[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                     EXAMINING BARRIERS TO ACCESS:
                 ONGOING VISITOR EXPERIENCE ISSUES AT 
                         AMERICA'S NATIONAL PARKS

=======================================================================

                           OVERSIGHT HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                        SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND 
                               INVESTIGATIONS

                                 OF THE

                     COMMITTEE ON NATURAL RESOURCES
                     U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                        Thursday, July 27, 2023

                               __________

                           Serial No. 118-54

                               __________

       Printed for the use of the Committee on Natural Resources
       
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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------     
                     COMMITTEE ON NATURAL RESOURCES

                     BRUCE WESTERMAN, AR, Chairman
                    DOUG LAMBORN, CO, Vice Chairman
                  RAUL M. GRIJALVA, AZ, Ranking Member

Doug Lamborn, CO			Grace F. Napolitano, CA
Robert J. Wittman, VA			Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan, 	
Tom McClintock, CA			    CNMI
Paul Gosar, AZ				Jared Huffman, CA
Garret Graves, LA			Ruben Gallego, AZ
Aumua Amata C. Radewagen, AS		Joe Neguse, CO
Doug LaMalfa, CA			Mike Levin, CA
Daniel Webster, FL			Katie Porter, CA
Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon, PR		Teresa Leger Fernandez, NM
Russ Fulcher, ID			Melanie A. Stansbury, NM
Pete Stauber, MN			Mary Sattler Peltola, AK
John R. Curtis, UT			Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, NY
Tom Tiffany, WI				Kevin Mullin, CA
Jerry Carl, AL				Val T. Hoyle, OR
Matt Rosendale, MT			Sydney Kamlager-Dove, CA
Lauren Boebert, CO			Seth Magaziner, RI
Cliff Bentz, OR				Nydia M. Velazquez, NY
Jen Kiggans, VA				Ed Case, HI
Jim Moylan, GU				Debbie Dingell, MI
Wesley P. Hunt, TX			Susie Lee, NV
Mike Collins, GA
Anna Paulina Luna, FL
John Duarte, CA
Harriet M. Hageman, WY


                    Vivian Moeglein, Staff Director
                      Tom Connally, Chief Counsel
                 Lora Snyder, Democratic Staff Director
                   http://naturalresources.house.gov
                                 ------                                

              SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS

                        PAUL GOSAR, AZ, Chairman
                      MIKE COLLINS, GA, Vice Chair
                MELANIE A. STANSBURY, NM, Ranking Member

Matt Rosendale, MT                   Ed Case, HI
Wesley P. Hunt, TX                   Ruben Gallego, AZ
Mike Collins, GA                     Susie Lee, NV
Anna Paulina Luna, FL                Raul M. Grijalva, AZ, ex officio
Bruce Westerman, AR, ex officio

                              ----------
                              
                               CONTENTS

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

Hearing held on Thursday, July 27, 2023..........................     1

Statement of Members:

    Gosar, Hon. Paul, a Representative in Congress from the State 
      of Arizona.................................................     2

    Stansbury, Hon. Melanie A., a Representative in Congress from 
      the State of New Mexico....................................     3

Statement of Witnesses:

    Reynolds, Michael T., Deputy Director for Congressional and 
      External Relations, National Park Service, U.S. Department 
      of the Interior, Washington, DC............................     5
        Prepared statement of....................................     6
        Questions submitted for the record.......................    11



 
   OVERSIGHT HEARING ON EXAMINING BARRIERS TO ACCESS: ONGOING VISITOR.
             EXPERIENCE ISSUES AT AMERICA'S NATIONAL PARKS

                              ----------                              


                        Thursday, July 27, 2023

                     U.S. House of Representatives

              Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations

                     Committee on Natural Resources

                             Washington, DC

                              ----------                              

    The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:39 p.m. in 
Room 1324, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Paul Gosar 
[Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Gosar, Rosendale, Collins, 
Westerman; Stansbury, and Lee.
    Also present: Representatives LaMalfa, Stauber, Wittman; 
and Quigley.

