Category: Places & Travel

Management problems at Interior, ya’ think?

First part of editorial from The Salt Lake Tribune —

It’s hard to imagine that one person could be responsible for misspending millions of taxpayer dollars, leaving national park construction projects unfinished, subcontractors unpaid and contracts awarded with no regard for rules and policies.

Yet contracts for $17 million in construction projects at Grand Canyon National Park were awarded by the park’s contracting officer to Pacific General Inc. without the insurance bonds required by federal law to guarantee that the work is finished and subcontractors are paid.

The company, whose license had been suspended in Arizona for two years before it got the park contracts, went out of business after being paid but before completing a number of major projects and without paying subcontractors an estimated $2.5 million for the work they did.

It may be true that one man, who, not surprisingly, retired abruptly when the mismanagement was uncovered, was the primary culprit in this financial morass that has pushed some of 50 subcontractors near bankruptcy. But where were those who should have been overseeing him?

If oversight was as scandalously lacking at Grand Canyon as it appears, what might auditors find if they checked into the $94 million the Park Service extravagantly spent in overseas travel the past two years, or the major construction projects under way without congressional approval?

Cape Cod National Seashore…

was authorized on this date in 1961.

CapeCod.jpg
Cape Cod National Seashore comprises 43,604 acres of shoreline and upland landscape features, including a forty-mile long stretch of pristine sandy beach, dozens of clear, deep, freshwater kettle ponds, and upland scenes that depict evidence of how people have used the land. A variety of historic structures are within the boundary of the Seashore, including lighthouses, a lifesaving station, and numerous Cape Cod style houses. The Seashore offers six swimming beaches, eleven self-guiding nature trails, and a variety of picnic areas and scenic overlooks.

Source: Cape Code National Seashore

Casa Grande Ruins National Monument…

was established by President Wilson on this date in 1918.

CasaGrande.jpg

For over a thousand years, prehistoric farmers inhabited much of the present-day state of Arizona. When the first Europeans arrived, all that remained of this ancient culture were the ruins of villages, irrigation canals and various artifacts. Among these ruins is the Casa Grande, or “Big House,” one of the largest and most mysterious prehistoric structures ever built in North America. Casa Grande Ruins, the nation’s first archeological preserve, protects the Casa Grande and other archeological sites within its boundaries.

Source: Casa Grande Ruins National Monument

Yosemite

President Abraham Lincoln signed the Yosemite Land Grant on this date in 1864. According to the Library of Congress:

The legislation provided California with 39,000 acres of the Yosemite Valley and the nearby Mariposa Big Tree Grove “upon the express conditions that the premises shall be held for public use, resort, and recreation.”

The newly-appointed Yosemite Board of Park Commissioners confronted the dual task of preserving the magnificent landscape while providing for public recreation. With amazing foresight, board member and landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted noted these goals could conflict. In his August 9, 1865 Draft of Preliminary Report upon the Yosemite and Big Tree Grove, Olmsted warns “the slight harm which the few hundred visitors of this year might do, if no care were taken to prevent it, would not be slight, if it should be repeated by millions.”

The name game

Attempting satire, Kimit Muston, writing in the L.A. Daily News, suggests it’s time for the City of Los Angeles to rid itself of its religious name.

Before the Spanish started putting up subdivisions, I believe the Yang-na tribe called this place, “Ours,” which is a great name, but I’m not sure their word “ours” means the same thing as our word “ours.” We might just call ourselves, “Here,” and then refer to everywhere else as “There,” but that could get confusing. And “Laker Town” seems to be out of the running for now.

We might rename our town “La Brea,” after the pits on Wilshire where creatures have the life sucked out of them by a black viscous fluid. Or not. I even considered changing our name to “Beverly Hills,” just to stick it to those snobs shopping on Rodeo Drive, but then, Tuesday afternoon it came to me in a flash, a new name that would fit our terrain, our vision, our history and our future.

So I humbly suggest as the new non-religious name for Los Angeles, California — Shaker Heights.

By the way, it’s worse than Muston realizes. The original full name of Los Angeles was El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciúncula, which means The Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels of the Little Portion (i.e., small parcel of land).

Predators, an integral part of nature (who would have thought?)

