Former NPS Official Found To Have Overlooked Environmental Regs Said To Be Next Acting Director

A former top National Park Service official implicated more than a decade ago for improperly paving the way for the owner of the Washington Redskins to cut down trees on a 2-acre scenic easement along the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park is expected to become the agency's next acting director, possibly as soon as next week, National Parks Traveler has learned.

P. Daniel Smith, who retired in 2014 after 10 years as superintendent of Colonial National Historical Park in Virginia, will return to the Park Service on Monday as deputy director and then be named acting director, according to sources. Mike Reynolds, who has been acting director since Jon Jarvis retired a year ago, must relinquish the position as it was limited by a 300-day appointment.

April Slayton, the Park Service's assistant director for communications, would not immediately confirm the appointment but referred the matter to the Interior Department's communications staff. Heather Swift, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke's spokeswoman, did not immediately reply Thursday morning to Traveler's inquiry on the matter.

Two sources, one inside the Park Service and one outside, told the Traveler of the pending appointment. An internal email obtained by the Traveler, from Lori K. Mashburn, the Interior Department's White House liaison, announced Mr. Smith's upcoming return to Interior.

Mr. Smith, at the time special assistant to then-NPS Director Fran Mainella, was found by the Interior Department's Inspector General to have "inappropriately used his position to apply pressure and circumvent NPS procedures" to permit Redskins owner Dan Snyder to have trees up to 6 inches wide at breast height on the easement cut down to improve the Potomac River view from his mansion.

According to the investigation by then-Inspector General Earl Devaney's staff, the Park Service failed to conduct the requisite environmental assessment as required by the NPS Director's Handbook before issuing the special user permit to Mr. Snyder.

Smith had become involved in the matter in 2002, according to the OIG report, and in 2004 called Chesapeake and Ohio Canal staff to say that, "Snyder was not happy with the pace of negotiations with NPS concerning the scenic easement."

"The C&O NHP Lands Coordinator admitted that after his conversation with Smith, he felt pressure to secure an agreement with Snyder," the report (attached below) added. "He related that he met with Smith at least twice after the call, once at Snyder's residence in June 2004 and another time on the C&O Canal towpath below Snyder's residence."

Caught up in the episode was Robert Danno, who was chief ranger at the historical park at the time and found himself maligned for raising the matter with superiors. A career Park Service ranger with an impressive resume, Mr. Danno seemingly was exiled by the agency for blowing the whistle on superiors who ignored well-established federal laws and agency policies and procedures in allowing a billionaire to chop down trees in a scenic easement.

He was busted from his chief ranger's position and, at one point, assigned to approving picnicking permits and, at another, given an office with virtually no tasks. He later reached an unspecified settlement with the Park Service and moved from Antietam National Battlefield in Maryland, where he managed the battlefield's boundaries, to Montana to work at the Arthur Carhart National Wilderness Training Center. 

Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, was disappointed that Secretary Zinke would bring Smith back into the Park Service.

"It is disturbing but perhaps indicative that the Trump people would resurrect a political hatchet man to take the helm at the National Park Service. In the Snyder-gate affair, Smith demonstrated a complete lack of respect for protecting park resources or for following established safeguards," Mr. Ruch said in an email Thursday. "It is also noteworthy that the IG investigators found Smith to be untruthful and that his mendacity prolonged the investigation at taxpayer expense – showing a troubling comfort level with alternative facts.

"Besides being a political-fixer, Smith also presided over a campaign of retaliation against the whistleblower, Chief Ranger Rob Danno, who reported the illegal tree-cutting to the IG. A recent survey of Interior employees found not only high rates of harassment but also reported retaliation," the PEER official added. "If promises by Secretary Zinke to change the culture of the Park Service are to be believed, then bringing in someone like Dan Smith is not only at cross-purposes but reinforces the very worst aspects of the deep dysfunctionality plaguing NPS."

President Trump has yet to nominate a permanent director for the Park Service. Interior staff have said a name was forwarded months ago but has yet to be acted upon.

After the tree-cutting episode, Mr. Smith was appointed superintendent of Colonial National Historical Park in Virginia. That park was in the news last year because of the Trump's administration's support and approval of Dominion Power's plan to erect a more than 7-mile-long line of transmission towers running near Historic Jamestowne and Colonial National Historical Park.

Mr. Smith was said to be against the transmission line.

Dominion Virginia Power maintains that its proposed Surry-Skiffes Creek-Whealton Transmission Line, which will cross the James River between Surry and James City counties with 300-foot-tall towers, is the best way to maintain a healthy power grid in the area. But groups including the National Trust for Historic Preservation, National Parks Conservation Association, and Preservation Virginia maintained there were less-damaging solutions that wouldn't need to span the river and invade the historic setting.

The Interior Department's position on the transmission line project changed when President Trump took office.

Mr. Jarvis, before retiring, had said in a letter to the Army Corps of Engineers that the project would cause "severe and unacceptable damage to this historically important area and the irreplaceable and iconic resources within it."

"Running power lines through the landscape where the earliest days of American history were written will forever change the ability of Americans to experience and understand our nation's earliest day," the letter also pointed out.