thebigcanoe
Well-Known Member
Wow. This reads like a congressional hearing.
Back to the main topic...
Is the water on at the slips and pump out dock yet?
Back to the main topic...
Is the water on at the slips and pump out dock yet?
Park Service Incompetence
- Thread starter Skip
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As the oarlock creaks the fact remains, visitation to our public lands continues to increase every year and budgets for managing these areas stay flat or go down. I would say that public lands and waters are part of this country’s infrastructure and we have all heard the political chatter about that. Petitioning your representatives is really the only way to improve those things that are important to you.
The NPS general operating fund has decreased by 5.2% since 2009. See https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42757.pdf. All this while visitation has increased by about 45 million per year.
I'm not sure where that figure comes from. The "Summary" page of that document seems to say something different.
Gem Morris
Keeper of San Juan Secrets
The Federal Budget constantly grows. It's the nature of the beast.
Do you realize WWII was funded by "War Bonds"? That is, NOT taxes. People buying War Bonds to support the war effort.
The $4T that flows thru Washington DC every year is literally beyond comprehension. It's no wonder the swamp is so wide and so long and so deep. Every elected official's brother's wife's son's neighbor is sucking off the teat and eating at the trough.
I don't know that the swamp can ever be drained. Is it worth trying? I guess? What else it there to do? How else can we save ourselves and country?
Certainly a lack of funding to the NPS is NOT the problem.
I couldn’t care less about seeing the tax returns of a billionaire who steps into government office for the first time in an attempt to drain the swamp. I would however like to see the tax returns of a "lowly public servant" who retires with $10 Million after 40 years of "service". I won't mention any names to protect the innocent but his initials are Harry Reid.
Do you realize WWII was funded by "War Bonds"? That is, NOT taxes. People buying War Bonds to support the war effort.
The $4T that flows thru Washington DC every year is literally beyond comprehension. It's no wonder the swamp is so wide and so long and so deep. Every elected official's brother's wife's son's neighbor is sucking off the teat and eating at the trough.
I don't know that the swamp can ever be drained. Is it worth trying? I guess? What else it there to do? How else can we save ourselves and country?
Certainly a lack of funding to the NPS is NOT the problem.
I couldn’t care less about seeing the tax returns of a billionaire who steps into government office for the first time in an attempt to drain the swamp. I would however like to see the tax returns of a "lowly public servant" who retires with $10 Million after 40 years of "service". I won't mention any names to protect the innocent but his initials are Harry Reid.
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Ryan
Keeper of San Juan Secrets
I haven't gone all the way through this, but the charts on the first few pages show growth as well.
Keeping this Lake Powell focused, is there anywhere to find what the NPS budget for GCNRA is, in enough detail to tell us/taxpayers anything? It would be of interest to me and I'm sure others. It would also be interesting to see where the NPS priorities are compared to what us/users think needs funding. And we may see uses of funds that we didn't understand were required. Is this available anywhere? It would have to be in enough detail to make sense, not just $xx,xxx,xxx to GCNRA. I think I recall someone searching for this information in the past years on WW, but I don't recall specifically.....
Read the paper. Page 5, first paragraph. As I indicated in my post, the number I quote relates to the operating fund. That is the fund that pays for day to day operations like water service, emergency medical, law enforcement, education/interpretation. The number you are referring to includes all NPS funds and also money for 2018 hurricaine relief. Keep in mind money provided for historical preservation, land acquisitions, etc cannot be siphoned off for operations. If you read the conclusion, total funding for NPS is down 8%. "Counting the supplementals, the total NPS discretionary appropriation for FY2018 was 5.6% higher than FY2009 in nominal dollars but 8.0% lower in inflation-adjusted dollars.
Whew! A sensible post. I don't know the answer but agree this would be of interest to us all. Rather than expound on "The Swamp" and trashing the government and NPS ad nauseum, maybe we can focus on the Park we know and love and come to understand the challenges, achievements and failings of its management. I'll see what I can find.
Ryan
Keeper of San Juan Secrets
Baseline budgeting. That is what i was referring to as well. And it isn’t just if the budget doesn’t increase. It’s if the budget doesn’t increase as much as they anticipated.
