30 percent payroll reduction at National Park Service?

[terrylane]

We have plans for our first trip to Yellowstone in late summer. I thought the first pass of staff reductions was going to be it in the near term, but now I see this from a couple of days ago.

Trump administration eyes 30 percent payroll reduction at National Park Service

https://thehill.com/homenews/state-w...-service-cuts/

[MooseCountry]

A fired former/ex-employee for a news source is the most trusted.

[Donskiman]

No telling what will happen. All you can do is plan your trip and hope for the best. If you're not staying inside the park, get to the entrance gates as early in the morning as possible.

[OldBaldFat]

A 30% gross payroll cost reduction is a pre-closure, or massive mission restructuring event.

The federal government has some excessive costs, as does every private business. Trimming payroll costs has to be done surgically to not impact the end product, be it cars or a service like a park.

Blanket cutting overall payroll 30% is stupid, wasteful and never works.

[Unplanned Tourist]

Originally Posted by MooseCountry

A fired former/ex-employee for a news source is the most trusted.

It's in most news sources. Google it.

[hamm2018]

Thread Reminder -
Please keep any & all politics out of this conversation. Any opinions should be stated and then move on from there, no bickering about the situation. This could be a situation that impacts allot of us, be kind and support each other through this situation.
__________________

[spock12]

I love Yellowstone and have been a few times. I took my great granddaughter there a few years ago, it was the year the park was shut due to flooding. We got one day with the granddaughter and had a great time. Bye all means go you will enjoy it.

[jacwjames]

Since 2021 I had a mission (think bucket list) to visit as many national parks as possible. I had already been to quite few but in the last 4 years I'm glad I did. I visited roughly 35 parks, 13 last year alone. I also visited other sites along the way.



Still have a 4 more NP's in the lower 48 and many in AK, HI, and the remaining parks.


Hopefully my quest will continue but this year I'm taking a break and waiting to see how all this plays out.

[RickNC]

A lot of things are being said off the cuff in Washington that people understandably take as fact. The 30% reduction taken in context of his words sounds more like a want than an executive order.

I spoke to my niece last night who is a long time NPS employee at one of the National park units. Her unit lost all their seasonal worker positions but got them back 9 days later except for two. Two of their 5 probationary employees are gone. Two long Term staff took early retirement offers. So far they are down those 6 plus 3 open positions from last year they did not have funding for in last years budget. Not sure about volunteers status yet (volunteers cost money too).

The ranger guided tours that occurred every 1/2 hour is now on the hour and only between the hours of 10 and 3. She also noted that scheduled remodeling of bathrooms and roof repairs on two buildings have been canceled.

We have excluded National Parks from our travel plans for this year. We are also relying less on USACE campground availability. It is a big country with plenty of other places to go and enjoy while this get worked out.

[boiledowl]

Originally Posted by jacwjames

Since 2021 I had a mission (think bucket list) to visit as many national parks as possible. I had already been to quite few but in the last 4 years I'm glad I did. I visited roughly 35 parks, 13 last year alone. I also visited other sites along the way.



Still have a 4 more NP's in the lower 48 and many in AK, HI, and the remaining parks.


Hopefully my quest will continue but this year I'm taking a break and waiting to see how all this plays out.

What would you say is your favorite can't miss visiting NP?

[MeNotYou]

I work outside of Glacier and have a cabin outside of Yellowstone, so I'm fortunate enough to be able to enjoy either pretty much anytime I want to. Have family that have never been to Glacier, so I'm sending them my park information as I have plenty of room to circle the wagons. If you're going to go to either of these lovely places, might I suggest taking along some motorcycles or a convertible? The scenery is 1000x better without a cage around you! Going-to-the-Sun road in Glacier and the Beartooth Hwy leading out of the north entrance from Yellowstone to Red Lodge (Montana) just can't be beat!

[twinboat]

Was there any data of how much the payroll increased in the last 2 years ? Adding federal employees keeps the unemployed #s down.

[Paul_D]

I retired from the Federal Government (DoD) and spent my last 5 years up to my eyeballs in the funding process. Congress allocates and authorizes funding. They are the sole owners of that process in the federal government.

Every year we would build a budget plan, down to the project level, and submit to Congress in the Congressional Budget build book. I doubt any congressional member has ever read "the book", but staffers definitely did. We would receive our allocations when the budget was passed. Don't even ask about allocated but not authorized funds.

Organizational leadership does have some leeway to re-direct funds, but it is limited. During a "continuing resolution", new projects can't be started, but existing efforts can continue, in fact some are required to continue, even if they were supposed to phase out.

So if the law is followed, funds can't be redirected or terminated without congressional approval. Time will tell how things work out.

[Paul_D]

Originally Posted by twinboat

Was there any data of how much the payroll increased in the last 2 years ? Adding federal employees keeps the unemployed #s down.

You can find the number on OPM's page or USAfacts.com

in the last 2 years - 130,000 added
If you look back to 2010 its 400,000 less