A request for additional comment Thursday morning was not immediately answered. National Park Service officials also did not immediately respond to a request for how the budget, if adopted by Congress, would impact their operations.
Traveler stories in recent days and weeks (here, here and here) have pointed out the strains national parks are currently dealing with due to funding and staffing shortages in the face of robust growth in visitation, which reached a record 331 million in 2016, the third consecutive year of increasing visitation, while park staffing has stayed stagnant or dropped.
While the Trump administration's budget document said it would put an emphasis on reducing the Park Service's $12 billion maintenance backlog, it also said it would reduce "funds for other DOI construction and major maintenance programs," a seeming contradiction that was flagged by the Coalition.
"While there is a proposed increase in dollars for deferred maintenance, daily maintenance operations essential to the health and welfare of park visitors and resources would be cut and staff reduced. These extreme cuts will be devastating to what some have called 'America’s best idea'," the Coalition statement said.
At the National Parks Conservation Association, John Garder, director of budget and appropriations, called the budget proposal "a non-starter for our national parks, our environment, and our cultural heritage, and should be dead on arrival in Congress."
Mr. Garder pointed to the "deep cuts" it proposed for "the Department of the Interior and key EPA clean water and enforcement programs." Such cuts, he continued, "demonstrate how irresponsible this budget is. The cuts to land acquisition, water restoration and historic preservation programs are nothing short of alarming. Cutting this funding fails to recognize how essential these programs are to protecting national parks, our natural resources and our cultural heritage."
According to NPCA, the president's budget would:
- Cut the land acquisition program that helps protect parks from development within their borders. The Land and Water Conservation Fund is critical to protecting areas within national parks from commercial and residential development and enjoys broad bipartisan support. Cutting this funding fails to recognize the program’s success as one of America’s most effective conservation tools protecting national parks and other public lands important to Americans.
- Eliminate funding for the National Heritage Area program, a $19 million program that supports historic and cultural resource preservation at sites all across the United States through innovative public-private partnerships. They include Niagara Falls National Heritage Area, which helped fund a shuttle system that has increased heritage tourism revenue throughout the Niagara region and at local historical assets like Old Fort Niagara, and Augusta Canal National Heritage Area, which finances preservation of the canal with revenue generated from a restored hydropower power plant.
- Eliminate funding for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, an important federal funding source that has provided $300 million annually for communities and park restoration projects in the region, is used to restore habitat for birds and fish, control invasive species, and reduce runoff from cities and farms to a improve water quality for the more than 30 million people that depend on the lakes for their drinking water.
- Eliminate the Chesapeake Bay Restoration Initiative. With more than 50 national parks in the watershed, eliminating the Chesapeake Bay Restoration Program threatens the overall health of the Chesapeake by stopping the progress made to restore native oysters, which help filter and remove pollution. These cuts would also stop the implementation of the bipartisan Chesapeake Bay Clean Water Blueprint - a historic and comprehensive pollution reduction plan for restoring clean water in the region’s streams, creeks and rivers.
- Eliminate the South Florida geographic program, which helps ensure clean water flows through Everglades National Park and Loxahatchee National Wildlife Refuge by monitoring and enforcing the pollution limit and working with the State of Florida on the Stormwater Treatment Areas, a successful state-federal partnership that has resulted in improved water quality for the Everglades.
- Eliminate opportunities for local input and environmental review of energy development near national parks and other sensitive areas. Administrative reforms such as the elimination of Planning 2.0 are already threatening the air, water, wildlife and visitor experience at iconic parks such as Zion, Mesa Verde, and Carlsbad Caverns, and further cuts to programs that facilitate a balance between energy development and park protection will only exacerbate these problems.
At the Outdoor Industry Association, Executive Director Amy Roberts said the budget would be devastating to rural communities.
“Outdoor recreation businesses drive spending and sign paychecks in rural communities, but they certainly couldn’t thrive if public lands and waters were closed or left without active management,” she said. “The places where America plays, and the products Americans use in the outdoors, wouldn’t exist without those other made-in-America jobs—those of the federal land managers, park rangers, and biologists who safeguard our lands and waters so we can enjoy them.”
At the Center for Western Priorities, officials noted that Secretary Zinke last week said he would "fight for the budget. I looked at the budget. I’m not happy, but we’re going to fight about it and I think I’m going to win at the end of the day.”