An intriguing report from Scientific American on the wolves in Yellowstone:

The wolf-effect theory holds that wolves kept elk numbers at a level that prevented them from gobbling up every tree or willow that poked its head aboveground. When the wolves were extirpated in the park as a menace, elk numbers soared, and the hordes consumed the vegetation, denuding the Lamar Valley and driving out many other species. Without young trees on the range, beavers, for example, had little or no food, and indeed they had been absent since at least the 1950s. Without beaver dams and the ponds they create, fewer succulents could survive, and these plants are a critical food for grizzly bears when they emerge from hibernation.

After the wolves’ reintroduction in 1995 and 1996, they began to increase their numbers fairly rapidly, and researchers began to see not only a drop in the population of elk but a change in elk behavior. The tall, elegant mahogany-colored animals spent less time in river bottoms and more time in places where they could keep an eye out for predatory wolves. If the wolf-effect hypothesis is correct, and wolves are greatly reducing elk numbers, the vegetation should be coming back for the first time in seven decades.

The national parks

The Rocky Mountain News laments cutbacks at the national parks in Colorado:

For instance, hours at Rocky Mountain National Park’s visitor centers were trimmed from 390 hours per week to 260.

Patterson said the centers will all close at 6 p.m., instead of staying open until 9 p.m., because visitor traffic slows in the evening.

The Casper Star-Tribune tells about the impact in Wyoming:

[At Devil’s Tower, the] park’s 2004 annual budget is $3,000 less than its 2003 budget, dropping from $771,000 to $768,000.

Wade said the public should know that when they travel to national parks, they will likely see fewer rangers, fewer educational services, and less maintenance of campgrounds and picnic areas.

The Salt Lake Tribune looks at the situation in Utah:

“We are not providing the same level of service that we have been able to in years past,” said Paul Henderson, chief of interpretation at Arches and Canyonlands. “Things are definitely tight.”

Managers at Utah’s five national parks said last year that they need to increase their annual operating budgets by $12.1 million to keep up with visitor demand and to run the parks in a way that fulfills the Park Service’s other mission of protecting resources.

Canyonlands, for example, needs $359,000 more each year to boost visitor information services and backcountry management, while Zion needs $422,000 to hire additional interpretive rangers.

But, last year, Utah’s parks saw no increases to their budgets.

The Denver Post has an editorial:

Instead of following optimistic talking points, the Bush administration needs to take a realistic look at the deterioration of the Park Service’s finances.

Yellowstone-area grizzly count dips

News report from The Billings Gazette

Observations of female grizzlies with cubs – an important indication about how well the overall population is faring – dropped from 52 in 2002 to 38 last year, according to the grizzly study team’s annual report. More than likely, that drop is tied to a poor food year in 2002 and a slight reproductive increase in recent years that left few females available to breed and show off their offspring in 2003, Schwartz said.

NewMexiKen is amused to think, what if the bears were in charge and humans were the object of their observations?

National Parks fast falling into disrepair

The Christian Science Monitor has a report on the state of the national parks. Nothing new, but still worthwhile. The article lists these particular problems (from the National Parks Conservation Association):

• Hikers cannot reach backcountry cabins at Mount Rainier National Park in Washington State because necessary bridges and trails need repair.

• Large sections of a historic lighthouse and Fort Jefferson at Dry Tortugas National Park in South Florida are unsafe.

• The visitor center at the USS Arizona Memorial in Hawaii is sinking.

• Yosemite National Park needs more than $40 million for backlogged projects, including trail and campground maintenance, sewer system replacement, and electrical upgrades.

• Ancient stone structures are collapsing at Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico.

• At Yellowstone, 150 miles of roads have not been repaired in years, and many of the park’s several hundred buildings are in poor condition.

Mile High

MileHigh.jpg
Two visitors from Virginia sit a mile above sea level on the steps of the Colorado State Capitol. After the original marker was stolen four times, the step was carved in 1947 to read “ONE MILE ABOVE SEA LEVEL.” In 1969, engineering students from Colorado State University found the measurement was incorrect. They marked their concept of one mile with the the brass marker you can see between the boys. Last year yet another correction was made. That marker, a few feet lower than the others is not shown in this photograph, but click here to see a close up.

For all the attitude about being a mile high, you’d think Colorado could measure it consistently.

The Orgy in Your Backyward

University of Wyoming Professor Jeffrey A. Lockwood celebrates the cicadas. His essay in The New York Times concludes:

We would do well, I believe, to begin to think of periodical cicadas as moving, living national parks. Maybe the Department of [the] Interior should declare a new category: national events. These would be wondrous natural happenings that define the character of our nation, occasions that warrant our attention, or processes that merit celebration. These events would honor the ways in which we are connected to the earth, recognizing that we are embedded in a marvelous natural world.

