Nat'l Parks Fear Budget Holdbacks

"Congress gets quite a bang for its buck with the park system. The budget is $2 billion and the nation receives a $31 billion annual return on its investment along with 258,000 jobs per year.""?u John Garder, budget and appropriations legislative representative for the National Parks Conservation Association.
Image: Madison River, Yellowstone National Park

John Garder, budget and appropriations legislative representative for the National Parks Conservation Association, anticipated a five percent across-the-board budget cut ($160 million) for the country's national parks if sequestration kicked in on March 1, 2013.

"Sequestration" is the fiscal policy procedure originally introduced in the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Deficit Reduction Act of 1985 as a means to keep all those bills passed by Congress from exceeding the annual budget resolution. Sequestration kicks in if Congress can't agree on cutbacks to stay within the budget, or does not pass a higher budget. The difference between the budget cap and what's actually appropriated is "sequestered" by the Treasury, instead of going to the agencies to which it was originally appropriated by Congress.

The president asked Congress for a short-term plan to avoid the $1.2 trillion sequestration, but to no avail. Sequestration began March 1, 2013.

Garder described park employees as "scared" for their jobs. If the anticipated $160 million is sequestered from the National Parks, these national parks would lose the following funding:

Yellowstone: $1.75 million: At Yellowstone National Park, there were 3.6 million recreation visits supporting $334.5 million in visitor spending and 4,881 jobs in 2010.

Grand Teton: $627,000: At Grand Teton National Park, there were 2.7 million recreation visits supporting $424 million in visitor spending and 6,258 jobs in 2010.

Devils Tower: $67,000

Grand Canyon: $1.06 million

National Mall and Memorial Parks: $1.6 million

Sequoia and King's Canyon: $820,000

Everglades: $841,000

Source: Coalition of National Park Service Retirees