What effect is Sequestration having on the parks?

answerswillvary wrote:
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yeah,these things affect our ability to camp yet we can't comment on them?

Several of the Blue Ridge Parkway campgrounds & visitor centers are reported to not be opening this year.....................

I am in Maine. Acadia opening date has been moved back 1 month, from mid April to mid May

One of my favorite NP CGs is closed. It's only 25 miles from home, and with my senior pass it cost me $8 a day to camp there. But not this summer.

It would interesting to know how many of our elected officials RV and camp at our wonderful parks.
These parks were set aside by folks like Teddy Roosevelt and such, these people seen the beauty and wanted this country's folks to see them too.
I think it is a slap in those forefathers faces not to just keep those parks open but not to improve them so more people can enjoy them.
Sometimes we don't understand that there are those who have never camped or RV'd in the wonderful areas for them we should be sad.

We were in Yosemite last week with my daughters 3rd grade class and we unable to go to one of the learning centers as it was closed. Apparently there is a big push in federal court to push a Bill to rip out alot of what is currently there to get back to "nature" and not allow as many cars to drive in, as well as no bikes, horses, etc. Makes me mad.

PUCampin wrote:

sammytoo wrote:
I don't think it's a decrease in their funding, it's a decrease in their proposed increase.
Next, I think the NPS waste percentage is probably around 20% so they should be able to absorb this with no noticable change.
My third opinion is that this is all hype to panic the public and encourage more wasteful spending.

Having said all that, is their any reason the NPS shouldn't be self supporting ( at least in their tourist business)?

No, it is not a decrease in the proposed increase, funding levels have been stagnent since the Budget Control Act of 2011. We have been on continuing resolutions that keep the government at the same funding level since then.

The other issue most people don't understand is the "Color of money". Money oblogated for certain things CAN NOT be re-obligated for something else easily. It quite literally takes an act of congress. Sequestration is across the board cuts, every line item. So while the total amount of cuts is small compared to the overall budget, the impact can be significant because of the color of money. When budgets are created, the employee salary line item is set and there is really no excess, so in order to reduce that line item, you have to reduce employee hours, period. And you can't just take funds from a non critical program and fully fund something more critical, like employees. So overall, a department may be able to absorb a cut without affecting the public, they are not allowd to shift funds around to accomplish that. The FAA was a perfect example of this. They had money unused in other pots, but it took an act of congress to give them permission to move that money to pay salaries and keep the towers fully staffed. This is why we are hearing about reductions in park service staff, closures, etc, while there are still programs to study Bison migration or whatever. Without specific permission, they CAN NOT move the money, and that permission has not been forthcomming.

PU. Please dont try to inject facts into this discussion. They are irrelevant to folks' world view.

The naivety of the people of this country is astounding and they deserve just what they got

fla-gypsy wrote:
There are places being affected from reports on this forum. It is obvious some think all of the mythical cuts should be made to impact citizens in the greatest possible way.

Why in the world do you think the cuts are mythical?? Very real to any who use National forest, national Park, COE, Blm campgrounds!!

Funny how local communities can still keep parks clean and nice, and our county parks still are open and clean and nice even in the camping areas. Our budgets have been cut as well, but somehow we manage---could it all be how these things are being managed?