Greg Zimmerman, the Center's deputy director, said Thursday that, "President Trump’s budget cuts funding for America’s parks, public lands, wildlife, and water resources at the expense of communities across the West. With the Interior Department already under strain, this budget appears intended to break the agency. Secretary Zinke gets it. But if today’s announcement is any indication, the new Interior Secretary lost the budget battle with the White House. It’s a big loss for America’s parks and for the public.”
At The Wilderness Society, Cameron Witten, the group's government relations and budget specialist, said the proposal "would wholly undermine and disinvest in" the public landscape.
"Our public lands provide invaluable benefits to the public health and safety of all Americans, and to our national economy. They filter our air, they purify our water, they support vibrant wildlife populations," he said. "They sustain our fisheries, they provide resilient ecosystems, they are the foundation, the backbone of the renewable energy revolution that is going to help address climate change and power a clean, sustainable future. So let's be clear. This budget is undermining that heritage, the heritage of all Americans, our shared public lands, our shared outdoor and wildlife resources. And it makes no economic sense."
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Comments
Decades of mismanagement resulting in an alarming out of control maintenance backlog. You progressives have created this mess and now you have to live with it. We will not blame Trumps budget. NPCA and Wilderness Society are part of the problem and they should instead propose how the NPS changes to fix the problems they created.
Not sure why you state that progressives "created this mess". Park Service funding dove under Bush to a growth of only one percent per year from about nine percent per year in the 1990s. From the 1980s to the mid 2000s Park Service funding fell about 25% when adjusted for inflation. Funding has been a battle under many administrations. Congressmen of both parties vote for new parks because they look good, rather than funding maintenance.
A 9% increase per year in the 1990s? It's no wonder Bush had to apply the brakes on that. I am on the Board of Directors of a four-season recreational community, and if we ever proposed 9% increases, we would be charged with mismanagement of funds. I am a NP user and contribute to charities that support the environment, but I am pragmatic, too, and trust the Trump will be first looking to cut out the fat.
Nope years of sequestration and grid lock from our lovely Congress. Republicans own this.
Trump's Political Appointees will facilitate the disruptions/down-sizing of Federal Agencies from within:
https://www.propublica.org/article/meet-hundreds-of-officials-trump-has-...
Wonder How Many NPS Employees Voted for TRUMP? Redwood NP's Management has had several high ranking charlatans politically-driven like the former Chief of Technical Services, L. L. Purkerson, who had little interest in coastal redwood forest ecological resource issues; in contrast, to the Redwood NP Founders, all passionate volunteers who were on the front lines fighting to perpetuate and to protect the last remaining fragments of ancient coastal redwood forests within a National Park
Today, there is an obvious lack of natural resource knowledge and passion within selected NPS superintendencys, many of whom have had a Law Enforcement Career, and have been rewarded through promotions to gain the highest compensation during their last three years prior to retirement.
i was nps and gladly voted for him. alot of waste in nps and gov wide.
Decades of liberal mismanagement? How about decades of bipartisan mismanagement or have you already forgotten the George Bush years? Give me a break. This budget is a disaster for our National Parks and Trump owns it because its his bill. Simple as that.
Dear Pffftttttfffftttt:
When I quoted one line of your comment [This budget is a disaster for our National Parks and Trump owns it because its his bill. Simple as that.] I had no idea that one of our resident Trump Apologists would take it upon himself to vent his spleen at me three times in different posts to attack me personally for what you said and I meerly agreed with. Goes to show you that when bullies never advance their skills above junior high school debate club they do keep on trying to bully, no matter how poorly their aim. Perhaps in the future he will more accurately attack you. Over to you for now.
The so-called mainenance "backlog" is not the fault of "progressives" or the National Park Service. It was artificially created by anti-public lands members of Congress — mostly Republicans — who refused to appropriate the needed funds.
It's not like we cannot afford to adequataly fund the National Park System. The agency's budget is only 1/15 of 1 percent of the total federal budget. Trump cannot be blamed for past failure to adequately fund the NPS. But now, his proposed budget doubles down on this failure, and he cannot escape the blame.
Trump may not care about our national parks, but tens of millions of Americans — including many who voted for him — do care. If these reckless cuts in the NPS budget comes to a vote, Trump and members of Congress will be hearing from a lot of angry constituents who refuse to just "live with it."
How the Interior secretary would distribute the 12 percent cut across his many agencies, which include the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Reclamation, was unknown.
What the Park budget is going to be, no one has a clue, but that doesn't stop many from making accusations.
This budget is a disaster for our National Parks and Trump owns it because its his bill. Simple as that.
