MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK –
Every homeowner knows about maintenance. You never quite catch up, and when one thing is done, there is usually another chore to be handled.
The National Park Service, which will celebrate its 100th birthday on Thursday, has the same issue – times 412. It has a backlog of just under $12 billion of deferred maintenance, according to documents from the NPS.
This number is significant by itself but becomes startling when compared to the 2016 enacted budget for the Park Service of $2.85 billion, of which $738 million is earmarked for the operation and maintenance of its facilities.
That means that if the Park Service were to apply its entire budget just to maintenance for the next four years, it would still come up short.
The nature and extent of work needed is as varied as the parks themselves, said Cristy Brown, public information officer for Mesa Verde National Park.
“Each park has its own unique features and unique set of issues that it deals with and has to figure out a way to manage the park and provide for visitor experience and enjoyment at the same time,” Brown said.
About a third of the backlog is critical systems maintenance, said John Garder, director of budget and appropriation for the National Parks Conservation Association. Such maintenance must be done to ensure the basic functions can be maintained, including the safety of visitors.
“The Park Service does a great job of ensuring visitor safety, but eventually, the problem could threaten that for lack of resources,” Garder said.
The deferred maintenance covers items that are apparent to visitors, such as historical sites and roadways that traverse parks, but also some things that people don’t see, such as water and sewer lines, said James Doyle, chief of communication and legislation for the Intermountain Region of the NPS.
“We manage national parks with the budget Congress makes available to us in the best way possible,” he said. “But I’d say every agency would love to have more, could use more, but we are certainly grateful for what Congress makes available to us.”
The growing visitation of the national parks, which recorded more than 300 million recreational visitors in 2015, is magnifying the deferred maintenance backlog as well as other issues.
“We’re working with more,” Brown said. “More public, more parks, more units, and we’re actually working with a decreasing budget, so you really have to put business into the national parks and figure out ways to save money.”
Those strategies can come in the form of shared staffing on managerial levels between parks that are geographically close and partnerships with private organizations on behalf of the Park Service, she said.
The NPS is not allowed to campaign on behalf of itself and must rely on private benefactors to solicit donations and funding outside of what is provided by Congress, Doyle said. That is where organizations such as the National Park Conservation Association, the National Parks Foundation and the Mesa Verde Foundation come into play.
“We are there to serve the park, that is our sole duty,” said Margaret Grey, executive director of the Mesa Verde Foundation.
That usually comes in the form of finding donors to subsidize projects within the park, such as stabilization of the Cliff Palace site at Mesa Verde.
That is a shared duty with the conservation association, which also prides itself on being a “watchdog” organization that ensures the Park Service is being effective stewards of America’s public lands, Garder said.
Part of the “watchdog” function of the association is verifying that the Park Service is not undermining its core goal of preserving unimpaired the sites entrusted to them for the enjoyment of future generations as it tries to augment its budget.
This came up during revisions of the order governing donations and fundraising.
“It is critical that the Park Service engage in this effort in a very careful way that does not commercialize parks,” Garder said.
Brown believes that partnerships with corporations, such as those with Subaru and Budweiser through the centennial celebration campaign, are something that will continue, but there is no intention of branding parks.
“The Park Service is going to maintain its identity. Obviously, you’re not going to have Pepsi National Park, but it is going to require looking at other sources for funding,” she said.
The association is carefully watching these developments and at times urging the Park Service to reconsider some proposals, such as the role of the director and deputy director in fundraising, Garder said.
He said he believes the Park Service leadership should be allowed to raise funds, but that should never become its priority. “To proactively solicit the donations begins to go down a road of changing the fundamental duties of Park Service leadership.”
While supporting organizations and foundations are important to sustaining the NPS, it is ultimately on Congress to address the increasing deferred maintenance backlog and operational expenses of the Park Service, Garder said.
“Our national parks are so deeply loved and appreciated, not just by the American people but by members of Congress,” he said.
“People understand that maintaining parks is important and there is bipartisan recognition that the backlog of infrastructure repair needs has become a serious problem. No one want parks to get to the point where they receive irreparable damage, however, we are getting to a critical point where a robust effort is needed.”
Luke Perkins is a full-time student at Fort Lewis College and was an intern at The Durango Herald.
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