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Understaffing Could Make National Parks a Real Mess This Summer



The temporary hiring freeze that has been ordered across the entire U.S. federal government by the Trump administration could wreak havoc on national parks this summer, observers warn. 

In addition to putting the brakes on the hiring of new workers for positions at the National Park Service, which is overseen by the federal Department of the Interior, the government has even rescinded job offers for “roughly 400” employees newly hired by the park service, reports the Washington Post

The abruptly dumped roles were for seasonal positions, according to the newspaper, even though “seasonal positions are supposed to be exempt from the hiring freeze.”

Most of the park service’s seasonal employees are there for the busy summer months, working as “park rangers, trail workers, visitor service assistants, and maintenance workers,” the Post explains. 

Now it looks like there will be fewer people taking care of those crucial tasks this summer. 

Conservation groups like the National Parks Conservation Association warn that understaffing can have harmful effects on public lands. 

In addition to caring for endangered species and priceless petroglyphs, National Park Service workers “perform daring searches and rescues, clear trails, clean bathrooms, and ensure our national parks are ready for all who visit them,” reads a post on the conservation group’s website. 

The National Park System could already use more workers, the conservationists argue, pointing out that “park staffing has eroded by 15% since 2010, while at the same time, parks have experienced a 16% increase in visitation.”

Some of the system’s most popular parks have already struggled with understaffing. Acadia National Park in Maine, for instance, has had trouble filling seasonal positions in recent years due to a lack of available housing nearby. A hiring freeze would only contribute to the problem.  

For an idea of what hugely popular national parks look like when they don’t have enough workers to take care of them, consider what happened during the federal government shutdown of 2018–19. 

Some state governments used their own funding to keep national parks within their borders open during the federal shutdown. But most of those states couldn’t afford to staff the parks adequately, and waste piled up. Including human waste. Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park got especially gross

The Washington Post reports that some of the people with revoked job offers are still holding out hope that seasonal workers at national parks will eventually become truly exempt from the federal hiring freeze.

The National Park Service didn’t respond to our request for clarification, but we share that hope. Otherwise it could be one crappy summer.