As candidates, I’d propose the migration of monarch butterflies from Mexico to Canada that unites our continent, the flickering of fireflies that turns suburban hedges into enchanted forests, the bugling of elk in the Rockies that is as primordial a sound as one could ever hear, and the turning of leaves in the New England autumn that reminds us of the cycle of life and death in which, for all of our medical technology, we are still a part.

And I nominate the exuberant arrival of the periodical cicadas as the inaugural national event. Rather than a few million of us visiting Yosemite or Yellowstone this summer, a few trillion cicadas will come to visit us. They will remind us that the world is yet to be tamed and that wonder is our birthright. Even staid scientists are entranced by these creatures — why else would the genus have been named Magicicada?

NewMexiKen notes that Professor Lockwood does not reside where he has to deal with these trillions of pests.

Yellowstone snowmobiling next winter

From The Billings Gazette:

Although the issue remains mired in legal dispute, snowmobiling is likely to be part of Yellowstone National Park next winter, Secretary of [the Interior] Gale Norton said Wednesday.

“I am certainly confident that it will be,” Norton said during a question-and-answer session with reporters in a telephone conference.

Before next winter season, National Park Service officials may have to conduct further environmental studies, examine the numbers of snowmobiles allowed into the parks and look at management practices, Norton said. She did not provide details.

“We are currently looking at our options to see what the implications of the court decisions are,” Norton said.

Field of dreams

Smithsonian Magazine has eight brief essays in its May issue under the general heading “Destination America.” As they put it, “eight beckoning variations on the great American vacation. Their secret ingredient? The unexpected.”

One of the articles, Fielder’s Choice: Dyersville, IA, tells how in “rural Iowa, baseball fans and film buffs alike flock to a divided field of dreams.”

For 15 years now, Dyersville, Iowa, a small farm town (pop. 4,000) 25 miles west of Dubuque, has been a place where a certain breed of American romantic converges. Some 60,000 visitors find their way here each year, traveling country roads and dirt lanes to a site where fantasy and reality intersect. On a five-acre stretch of cornfield just northeast of town, director Phil Alden Robinson filmed Field of Dreams. The 1989 movie starred Kevin Costner as a baseball-obsessed farmer who heeds a disembodied command (“If you build it, he will come”) and sets out to construct a ball field in the middle of nowhere. Today, the diamond built for the film has become a fixed location in the geography of the imagination. Tourists arrive equipped with bats and balls to play catch, sit in bleachers (another relic of the set) or organize teams of strangers in pickup games.

If you saw Field of Dreams, the article may be of particular interest, in part because the field is split between two properties and “the owners hold opposing views of what a visitor’s experience should be.”

Court Halts Yosemite Park Plans

From The Washington Post:

A federal appeals court has ordered the National Park Service to halt its ambitious plans to reshape public access in Yosemite Valley after concluding that some construction projects underway could harm the Merced River.

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, which was issued late Tuesday, has thrown a long-delayed $441 million blueprint designed to transform the visitor experience in Yosemite National Park into turmoil, again.

After decades of contentious debate, park officials had just embarked on the new master plan, which they a call a back-to-nature campaign to limit or change human activity in ways that better protect Yosemite’s many natural wonders.

But some environmental groups contend that the proposed renovations would imperil, not enhance the natural splendor of, Yosemite and the Merced River, which runs through the park. The groups filed a lawsuit to stop the valley plan but were rebuffed last month in federal court. Their appeal of that decision led to Tuesday’s ruling.

Grand Staircase-Escalante

From the The Salt Lake Tribune:

The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument — whose rugged beauty was formed over the ages by ice, wind and water — has weathered its biggest legal storm.

On Monday, a federal judge upheld former President Clinton’s use of the Antiquities Act to designate the embattled reserve in southern Utah nearly eight years ago.

In a 47-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Dee Benson rejected each of the “myriad claims” offered by the Utah Association of Counties (UAC) and the Colorado-based Mountain States Legal Foundation, a group that represents grazing, mining and motorized-recreation interests in the West.

Staircase.jpg

President Clinton, joined by Vice President Al Gore on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona, signs a [proclamation] declaring 1.7 million acres of southern Utah’s redrock cliffs and canyons as the Grand Staircase- Escalante National Monument in September 1996.