This.
OK Rick, what is the 2018 NP budget?
Wally, you are correct that the build up of the park maintenance backlog didn't occur only under progressives, but it has been the progressives (both Republican and Democrat) that have generated the $20 trillion deficit that must be addressed. Oh, and BTW, Bush was a progressive, at least fiscally.
Doesn't it seem fair that shortfalls for funding parks and park programs should come from those who benefit? Taxpaters, including many who never step foot into a park in a particular year, are funding parks with tax dollars. I enjoy federal and state parks. I enjoy the freedom to visit them. I don't presume to expect others to subsidize my enjoyment. Last year, national park system said there were over 300 milion visitors. Raise the fees by $5 per visitor and the proposed $1.5 billion cut is fully funded by users. Double my fees and my attendance won't change.
Rick Gallagher, I agree with your view of user fees except as a regular reader of the traveler it would appear to me that the NPS has in many cases already Far surpassed the $5 you mention in the last year and like business everywhere found new ways to charge people. Things like a fee to watch the sunrise for instance and fees to walk on a frozen lake. I have lost faith that the NPS can manage their budget and prioritize the money it already has. It is almost a guarantee anytime you have an overly large bureaucracy like the NPS. It's a difficult task to be sure but that doesn't mean they should get a pass either. It is also foolish to blame one administration or rather party more than another and then at the same time cry about how broken government is. While guilty of it myself from time to time the blame game only serves to distract from identifying the real problems munch less being able to fix them.
Wonder What Percent of the Federal Workforce Voted for TRUMP ? NOTICE to Federal Employees: No TRUMP Dividends for YOU !
RETIRE or LEAVE NOW while You Still Have Some Retirement and Medical Benefits Left !
http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/16/news/economy/federal-job-cuts-trump/inde...
It's going to be very, very interesting when the Fit Hits the Shan and people begin to realize how much they have come to depend upon services provided by all those awful bureaucrats.
I was at our federal building the other and heard a guy wearing a Trump T-shirt whining loudly about the "long wait" he had before anyone in the Social Security office could talk to him. (Average wait up there is a little over an hour, they say.) How long will the wait become after they cut all those extra bureaucrats? And who will they blame then? Obama? Bush? Jefferson? (Drumpf will just fib his way around any responsibility and Sean and Kellyann will spin it up good.)
Then what will happen when all those federal jobs are eliminated and a few hundred thousand "unnecessary" employees hit the unemployment lines? But those jobs probably won't count in Drumpf's statistics. After all, he just said that those unemployment numbers and stats on new jobs were fake before he was elected, but the statistics from February were absolutely correct.
It's becoming more and more apparent that the Liar In Chief hasn't thought all his ideas through beyond campaign promises.
Thank goodness I'm retired. But since I depend upon a pension and Social Security, I'm not sure if anything is safe there.
I had an interesting experience the other day. One of the medications I take -- a generic -- went from $6 per month to $100. I asked a pharmacist about it and he said the cost of meds in America are driven upward by about four layers of middlemen between the manufacturers and the pharmacy. In Canada, the same medicine would cost about $4 per month. Why? Because in Canada there are no middlemen. Why do we have middlemen? Because Congress caved in to lobbyists and now requires that pharmacies cannot go directly to manufacturers. They also passed some laws that make it almost impossible for anyone to obtain meds from Canada. I found a way to do it that and just paid $14 for a 3-month supply.
The pharmacist also stated that many in their business firmly believe that it was not the Affordable Care Act that caused problems. Instead it was a shady coalition of drug manufacturers and insurance companies working to do anything they could to sabotage the ACA.
I know that has no direct bearing on parks, but think it's a good illustration of how badly both parties of Congressional career politicians have messed things up for all of us. The press is not the enemy of the people. The real enemy is Congress and the powers that have bought them.
=============
I just learned that Drumpf's budget for the Federal Aviation Administration also calls for outright privatization of Air Traffic Control. Thus airport control towers and enroute facilities will be "private" enterprises. The airlines have been pushing for this for years because they feel they should have priority over general aviation traffic. General aviation has nearly died in recent years. Many of us who once flew light aircraft can no longer afford to fly. This will probably put the final nails in the coffin.
While airlines complain that the ATC facilities and upgrades have fallen far behind where they should be, a careful look brings about the discovery- again -- that Congressional political games are largely responsible for the current problems.