    Dr. Gosar. The Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations 
will now come to order.
    Without objection, the Chair is authorized to declare a 
recess of the Subcommittee at any time.
    The Subcommittee today is meeting to hear testimony on 
``Examining Barriers to Access: Ongoing Visitor Experience 
Issues at America's National Parks.''
    I ask unanimous consent that all Members testifying today 
be allowed to sit with the Subcommittee, give their testimony, 
and participate in the hearing from the dais.
    I ask that the gentleman from California, Mr. LaMalfa, be 
allowed to sit with the Subcommittee and participate in the 
hearing.
    I ask that the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Stauber, be 
allowed to sit with the Subcommittee and participate in the 
hearing.
    I ask that the gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Wittman, be 
allowed to sit with the Subcommittee and participate in the 
hearing.
    And I ask that the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Quigley, be 
allowed to sit with the Subcommittee and participate in the 
hearing.
    Without objection, so ordered.
    Under Committee Rule 4(f), any oral opening statements at 
hearings are limited to the Chairman and the Ranking Minority 
Member. I therefore ask unanimous consent that all other 
Members' opening statements be made part of the hearing record 
if they are submitted in accordance with Committee Rule 3(o).
    Without objection, so ordered.
    I will now recognize myself for my introductory comments.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. PAUL GOSAR, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS 
                   FROM THE STATE OF ARIZONA

    Dr. Gosar. I thank Deputy Director Reynolds for coming 
before the Subcommittee. We are gathered here to examine the 
incredible failure of the National Park Service under the Biden 
administration in carrying out the agency's core mission of 
both providing access to public lands and conserving those 
lands for future generations.
    And to be clear, I have a lot of respect for the many 
dedicated, talented Americans working day in and day out in our 
parks and welcoming visitors every day. My criticisms today are 
pointing toward the bureaucrats in DC who have steered the 
agency in the wrong direction.
    Over the last several years, the Park Service has received 
an historic level of investment from the Federal Government 
and, I should note, the private sector. For years, I have 
listened to the Service come before this Committee and my 
friends on the other side of the aisle as well, who mirror one 
another, ``If you give us more money, we will solve these 
problems.''
    If I can get one message across today, it is this. Maybe, 
just maybe, more money isn't the solution.
    My friends, I am here to tell you something. Americans 
continue to love their national parks, as they should, but the 
management stinks. The lines are longer. The employees continue 
to not show up for work in person. Bathrooms are dirty, windows 
are broken, and trails across the country are closed.
    The so-called Inflation Reduction Act set aside $500 
million. Yes, that is half a billion dollars to hire staff for 
the Park Service. Several years ago, Congress passed the Great 
American Outdoors Act, a pact made in part with the National 
Park Service, among other management agencies to pay down then 
the approximately $13 billion of deferred maintenance backlog.
    Today, instead of a growing and thriving workforce, we 
continue to receive reports of closed trails like the popular 
White House Overlook Trail and Canyon de Chelly at the National 
Monument, the only public trail on the south rim, or alerts on 
an official website to be aware of the illegal traffic or 
smuggling, as well as the presence of rabies in the park like 
Coronado National Monument.
    Lake Powell has numerous boat launches closed along with 
the marinas, and convenience stores closed until further 
notice, which is effectively permanent at this point. The 
Service has added recreational water advisories to its website, 
warning visitors not to ingest any of the water at the lake, 
ostensibly where the same freshwater that millions of Arizonans 
drink, although it is obviously not filtered first.
    Despite the historic and growing levels of investments in 
our national parks at every level, from employees to critical 
infrastructure, heck, even to climate change projects, the 
situation seems to be getting worse for both the visitor and 
the critters who live in the parks. The entire park system is 
suffering from mismanagement and, as usual, the American people 
end up paying for it.
    My home state of Arizona, as of September 2022, had over 
$1.2 billion in deferred maintenance and repairs across 22 
different park units. This is unacceptable, and ultimately it 
damages the overall visitor experience and restricts access to 
America's national parks.
    Reducing the deferred maintenance backlog should be our 
utmost priority, but the record clearly shows that this is not 
the case. With the deferred maintenance backlog continuing to 
grow year after year, and the huge increase in the backlog 
since the National Park Service received over $1 billion from 
the Great American Outdoors Act, the Committee expects to hear 
a concrete plan from you on how the National Park Service can 
get back on track.
    The National Park System infrastructure is in a state of 
disrepair, with countless examples across the nation of damaged 
transportation infrastructure cutting off access to whole areas 
of the National Park System and impacting recreation 
opportunities, businesses, and the gateway communities that 
support the parks and outdoor recreation economy.
    In 2022, the National Park System recorded over 311 million 
recreational visits, a 5 percent increase from the year before, 
with similar visitation numbers expected for this year. As 
visitors from around our country and the world continue to 
flock to our national parks, I find it shocking, quite frankly, 
that the National Park Service isn't doing everything in its 
power to support the businesses and gateway communities who 
support these parks.
    In my home state of Arizona, as well as a number of other 
states, I have been discouraged by the Service's efforts to 
effectively shut down air tours over our parks. These air tours 
are very critical for those who do not have the physical 
ability to hike or bike through some of our nation's natural 
wonders, and at the same time support local economies.
    I still believe that with stronger leadership at the 
National Park Service and working together with Congress, we 
can get back to the basics and accomplish a lot for the 
American people. The National Park Service should work with 
Congress to develop a more active, efficient management 
strategy for the National Park System that incorporates the 
best science and technology available in order to increase 
access to public lands and recreational opportunities for all 
Americans and to protect these amazing spaces.

