E-mail abby_miller@nps.gov Deputy Associate Director, Natural Resource Stewardship and Science; Washington, D.C.
Fiscal year 1996 continued a downward trend in natural resource funding that began in FY95. In terms of actual dollars, constant dollars, and percent of the operation of national park system (ONPS) appropriation, FY95 and FY96 natural resource funding declined approximately 12% while the total ONPS appropriation grew 2% over the FY94 level. Despite the transfer of $20 million to the National Biological Survey (NBS, now USGS Biological Resources Division-BRD) in FY94, natural resource funding went up slightly that year from FY93. Expenditures for natural resource management for FY96-actual expenditures, rather than projected expenditures presented in the budget-were about 3% less than appropriated. Although regional and support office funding is only 1011% of total funding, expenditures at this level declined 16% in FY95 and FY96, contributing to this overall decline.
The ONPS appropriation is the largest of five principal appropriations for the National Park Service, accounting for 82% of all NPS funds, and contains most natural resource-related funding. Elsewhere, $916,000 is included for the National Natural Landmarks Program and $338,000 for environmental compliance activities, but this discussion focuses on ONPS funds only. In addition to a small administrative costs category, the ONPS appropriation has four major subdivisions; maintenance (32% of total ONPS in FY96), visitor services (23%), park support (20%), and resource stewardship (16%). This last category includes cultural resource research and resource management, natural resource research and resource management, and resource protection (i.e., ranger resource protection patrols).
In FY96, over two-thirds (approximately $52.4 million) of the $76.4 million in ONPS funds allocated to natural resource management and science went to the field (parks, support offices, and regional offices). The remaining $24 million funded the Natural Resource Program Center and the Washington Office Natural Resource Stewardship and Science Directorate. Much of these funds went to parks in direct project dollars (about $8 million in Natural Resource Preservation Program, water resource, and GIS projects), centralized acquisition of park data (e.g., inventories), and technical assistance.
Two observations can be made about the recent downward trend in natural resource funding. First, following establishment of the NBS in October 1993, funding for natural resource management has declined slightly. Between FY87 and FY93 (for which figures are readily available) natural resource line items increased 53%. Since then, natural resource initiatives have not been as successful. Second, natural resource-related appropriations for the field dropped 18% in FY94 and FY95 while overall park appropriations rose 6.6%.
Natural resource management funding in parks is not dictated by the portion of park funding described for resource management in the budget request, but by the amount that superintendents elect to assign to this function. Additionally, the NPS budget tracking system does not distinguish between some types of resource management activities. For example, under this system, both foot patrol and visitor management in wilderness are classified as "resource management" expenditures, on a par with scientifically established monitoring activities. This is important because future budgets are based on these figures, which are not very precise in measuring park resource management activities. During this period of declining park natural resource expenditures and slightly increasing overall park funding, parks were required by two different initiatives to increase grades and salaries of rangers and take on additional benefit costs in converting many temporary employees to term or permanent staff. These and other types of cost increases reduce the flexibility of superintendents in allocating increases.
As long as natural resource funding initiatives are relatively unsuccessful and superintendents are pressed to fund aspects of park management other than natural resource management, the downward trend is likely to continue. On the other hand, the FY98 budget forwarded to Congress could change that trend, due to significant nationally focused initiatives, all of which provide direct assistance or project funding to parks.
Other articles in the "Meeting Demands" chapter:
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