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National Parks Face Years of Damage From Government Shutdown (nationalgeographic.com)
When the government eventually reopens, park experts warn reversing damage won't be as easy as throwing out the trash. From a report: National parks are America's public lands, but right now they're America's trashcans. That's because the U.S. federal government, embattled over funding for a border wall, has shut down, leaving national parks open and largely unattended. Since the shutdown began, brimming trashcans, overflowing toilets, and trespassing has been reported at many parks locations. "Never before have I seen the federal government tempt fate in national parks the way we are today," says Diane Regas, president of the Trust for Public Land. "It's not about what has happened already. It's about what could happen if you don't have the appropriate staffing."
According to the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), staffing varies by park, but some 16,000 parks service employees are furloughed, leaving a small number active for policing and security. The government shut down three times in 2018, but only three days last January and less than a day that following February. As of Friday, the government had been partially shut down for 13 days. Further reading: Government Shutdown is Putting a Damper on Science in Seattle and Elsewhere.
According to the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), staffing varies by park, but some 16,000 parks service employees are furloughed, leaving a small number active for policing and security. The government shut down three times in 2018, but only three days last January and less than a day that following February. As of Friday, the government had been partially shut down for 13 days. Further reading: Government Shutdown is Putting a Damper on Science in Seattle and Elsewhere.
Like Roosevelt did, create a new CCC, or you could use community service sentences to do the work.
If there are arrests for trespassing... sentence them to work in the parks.
Well a lot of the existing border fencing does need repairs/upgrades so it would be an infrastructure project.
And the Dems are offering $1.5 billion for upgrades to border security and infrastructure. But Trump has to have his Great Wall of Trump. All this shut down is going to do is cost us more money. All the people who worked during the shutdown will still get paid. All the people who didn't work over the shutdown will get paid (there's no way Congress will let hundreds of thousands of government workers go a month without pay). And then we will have to pay for the overtime for every department to clear weeks worth of backlogs.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
Most of the national parks used to be free. There are tollgates now and they do charge except right now during the shutdown because there is nobody to collect the tolls. OOTH I am not at all sure why they don't leave the honor boxes used at lots of less popular locations open. My guess is a lot of patrons would happy continue to pay.
That said I don't agree with a lot of what the Park Service and the USFS do with our parks and public lands. The USFS still does all kinds of agricultural experiments in places that are supposed to be public land. Frankly commercial enterprise should be paying for that and doing it on already private property. Same thing with a lot of our parks. Most (not all) have dual purpose to act both as wilderness preserves and as recreational spaces for people. The thing is large unbroken areas of back country and critical to life cycles of lots of the creatures we are trying to protect. This is incompatible with paved auto trails, and large campsites. Its also not fair I don't think to other Americans to ask them subsides the businesses around these parks.
I was reading an article about how snowmobiles in the western parks and how private enterprise is keeping the trails groomed. That's fine, but why is the Park Service nominally maintaining snowmobile trains anyway? Again I get there has to be some push pull to accommodate the dual use mandate but honestly, the Park Service should probably identify some lower impact areas for things like powered vehicle trails and tell the business look these areas its okay to clear some trails thru if you want to do so and maintain them at your cost. Sell permits (at administrative cost if you want to) just so that we can attach a number to operators and hold them accountable for keeping to the permitted areas and enforce other likely needed restrictions. But but but.. "Bobby's Snow Tours" isnt going to do the work when "Wild Bills Tours" can just sponge off his efforts. BS - I say. Firstly the shutdown is proving that isn't true, and second Bobby still gets to profit of what is public land so I don't feel to sorry for him.
Beyond this I would say the park service ought to engage in the minimal expense of putting in wilderness trails for individuals and (non-commercial) small groups to use for hiking/backpacking because putting in trails and asking even those low impact users to stay on them reduces total impact. It also make search and rescue somewhat possible where as if you just turn people loose in a few million acres good luck finding anyone and good luck with any sort of extraction if that is required. Otherwise they should really let nature have run of the parks, and that includes wildfires (provided we believe they were sparked by natural causes).
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Over the past decade, Democrats have supported billions of dollars in funding for physical barriers. In 2006, the Secure Fence Act passed with bipartisan support requiring the construction of physical barriers along 700 miles of the nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border. Sixty-four Democrats voted the measure in the House and 26 in the Senate.
The current Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer voted for it, so did Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. Then-Illinois Sen. Barack Obama praised the bill in a floor speech saying it would "certainly do some good" and "help stem some of the tide of illegal immigration in this country."
In 2013, all Senate Democrats and most House Democrats backed comprehensive immigration reform legislation, the so-called Gang of Eight bill. It included $46 billion for border security and around $8 billion to repair or reinforce barriers along the 700 miles of the border as required under the Secure Fence Act.
Yeah but there are already walls and fencing where they're needed, just buy some surveillance drones to patrol the rest of the border and you're done. A Great Wall is dumb.
makes me sad that a great piece of nature can't stay clean for a few days unless there are paid people who clean up after the visitors - the real trash are the humans leaving their trash behind.
If you see the examples in TFA about the National Mall, it's not that people are trash for leaving trash behind, it's that the dedicated bins to leave said trash are actually being used as expected by normal decent people, but are not being emptied and thus are overflowing with garbage.
Yeah there's some grubs out there, but in this case the people attempting to do the right thing are unable to do it.
makes me sad that a great piece of nature can't stay clean for a few days unless there are paid people who clean up after the visitors - the real trash are the humans leaving their trash behind.
If you see the examples in TFA about the National Mall, it's not that people are trash for leaving trash behind, it's that the dedicated bins to leave said trash are actually being used as expected by normal decent people, but are not being emptied and thus are overflowing with garbage.
Yeah there's some grubs out there, but in this case the people attempting to do the right thing are unable to do it.
It's already being cleaned up voluntarily:Libertarians step in to clean up Washington during government shutdown
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
The conservative Cato Institute published a response to that FAIR report.
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