    I now recognize the Ranking Member for her opening 
comments.
    Ms. Stansbury.

STATEMENT OF THE HON. MELANIE A. STANSBURY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

    Ms. Stansbury. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to 
welcome our Deputy Director, Mr. Reynolds.
    Thank you so much for being here with us today.
    And I also want to just take a moment to thank all of our 
Federal employees and our Park Service employees who are out on 
the ground serving our great country every day and protecting 
these iconic and beautiful spaces that are so important to our 
cultural heritage and our ecological integrity.
    This is a wonderful and welcome hearing to be here with the 
Park Service today, and I want to take a moment to just 
acknowledge what an incredible moment we are living in, 
historically, in terms of the transformation of the Park 
Service. I actually worked at the Office of Management and 
Budget during the Obama administration, and was involved in 
oversight of the Department of the Interior. And it is amazing 
to see, even during the last several years, the transformation 
within the Park Service and what a difference that great 
leadership makes.
    It is extraordinary to think that the U.S. Department of 
the Interior is now under the leadership of our nation's very 
first Indigenous Cabinet Secretary, and that the National Park 
Service has at its helm our nation's very first Director in 
Chuck Sams, III. And we are extraordinarily grateful for his 
leadership and for all of the things that he is doing to help 
transform the culture within the Park Service, to help tell a 
more complete history of our nation's beautiful public lands, 
and his efforts and all of the efforts of the National Park 
Service to protect these historic and ecologically important 
places.
    Of course, the National Park Service is working to advance 
equity, to support underserved communities, to tackle the 
climate crisis, to conserve our natural resources, and to 
preserve these public spaces and waters for generations to 
come. The Park Service is indeed making these spaces more 
accessible to all people and, as I said, telling a more 
complete history.
    And, in fact, as we know, many of our national parks are 
actually spaces that are formerly Indigenous lands in which our 
tribes lived, used, hunted, prayed, and used for ceremonial 
purposes since time immemorial. The Park Service is partnering 
with our tribal communities and co-stewardship efforts, helping 
to return sacred places and access to important resources. The 
Park Service is working with our communities to increase access 
for underserved communities and, of course, doing the daily 
activities that they have always done to make sure that we can 
access those spaces.
    But in addition to that, and I do agree with many of the 
comments that my colleague made about conditions worsening in 
our national parks, but I would beg to differ that the primary 
source of that problem is actually rooted in climate change. It 
is getting hotter. Our ecosystems are degrading. We have less 
people working in our parks right now because not only a 
historic pandemic that decimated the Federal workforce, but 
Donald Trump, who dismantled and made a concerted effort in 
dismantling our Federal workforce, and forced and pushed many 
people out of Federal service. So, while there may be 
challenges that the Park Service has always faced, they have 
certainly been exacerbated by climate change, by the pandemic, 
and by a historically bad President who pushed out many of our 
Federal workers.
    But I do want to take a moment to turn to some of the 
important work that the Park Service is undertaking currently 
and, in particular, just to use a few moments at the end here 
to thank the President and to thank our Deputy Director and all 
of the staff out there for the announcement this week of the 
President's creation of the Emmett Till and Mamie Till Mobley 
National Monument.
    For those of you that are not familiar with this story, of 
course, this week would have been the 82nd birthday of Emmett 
Louis Till, a young Black man from the South who met an 
untimely death at 14 years old. His mother's refusal to remain 
silent after the death and the brutal murder of her son and the 
open casket of his death are part of what galvanized the civil 
rights movement and helped to propel it forward. And this is 
the work that the National Park Service and our President are 
doing today to make sure that we tell the complete story of 
this great nation and its sometimes tragic and complicated 
past.
    I am grateful for the President's brave efforts to 
recognize Emmett and his mother, the signing of that 
proclamation, and the continued work by the National Park 
Service to uplift these stories, to create spaces where all 
Americans see themselves, see their history, and see their 
future.
    With that, I yield back.