It's amusing to realize that it's almost a dead certainty that many, if not most, of Drumpf's supporters are among those American who feel most entitled to whatever the government is willing to hand them. It's gonna be fun watching them as all this hits them in their wallets or with a slap of incenvenience.
And of course Rick has yet to provide us with the NPS budget for 2018, yet without hesitations he proclaims "This budget is a disaster for our National Parks" He has no idea what the budget is but makes the unequovical claim that it is a disaster for the parks. Typical baseless accusation. Kind of like those (maybe including Rick) that claimed Trump wasn't paying taxes and it turns out he was paying a 30% higher rate than Obama and twice the rate of Bernie. Totally unsubstantiated accusations and now they run and hide.
I just took a look at the Drumpf "budget" proposal. It contains little more than his campaign talking points and very little in the way of specifics or actual numbers.
He's tossing the bouncing ball to Congress. Whatever happens will be their fault and not his. Nice way to dodge, Donald.
Lee - read the Constitution, it is the role of Congress, specificially the House, to come up with the specifics and actual numbers. But then, maybe it is Rick that is making up the budget since he claims to know the numbers.
And contrary to your claim, I would say Trumps proposals contain quite a bit of specifics.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/16/politics/trump-budget-cuts/
But as the article states: "Congress will have the final say"
psst: Air traffic control is privatized in Canada and the UK. Don't fly over that airspace!!!
Esteemed Comrade, here is a link to the actual Drumpfian budget: https://apps.npr.org/documents/document.html?id=3518196-2018-Blueprint
Here are a few gems of specificity clipped from it:
Reduces staffing in USDA’s Service Center Agencies to streamline county office operations, reflect reduced Rural Development workload, and encourage private sector conservation planning.
(Have you had any personal dealings with already understaffed Ag Extension offices?)
This from plans for the Department of Commerce :: "
"Strengthens the International Trade Administration’s trade enforcement and compliance functions, including the anti-dumping and countervailing duty investigations, while rescaling the agency’s export promotion and trade analysis activities."
From Defense:
"Increases DOD’s budget authority by $52 billion above the current 2017 level of $587 billion. This increase alone exceeds the entire defense budget of most countries, and would be one of the largest one-year DOD increases in American history. It is exceeded only by the peak increases of the Reagan Administration and a few of the largest defense increases during the World Wars and the conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan (in constant dollars, based on GDP chained price index). Unlike spending increases for war, which mostly consume resources in combat, the increases in the President’s Budget primarily invest in a stronger military."
(A Christmas gift for the military/industrial complex)
Education:
"Eliminates the 21st Century Community Learning Centers program, which supports beforeand after-school programs as well as summer programs, resulting in savings of $1.2 billion from the 2017 annualized CR level. The programs lacks strong evidence of meeting its objectives, such as improving student achievement."
(Ask teachers in inner city schools what they think of the program. This has been a political hot potato for a long time because it sends money to "people who don't really deserve it." Statistics depend entirely upon which study you look at. )
From Interior:
Ensures that the National Park Service assets are preserved for future generations by increasing investment in deferred maintenance projects. Reduces funds for other DOI construction and major maintenance programs, which can rely on existing resources for 2018. (Sounds encouraging, but I'll believe it when I see it.)
Compare this budget proposal with those of previous administrations. They are easy to find online.
Looks good to me, Lee.
You are right, ec, that we don't know the exact amount of the NPS budget right now, but it doesn't look too good. Even thought it sounds like Congress will reject the big chops everywhere, the presidential budget often acts as a baseline. And with attendance increasing (see another thread) the NPS needs more money to handle the visitors.
All Americans benefit from national parks. It goes way beyond just recreation.
Saying that all parks should be funded from fees is like saying that all freeways should be toll roads. Our Interstate System is funded by a gas tax, which everyone who drives has to pay — whether or not they ever drive on the Interstate. That is because the System is seen as benefiting all Americans. The same is true of our National Park System.
The benefits of national parks include storing carbon and preserving adaptive ecosystems to fight climate change, preserving native biiological diversity, saving endangered wildlife, producing clean air and water, buffering adjacent farms and communities from storms and other major disruptions, fostering public education, enabling scientific research, and providing huge economic benefits to people living in towns around the parks.
Economists have looked at this issue. For example https://www.hks.harvard.edu/news-events/publications/hks-magazine/archiv...
Another issue is that if fees go too high, people with modest means may no longer be able to visit the national parks that they own.
The National Park Service budget is only 1/15 of 1 percent of the federal budget. Even if we zeroed out this budget, it would have no significant impact on the total budget.
