...or the Federal Government, which owns most of the western U.S., could sell some of their holdings to private individuals or corporations. The Feds obviously can't take care of it.
"To make some 6,000 shafts and caves completely safe would take money that Reynolds does not have."
Dynamite them closed. Next?
"When winter rain visits Death Valley, the bucket comes out near the visitor center cash register. Before the leaky ceiling got a temporary patch job...'
That's all you need to know about the fat-ass bureaucratic culture.
They're too damn stupid and lazy to buy a bucket of roof tar, climb up the ladder and patch the hole.
Sell off the federal socialist commons to the private sector and the parks will be fixed. And fire every bureaucrat.
Speaking of falling down mineshafts, a guy in Alta California died a few months ago when his *house* collapsed into a mineshaft that ran below it. Nobody knew the shaft even existed and so they built over the top of it.
Bad luck, and he was reportedly a nice guy too.
IMO, the parks system is really run for the benefit of the people running the parks and not the visitors. If they had less visitors it would be fine by them.
Looks like the annual story before they start lobbying for a larger budget.
Soon to follow will be the story about the Hubble Space Telescope getting canceled again.
Last month the story was about the Tropical Prediction Center getting it's funding cut.
Too many visitors will damage the infrastructure, so raise fees, maybe introduce a lottery system for tickets. As far as the mineshafts etc, post warning signs at main lots and then you're on your own (common sense applies).
Just the usual whining for money. Why should they raise entry fees when its the taxpayers money already being used? Disney is a private company and should be free to charge more.
Sell the damn property to the citizens on auction, ebay or whatever. Private property means more money for the school district and the chiiilllldreeeeennnn.
Seems to be a concerted effort recently by the drive-by media to criticize the lack of funding and the overuse of our national parks. This is about the 3rd article on this theme I've seen in just the past few weeks.
I agree that those who use the parks should pay more. Why should someone who never sets foot inside a national park subsidize those who do?
Charging more would discourage those tourists who drive to the parks, stay an hour or two to glimpse the highlights and snap some pictures, then move on to the next one. That would cut out a lot of the traffic.
I know it was T. Roosevelt's goal that the national parks would be a treasure that all people could visit and enjoy (used to be for free) but he could never have envisioned the current rate of park visititation.
When will people wise up and realize we've been on a war footing for, oh, the past few years?
We're so lucky, we are not experiencing the shortages our parents and grandparents endured. So the national park system is having to make do with less money?
Boo hoo.
Eliminate the little wannabe hitlers, who rather than providing a service, always degenerate into rule-making idiots with delusions of grandeur.
Other than building and maintaining access roads, we don't need a single welfare-by-another name doofus in a funny hat.
We could save billions. Immediately.
I disagree. First of all I'm already paying taxes that are supposed to be used to support the parks. I don't pay taxes to support Disneyland.
Now I have to pay $5 a day just to park on National Forest land, or $35 for an annual pass so I don't get hassled into a $100 fine. That's not counting the camping fees. So I need to keep paying higher "fees" because the gov't can't do their damn job and fund these parks appropriately?
I have no problem paying one way or the other, but I don't like paying twice for essentially the same "service".
SZ
[Give me more money!]
"We put up a good front and try to keep high visitor-use areas clean and neat.
[Give me more money!]
Even this facade is fading due to the lack of appropriate resources."
[Give me more money!]
I wonder if more money would help alleviate this horrible, horrible situation ...