Try to imagine Bush and Cheney doing this.

Deep powder, good golf, world-class fly-fishing

From AP via the Billings Gazette, Wyoming county is tops for wealth. Read to the bottom to see the real attaction.

For the fourth time in six years, Teton County – home of scenic Jackson Hole and gateway to Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks – is the wealthiest in America.

Teton’s average adjusted household gross income in 2002, the latest year for which data is available, was $107,694, or 2 percent higher than runner-up Fairfield County, Conn., according to the Internal Revenue Service.

Other high-income counties were Marin, Calif., Somerset, N.J., and Morris, N.J. In Colorado, Clear Creek and Douglas counties ranked sixth and seventh, respectively.

Rounding out the top ten were Hunterdon, N.J.; Westchester, N.Y.; and New York, N.Y.

Since 1997, Teton County’s per-return income has ranked either first or second among the nation’s 3,140 counties. The county also was tops in per-capita income in 2002, the IRS said.

Many wealthy people move to Jackson for its myriad outdoor activities and culture, real estate broker Bob Graham said.

“Aside from the normal attractions – parks et cetera – you can go through the long list of deep powder, good golf, world-class fly-fishing, the museum, the symphony,” he said.

The list is not paramount, though.

“It’s second only to the enormous tax advantage the state of Wyoming offers,” Graham said.

Wyoming has no personal or corporate income tax and relatively low property taxes thanks to revenue from a robust minerals industry.

Jefferson’s home town

Top 10 cities and metropolitan areas from the newly released Cities Ranked & Rated:

1. Charlottesville, Va.
2. Santa Fe
3. San Luis Obispo, Calif.
4. Santa Barbara, Calif.
5. Honolulu
6. Ann Arbor, Mich.
7. Atlanta
8. Asheville, N.C.
9. Reno
10. Corvallis, Ore.

See The Washington Post article on Charlottesville, ‘Best’ a Mixed Blessing for No. 1 City. “This place is a magnet for people looking for a special place.”

A new campfire song: Help!

The Los Angeles Times tells how “Upheaval in the National Park Service has turned the genial ranks of America’s rangers into outposts of fear and frustration.”

Millions of visitors a year hear friendly rangers banter about prehistory at Agate Fossil Beds National Monument in Nebraska or geology at Utah’s Zion National Park. The crisp green and gray uniforms declare that all is right in this nationwide realm of 387 taxpayer-financed battlefields, cemeteries, ruins, seashores, parkways, preserves, scenic rivers, trails and parks. Out of earshot, however, many employees complain about slashed budgets and staffs, and say they fear recrimination if they don’t toe the line. …

Working for the park service has always been a calling as much as a job, one with such a shared commitment that staffers often feel like kin. Third-generation rangers and husband-and-wife teams are common. Employees not only go through extensive training together in search and rescue and other skills, they also work together in remote, sometimes searingly beautiful locations, and often live in close quarters in modest housing, paying rent to Uncle Sam.

At Death Valley, all hands pitch in to drive the ambulance or firetrucks or do countless other chores. Before heading to town, 58 miles away, a staffer asks around for video or grocery requests. When a relative is sick or dies, employees donate vacation days to their bereaved colleague.

Beneath the camaraderie lies a devotion to “the mission,” enshrined in the congressional Organic Act of 1916 that created the park service. Any ranger anywhere will rattle it off like the Ten Commandments: “Which purpose is to conserve the scenery, and the natural and historic objects, and the wildlife therein, and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner … as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.”

The article continues.

On a clear day, How it will astound you, That the glow of your being, Outshines every star, You’ll feel part of every mountain sea and shore

The Los Angeles Times reports that More National Parks Fail New EPA Smog Ratings.

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to announce next week that the air quality in areas that include at least eight of the nation’s most popular national parks, including Yosemite, is in violation of a new and more protective federal smog standard, National Park Service officials said Wednesday.

Yosemite would join a roster of national parks — including Sequoia, Kings Canyon and Joshua Tree in California — listed as having unhealthy air. The air quality in those three parks already violates the EPA’s old and less stringent smog standard, which was based on a one-hour measurement of air quality. That is being phased out in favor of an eight-hour measurement.

Other popular national parks to be newly designated as having dirty air include Rocky Mountain in Colorado, Great Smoky Mountain in North Carolina and Tennessee, Acadia in Maine, and Shenandoah in Virginia, National Park Service officials said.

The article continues.