If Trump wants to find places to save money, why doesn't he address the $125 billion (with a "b") in waste, fraud, and abuse that the Pentagon's own audit revealed? https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/pentagon-buries-evidence-o... Instead, he wants a massive increase in this already-wasteful budget.
How typical. Let's look at the Pentagon's budget for cuts. Why is it that some folks just cannot understand that the DoD should be the best funded organization within the entire government? There are entire Cabinet level departments whose existence is Constitutionally questionable, and should be the recipients of the Golden Fleece Award, yet you want to look at DoD. There are components of DoI that we don't need.
Let's get rid of the fat, of the unconstitutional departments, of the thousands of senior level personnel who don't add a thing to the country. Let's stop subsidizing stuff that rightfully should be the responsibility of the states, counties, and cities.
Trump won because he promised to drain the swamp. There are a lot of swamps to drain.
Actually, they indirectly are. The freeways are primarily paid for by gas taxes. So the ones that use them, other than the all electric cars, are paying for them.
Hi ec,
Yes, I pointed out that the Interstate System is paid for by gas taxes. However, not everyone uses the Interstates equally and some drivers hardly ever use them. Try to find an Interstate freeway in central Nevada, the Four Corners region, the state of Alaska, or most of the Great Plains. The people who live there pay just as much gas tax per gallon as people who commute to work every day on I-5.
I do not have a problem with that model. I think it makes sense (though the tax needs to be increased to account for years of inflation). My point is that we should also fund the National Park System primarily through broad taxpayer contributions, not user fees.
error
The gas tax monies aren't limited to the interstates. The states get those monies for state and even county roads as well. In Colorado almost the entire DOT budget comes from federal gas taxes, state gase taxes or fees and taxes on car registration. In fact, the gas tax is probably the closest we have of a program funded directly by the users. It has its flaws, varying gase mileage, electric cars, etc. A mileage based tax would be best if the privacy concerns could be overcome.
What I am not understanding is why these parks are not self-sustaining? Disneyworld, Disneyland, Lego land, etc, all are private and able to make profits, where the parks are subsidized to maintain their ability to stay open. Maybe the national park service should try and look at that buisiness model in order to stay open instead of "conservationists" whining about budget cuts. And the journalist here shuld also keep in mind that the DOI budget cut is for the WHOLE department, not just to the national park budget. Raise the fees by five dollars and I bet that would more than curtail any budget cut to the nastional parks.
No, Robert. What the parks do NOT need is a more business mode of operating. The parks are a part of our national wealth and heritage which are worth our investing in for their intangible value as well as tangible, and which we are entrustusted to protect and preserve. The business mode would lead to resource extraction, which is resource depletion, and although some say it can be done without harming the rescourse, somehow they always just seem to muck about and make things worse. Mountain top removal, dumping coal waste in running water, the well documented hazards of fracking, and on. No, Robert No.
//typoes edited//
I agree, Rick. Disney's a for-profit company and charges I think something like $100 per person per day.
America's "best idea" that the national parks be available to all Americans regardless of their wealth is an idea I'd say is worth sustaining/aspiring to.
Make park prices equal to Disnyland prices? Is this really what you want? But some modest increases would be a really good idea.
Disneyland Tickets
1 Day 1-Park Ticket - Value
$91. Ages 3-9
$97. Ages 10 +
1 Day 1-Park Ticket - Regular
$104. Ages 3-9
$110. Ages 10 +
1 Day 1-Park Ticket - Peak
$118. Ages 3-9
$124. Ages 10 +
2 Day 1-Park Ticket
$187. Ages 3-9
$199. Ages 10 +
well, I won't be visiting again. I am a senior and can't afford those prices. Our family made a annual trip to Yellowstone, but no more.
G Brand--
If you're a senior (62 or older), your family needs you! As a senior, you get an annual Senior Pass for $20 that gets you and everyone travelling with you in the same (non-commercial) vehicle into all NPS parks, FS Forests, FWS refuges, BOR, BLM, and other federal lands with entrance fees. That's way below the $70 cost of a 7 day pass for just Yellowstone. And, after you purchase 3 of those annual passes for $20 each year, the 4th time you pay the $20, if you turn in your previous passes or receipts you get a lifetime senior pass.
G - For $40 you will stop going? Did you go when gas was $5 a gallon? At current prices, gas savings alone likely covers that $40.
And, GBrand, your senior pass covers all of your younger family members in the same car with you.