Misleader Home A Daily Chronicle of Bush Administration Distortion
Photo: Collage of President Bush and White House
Navigation: Who We Are Navigation: Special Reports Navigation: Ask the Experts Navigation: Feedback Navigation: Donate Navigation: Tell a Friend Navigation: Contact Us




A Daily Chronicle of Bush Administration Distortion October 30, 2003

     

Funding for National Parks Is Diverted to Pay for Privatization



President Bush has called our national parks the "crown jewel of America's recreation system."1 His words are not borne out in action, however, as new funding for parks maintenance is diverted toward paying for privatization of 1,700 agency jobs.

While the administration insists that it is fulfilling Bush's $5 billion request in new funds to overcome a maintenance backlog, 120 former National Park Service administrators sent a letter to Interior Secretary Gale Norton in August criticizing the administration for not meeting its pledge to do so.2 In Western parks, the result was a 28 percent cut for maintenance, according to a memo obtained by the Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.3

Claiming "tremendous headway in addressing the President's commitment to reduce the deferred maintenance backlog,"4 a July Interior Department report asserted that nearly $2.9 billion of the necessary $4.9 billion had been allocated. But National Park Service Deputy Director Don Murphy admitted in Senate testimony that only "$200 million to $300 million" was new backlog funding.5

Meanwhile, since August, the Interior Department has designated 12 National Parks as "Park of the Week." The first designated park, Rocky Mountain National Park, was named so in the same month that the administration directed the Bureau of Land Management to eliminate regulations protecting public lands from exploitation by companies drilling for oil and gas in parts of Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, and New Mexico.6

Another three "Parks of the Week" have the dubious distinction of being on the National Park Conservation Association's 2003 Ten Most Endangered National Parks.7 One, Yellowstone National Park, is forced to turn away nearly 60 percent of all school groups who wish to visit.8 Another, the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, where Bush recently reiterated his pledge to eliminate the maintenance backlog, has a two-year waiting list for local schools to participate in the park's educational programs.9

Sources:
  1. Strengthening and Caring for America's National Parks, August 15, 2003.
  2. Ex-Parks Employees Take Aim at Bush, Ex-National Park Bosses Blast Bush, Salt Lake Tribune, 8/16/03.
  3. http://www.peer.org/PARK_SERVICE/Pac_West_Outsourcing_Assessment.pdf
  4. http://www.nps.gov/accompreport2003/fact-sheet.htm
  5. Fact Sheets on the Bush Administration's Destructive Park Policies, Rockefeller Family Fund.
  6. RPT-Investors seek environmentally sound gas drilling, Reuters, 10/3/03.
  7. These are the Denali National Park and Preserve, Shenandoah National Park and Yellowstone, America's Ten Most Endangered National Parks, 2003, National Park Conservation Association.
  8. The Bush Administration and America's National Park System, A Two Year Analysis and Rating, June 2003; Hidden crisis is taking root in U.S. parks, The Seattle Times, 5/25/03.
  9. Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area.



Misleader Archive