Yes, I read that. I purposely skipped quoting that sentence in my post because supplementals aren't predictable and therefore make little sense for budget comparisons over time. I feel somewhat the same about inflation-adjusted dollars. There is no such real world currency - only an academic construct. Setting those two items aside, there is an almost 9% increase over the period studied in the ONPS operational account that you cite. I don't claim that that increase is sufficient, only that it is an increase.
per Pegasus' post on Sunday, here's what I found for Glen Canyon specific funding:
2020 (asking): 161 FTEs, $11,469,000, visitors TBD
2019 ??? FTE, $10,590,000 (asked), visitors TBD
2018: ??? FTE, $11,983,000, 4,219,441 visitors (8% decrease)
2017: 162 FTE, $11,834,000, 4,574,940 visitors (41% increase)
2016:147 FTE, 11,802,000, 3,239,525 visitors (30% increase)
2015: 135 FTE, 11,621,000, 2,495,093 visitors
From: https://www.nps.gov/aboutus/budget.htm and also: https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/SSRSRepo...itation (1904 - Last Calendar Year)?Park=GLCA
Net visitation increase, 2015-2018: 1,724,348 persons (69% increase)
Net FTE increase 2015-2017 (can't find 2018 data): 27 employees (20% increase)
Net budget increase, 2015-2018: $362,000 (3% increase)
69% and 20% vs. 3%? No wonder the water is not on yet…
Haven't found anything on the park's specific budget, but I find these numbers well worth considering... The best case scenario is the park is doing more with less. The worst case scenario is this is non-sustainable and more and more services, programs, and infrastructure will be cut.
2020 (asking): 161 FTEs, $11,469,000, visitors TBD
2019 ??? FTE, $10,590,000 (asked), visitors TBD
2018: ??? FTE, $11,983,000, 4,219,441 visitors (8% decrease)
2017: 162 FTE, $11,834,000, 4,574,940 visitors (41% increase)
2016:147 FTE, 11,802,000, 3,239,525 visitors (30% increase)
2015: 135 FTE, 11,621,000, 2,495,093 visitors
From: https://www.nps.gov/aboutus/budget.htm and also: https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/SSRSRepo...itation (1904 - Last Calendar Year)?Park=GLCA
Net visitation increase, 2015-2018: 1,724,348 persons (69% increase)
Net FTE increase 2015-2017 (can't find 2018 data): 27 employees (20% increase)
Net budget increase, 2015-2018: $362,000 (3% increase)
69% and 20% vs. 3%? No wonder the water is not on yet…
Haven't found anything on the park's specific budget, but I find these numbers well worth considering... The best case scenario is the park is doing more with less. The worst case scenario is this is non-sustainable and more and more services, programs, and infrastructure will be cut.
Thank you for looking this information up and sharing it with us. I agree that it looks like FTE budgets are not keeping up with visitor numbers. But I caution that without knowing where current FTE's are and what they are doing, it's hard to comment on where FTE should be better utilized.
2019 as requested is $71k per FTE (11.469m/161) - that seems very low to me. And where else are non-FTE dollars being spent (as you mention you have not found where to find yet)? It's got to be much larger than the $11 million.
Again, thank you for looking this up. You'd think that this information would be easy to obtain since it's "our" government, but I know that it's a very time-consuming task. -Doug
p.s. - are the numbers available anywhere that show 'gate receipts' for Lake Powell visitors entering the park? That alone must be many millions of dollars......
Haven't found any gate receipt info or park specific budget detail. May require a FOIA request (unfortunately).
Just want to be clear, the numbers I provided in the $11 million range per year are total park funding, not funding just for people (FTEs)!
Wow, thanks for clarifying. That is not how I'd read it initially. I did expect the budget to be much higher than this.
As far as I can tell, the National Park Service has been struggling for years with low budgets and ever increasing numbers of visitors. With demand being so high for places to escape and recreate you would think that the folks in Washington would take notice and do the right thing. Anywho, I don’t want to get on my soapbox about this, but I would really like to find some solutions to this problem and improve our park lands and even increase them where possible. Any ideas? And to think this conversation started with a dry hose bib. Thanks Skip!
Nomofish
Active Member
If remember right the word is Payola! I'm sure Aramark greases politicians palms!
Contact your congressional representatives. Contact the White House and ask the President to increase funding for NPS (or at least not cut it). Volunteer (https://www.nps.gov/glca/getinvolved/volunteer.htm or https://stateparks.utah.gov/resources/volunteer/). Contact the Glen Canyon Conservancy (https://www.canyonconservancy.org/) Contact the National Parks Foundation (https://www.nationalparks.org/) Contact the National Parks Conservation Association (https://www.npca.org/) Heck, call up the park superintendent (Billy Shott) and ask what you can do (928-608-6210, billy_shott@nps.gov).
Like my uncle used to say... "Do something. Even if it's wrong."
I would venture to say a group of Wayne's Worders could share this volunteer position with no trouble at all: https://www.volunteer.gov/results.cfm?ID=17925
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