Glacier Park could see a hefty budget cut

Glacier National Park could see an across-the-board budget cut of $682,000 this year if federal budget sequestration goes through. According to internal National Park Service documents released by the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees, Glacier Park’s budget could be cut from $13.68 million to $12.95 million.

National parks across the U.S. have been told to plan for a 5 percent cut in their budgets, according to a Jan. 25 memo NPS director Jonathan Jarvis sent to regional, associate and assistant directors.

The memo also directs national parks to “eliminate all seasonal and temporary personnel costs unless they provide the only option for ensuring the health and safety of visitors and employees or the protection of resources and assets.”

Glacier Park’s staffing is largely seasonal in the summer months, with more than 350 seasonal employees in the busy tourist time.

Jarvis’ memo also directs national parks to apply immediate hiring freezes for permanent employees, non-essential travel, non-mandatory training, overtime, purchases of supplies, materials and equipment, and contracts. It also calls for extending furloughs to employees who are subject to that provision. Permanent and term employees could also be subject to furlough.

Initially sequestration was expected to take place earlier this year, but a recent budget deal delayed the move until March 1 to give Congress more time to hammer out a deal.

NPS, however, is planning as if sequestration will happen. All told, the cuts amount to a $110 million reduction in the NPS budget.

The timing couldn’t be worse, Coalition chairman Bill Wade notes. A former superintendent of Shenandoah National Park, Wade said that national parks begin their seasonal hiring in March, and some seasonals begin as early as April. Calculating cuts also takes staff time, he said — time that could be spent on other projects.

The Jarvis memo comes with specific instructions on how national parks should calculate their cuts. For example, the cuts must be across-the-board — national parks can’t shift money from one account to another in order to wholly preserve a program.

While the cuts won’t shut down a place like Glacier Park, visitors could see far fewer interpretative staff and programs if Congress doesn’t get a budget deal completed.