The National Park Service marks its one-hundredth birthday on August 25, 2016. The park community is celebrating the centennial by connecting people from all walks of life to the awe-inspiring landscapes, shared history, and rich culture that make up America’s national parks. This is the perfect moment to invite the next generation to explore their national parks and ensure these treasures are loved and cared for into the next century.
People from across the U.S. and all over the world have responded. The National Park Service welcomed a record 307 million visitors in 2015 and this year’s visitation looks like it will be even greater. This level of participation is both gratifying and daunting as we must be sensitive to the collective footprint we leave on these special places.
However, as we ignite the desire for meaningful, lifelong connections to the national parks, we must also consider the challenges that an already underfunded National Park System faces.
Today, the National Park Service receives $3 billion in annual funding from a combination of visitor fees and federal appropriations. This sum barely covers the agency’s basic operating costs with little or nothing left over to perform adequate maintenance and enhancement. There is a $12 billion backlog of critical maintenance projects to repair campgrounds, trails, visitor centers, roads, bridges, and properly support fire prevention. And, the parks have needs over and above these base level requirements that are necessary to meet changes in demographics and climate, share a more comprehensive representation of American history and culture, conserve private inholdings that threaten the integrity of the parks, and protect wildlife habitats and ecosystems.
And yet, the parks’ intrinsic worth is clear; national parks contribute $32 billion to the U.S. economy and support nearly 300,000 private-sector jobs. A recent study by Harvard - Colorado State University concluded that the American public conservatively values the national parks and programs at $92 billion. This study found that 95% of American households believe that protecting national parks is “extremely important,” and 85% say they personally benefit from the existence of these places regardless of whether or not they actually visit. And, in our increasingly divisive political climate, the national parks continue to enjoy broad, bi-partisan support. We must find ways to both increase federal appropriations and philanthropic support to correct the disparity between strong public support and inadequate funding for these universally beloved places.
As we celebrate this historic centennial milestone, we have the opportunity to create and deliver the most effective funding model to support a vibrant second century for the national parks. All park supporters need to let their representatives in Washington know that more funding is needed for the parks. However, given the diversity of demands on the federal budget, it is doubtful that government funding will ever be able to fully address the important needs across the park system.
That is where the long-standing tradition of private philanthropy comes in: individuals, foundations, and corporations must continue to play a vital, supplementary role in the protection, preservation, and enhancement of our country’s national parks. For forty-nine years, the National Park Foundation and its many local partners around the country have raised private funds for park projects and programs to make America’s best idea even better.
This type of robust public-private partnership is critical to the future of the national parks and its impact is considerable. Currently, it is funding essential programs to get kids outside including introducing nearly 500,000 fourth graders to their local parks, establishing youth corps in national parks across the country to repair trails and plant trees, investing more than $3 million in the restoration of wildlife habitats so native species can thrive, and granting more than $25 million toward the preservation of historical structures and cultural resources to better tell the diversity of the American story.
To build on this important work and meet the growing needs of our nation’s parks, this year, the National Park Foundation launched The Centennial Campaign for America’s National Parks, the largest fundraising campaign in the organization’s history.
More than a century ago, America’s national parks were established through private support and today we must step up again. We must engage at every level; visiting, volunteering, giving, and advocating. Collectively, WE are the national parks. They belong to each of us and, in exchange for this unique birthright, we must watch over them. Once we blow out the candles on the hundredth birthday, we must recommit to supporting our national parks in perpetuity.