It breaks my heart… again

Susie and I really enjoy our country’s national parks — our $25 senior pass is one of the few perks to growing old that we both appreciate. I think the same pass is now somewhere around $80 — sure glad inflation is promised to end real soon.

Anyway, two of our favorite parks have always been Joshua Tree National Monument, and Yosemite National Park.

We were married at sunrise in Joshua Tree back in 1971. Things were so much easier back then, and the only accommodation we had to make in order to get permission for our special morning was that we would throw birdseed instead of rice. Other than that it was your normal wedding and — although we were both “hippies” at the time — the service and setting were memorialized in a national Christian publication. Oh yeah, already famous and only nineteen…

And then there is Yosemite. Along with numerous family vacations, I have led quite a few field trips and summer field courses to the valley during my time as an instructor at the college. Things used to be easier in Yosemite as well. Back in the day, all we had to do was reserve a campsite, and then make it to the valley.

The classes I led would usually spend a week in the area, with the highlight of the trip being our hike to the top of Nevada Falls, and then we’d either wimp out and head back down again, or put on our big-kid pants and trek up to Half Dome or Glacier Point, depending upon the interest — and motivation — of the students.

(By the way, if you’ve never been to Yosemite, I’d like to recommend the following: There are two ways to enter the valley. I’d suggest taking the southern approach (Hwy. 140 out of Merced through El Portal), even if you are traveling from the north. The view coming out of the Wawona Tunnel is like Dorothy landing in Oz. There is a big turnout on the left immediately as you exit the tunnel — be prepared to brake hard!)

I bring this up for what will soon, unfortunately, be an all too obvious reason: the current administration is going after many of our national institutions, not the least of which is the National Park Service.

(I’ll save the post on the decimation of NOAA and the National Weather Service until tornado season gets here. Until then, watch the original Twister — the version with Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt — to get an idea of what can happen without any advanced warning. This Hollywood version is so spot-on that I would actually devote three class sessions in Hydrosphere at the high school to show it to the kids during our week on severe storms.)

I always try to stress to my students that there really isn’t much room for politics in a geology course, and I promise to skirt the issue… unless the politics in some way affect the science. I’m distressed to say that what is beginning to happen at our national parks falls into that category. So, I feel duty-bound to touch on this. Sorry.

There are an increasing number of articles in the news services about what is being proposed, and in some cases already in process, to save money for tax cuts by eliminating services at our national parks. This starts, obviously, with mass layoffs of employees, many of whom could be considered by some to be critical personnel.

The first article to grab my attention was on the SFGATE website titled: “Dire situation in Joshua Tree and Yosemite leads to weekend protests.” The authors have concerns about what is coming for the Rangers and maintenance staff, and don’t hold out much hope for a happy park experience if the proposed cuts occur at the predicted levels. A few paragraphs from the article may help illustrate their point:

In Joshua Tree, locals and business owners gathered outside the visitor center, holding signs and passing out flyers. Meanwhile, in Yosemite Valley, protesters used the park’s firefall event at Horsetail Fall to highlight the staffing crisis.

The demonstrations followed mass layoffs across the Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Service. On Feb. 14, the agency terminated 1,000 employees, including six rangers at Joshua Tree. A day earlier, 3,400 U.S. Forest Service workers were also dismissed, part of a larger effort to reduce the federal workforce by more than 200,000 jobs.

At Yosemite, demonstrators raised concerns about how staffing reductions could impact basic park services, such as in the form of restroom closures, delayed search-and-rescue response times, and increased strain on remaining rangers. Some employees who were laid off expressed frustration with the abruptness of the terminations, including a former park custodian who learned he was fired just one day before the protest.

This from the Daily Beast (2/24/25) titled “Under Attack”:

After 1,000 National Park Service employees were abruptly fired Feb. 14, staff have banded together to signal “dire distress” by hanging the American flag upside down off Yosemite’s El Capitan. The iconic monolith is famous for its “firefall,” a phenomenon that transpires with the sunset illuminates the waterfall beneath the cliff face. As dozens of onlookers gathered Monday to admire the view, they were met with a far different sight: an upside-down flag draped from the 3,000-foot summit.

The protestors were park employees aiming to expose the Trump Administration’s sweeping federal cuts. About 3,000 U.S. Forest Service workers were also terminated, and both parties say that the country-wide slashes will lead to chaos at the parks—dirty bathrooms, longer lines, and a lack of people to patrol the wilderness and keep visitors safe. This includes search and rescue, a team committed to extracting hikers and campers from emergency situation.

Lest you think this is just more left-wing misinformation (and there is surely plenty of “fake news” on both sides), even the myriad Fox outlets — not considered to be bastions of woke radical-liberal sentiment by anyone — are joining the discussion of the Yosemite staffing reductions, as well as similar adjustments at various parks in Colorado, North Carolina, and elsewhere. This gleaned from an article titled “National parks cutting hours, services amid federal layoffs” (2/25/25) on what the public can expect from the lay-offs and firings:

People should be prepared to lower their standards, because they may very well see things like long lines on the way into the park, dirty bathrooms, or even some closed bathrooms or visitor centers.

This is only a smattering of the hue and cry that is beginning. The situation is certain to escalate as the summer tourist season actually begins, and visitors start to experience disruptions to their vacation plans at these, and other, parks in the U.S.

Be sure to keep yourself informed, and adjust your plans accordingly…