Arizona State Park camping fees

4X4Dodger wrote:
I think that most state park administrators have smartened up and figure that if the average RV'er will pay 35$ for a site in some "RV Resort" then they are justified, competitively speaking, in charging the same for better scenery, semi wilderness big trees, lakes, rivers etc...location location location as they say.

State parks are under pressure from the anti tax, anti government political forces to support themselves as state funding has been taken away. You will pay the cost to operate the park one way or the other, either with taxes or with fees.

Nothing is free. Meanwhile the cost of keeping those state parks open is rising every year.

One thing is certain. You cant complain about the fees if you support the people who take away the funding. And Vice versa.

I agree - but a further note we need to be aware of also :: When the feds or state parks hire out the booking and other services to vendors, and the vendors either increase the rates or cause the state to increase the rates, THEN any "left-over funds ( eg. extra bucks beyond actual costs) the money goes to vendor profit, not back into the parks for additional maintenance or improvements.

The state and the feds want to reduce the actual budgets - and one way it "look better" is to remove park funding, so it shows a total smaller budget overall. But, when it does that, WE, the users, pay more to vendors in the form of higher fees. IF the feds and the states simply raised the fees a small amount ($2-3 instead of $12 per site / per day for Electric (like the vendor did in Tetons) We'd have a cost sustaining camp program instead of a vendor induced profit motive.

For example: If it costs $100 per electric pedestal, and the site fee goes up $12 per day, the vendor gets back the $100 in ten days, after that, it's all profit (well, maybe $1-2 for power in RV) -- so go figure where the funding goes then - not back into the parks, that's for sure.