Fee demonstration funds bolster natural resource protection--National Park Service--WASO-INFO




						by Abigail Miller
						From 1997 to 1998 the National Park Service collected $140 million in fees through the Recreational Fee Demonstration Program. Authorized in 1996 for three years, the program originally allowed the National Park Service to retain a portion of user fees collected in certain parks, with the remainder to be returned to the U.S. Treasury. In 1998, legislation creating the program was amended to extend it through FY 2001 and allow retention of all receipts. Congress intended the funds to be used in support of the backlog of various park improvement projects that paying park visitors can appreciate. An initial group of projects worth $79.6 million was approved in September 1997 and strongly emphasized the backlog of park infrastructure needs; an additional $61.9 million in projects were forwarded for additional approvals. Based on project titles alone, at least 46 of the approved projects out of more than 800 titles related principally to natural resource protection. These totaled about $3.9 million for exotic species control, threatened and endangered species inventory, resource impact studies, and habitat and species restoration. These figures demonstrate the importance of this new funding source for resource protection. In November 1998, with increased receipts anticipated, $55 million in additional projects were approved. Although first priority was given to critical health and safety needs, nearly 40% of the receipts retained by fee demonstration parks (excluding the cost of fee collection) went to natural or cultural resource protection projects. In addition, 20% of the receipts collected were distributed to projects in parks where no fees are collected or to projects that apply broadly to the national park system. Additional natural resource–related projects are likely to be approved from these funds in the future. The number and value of 1998 resource protection projects from the fee demonstration funds are difficult to determine precisely. Many of the nearly $16 million in resource protection projects involve cultural resources, especially structures. Numerous other projects, whether primarily for resource protection, health and safety, or visitor services, meet multiple objectives. For example, projects to add or replace bear-resistant food containers at Glacier Bay, Lassen, Crater Lake, and Olympic are ascribed to health and safety; however, in addition to protecting visitors, these projects protect bears by helping to prevent their habituation to human food sources. As another example, trail and campground restoration projects are categorized in some cases as resource protection projects and in others as visitor services projects. Additionally, many water-related projects meet multiple objectives. Beyond these multipurpose projects, at least $4.5 million—over 10% of the value of projects—has been spent on projects with natural resources as their principal direct beneficiary, based on an analysis of project titles. A closer examination of all project descriptions would likely yield even more. These natural resource projects include exotic species control at Glacier, White Sands, Cuyahoga Valley, Pictured Rocks, Theodore Roosevelt, Death Valley, and Haleakala; restoration of native species, including threatened and endangered species, at Badlands, Assateague Island, Haleakala, Hawaii Volcanoes, and Joshua Tree; and a paleontological excavation at Badlands. Fee demonstration projects even include resource inventory, monitoring, and studies. Although these projects are not as visible to the public as most, visitor center displays and other means can be used to explain the need for these types of fee-funded projects. Examples of such projects are bear studies at Denali; a grassland assessment at Glacier; modeling of an aquifer system at Great Sand Dunes; a rare plant survey and development of beach survey techniques at Assateague Island; and grizzly bear population modeling, a geothermal inventory, aspen research plot installation, a pronghorn ecology study, and quantification of the importance of winter roads for bison at Yellowstone.

			Great Sand Dunes National Monument (Colorado) is the site of an aquifer-system-modeling project funded by the Recreational Fee Demonstration Program. During 1998 fee demonstration funding of natural resource management projects was roughly equivalent to that provided by the Natural Resource Preservation Program, the largest dedicated funding source for natural resource projects, excluding inventories. Photo Credit: © Jeff Selleck abby_miller@nps.gov Deputy Associate Director, Natural Resource Stewardship and Science, Washington, D.C. MAJOR FUNDING FOR WATER RESOURCES In October, Congress funded a $2.5 million program under the Clean Water Action Plan that focuses activities of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) on water-quality issues in national parks. All projects to be pursued stem from needs identified in park resource management plans and were developed cooperatively between parks and USGS district offices. In spring 1998, 35 of 77 projects were selected, which fall into three categories: cyclic, long-term monitoring studies; intensive or synoptic studies; and technical assistance. This appropriation dwarfs NPS funds for projects and technical assistance related to water resources and provides a tremendous boost to parks. Back to Chapter 6: New Horizons President mandates coral reef protection by James Tilmant Feral burro removal: New solutions to an old problem by Christopher J. Stubbs Doppler technology applied to large-river studies by Brian L. Cluer Natural resource information tools make their way to the web by Jen Coffey Congress places a positive imprint on park management by Mike Soukup Solicitor opinions advance park protection by Julia Brunner and Carol McCoy Research and collecting permit procedures revised by Robert Winfree Home

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Last Updated: 07/22/99
Direct comments on this website to jeff_selleck@nps.gov
This article is from Natural Resource Year in Review--1998, published by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, in June 1999 (publication D-1346)