    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentlewoman. I just think there is 
another way of going about things. I think I look through a 
different lens. Is there something we could see with 
volunteers, having a national park volunteer system, where we 
can actually put people to work? I think there are a lot of 
ways we should be looking at this, not just one way with more 
money. So, I thank the gentlewoman.
    Now I would like to hear from our witness, Mr. Mike 
Reynolds, the Deputy Director of Congressional and External 
Relations, National Park Service.
    Your 5 minutes are starting. Thank you.

     STATEMENT OF MICHAEL T. REYNOLDS, DEPUTY DIRECTOR FOR 
 CONGRESSIONAL AND EXTERNAL RELATIONS, NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, 
        U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, WASHINGTON, DC

    Mr. Reynolds. Thank you, Chairman Gosar, Ranking Member 
Stansbury, and members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity 
to present the Department of the Interior's views on the 
visitor experience at national parks.
    The National Park Service is honored to care for all parks 
on behalf of the American people, and to welcome them to 
experience the wonders of their National Park System. The NPS 
seeks to provide outstanding experiences for all visitors, 
while upholding our mandate to conserve each park's resources 
for the benefit of present and future generations.
    Significant investments from the Great American Outdoors 
Act, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Inflation Reduction 
Act, and recent disaster supplemental appropriations have 
allowed the NPS to address critical needs in our national parks 
and enhance the visitor experience. Yet, the NPS faces many of 
the same challenges and constraints that other government 
agencies, towns, and businesses face across the country, 
whether due to natural disasters, public safety, seasonal 
wildlife protection, or infrastructure improvements, certain 
areas of national parks may be closed out of necessity. Our 
goal is to re-establish access as soon as possible and where 
feasible, or provide alternatives where closures are permanent.
    Park resources and facilities can be impacted by natural 
events such as hurricanes, flooding, drought, wildfires, 
leaving them inaccessible to visitors. There are also times 
when areas may be closed to protect wildlife or culturally 
significant artifacts. Closures or limited hours of visitor 
facilities may occur due to staffing shortages, as our existing 
staff is spread more thinly than in years past.
    The NPS is grateful for the $500 million that Congress 
provided in the Inflation Reduction Act to hire employees. 
However, this will not fully or permanently restore lost 
capacity. As we welcome visitors to their national parks this 
summer and beyond, we encourage visitors to check our website, 
nps.gov, to make sure the areas that they hope to see are open 
and accessible.
    Visitors expect to find high-quality facilities which 
enable a safe and memorable experience, yet many of the roads, 
trails, restrooms, and facilities in national parks are aging 
and strained by underfunding for the use that they were not 
designed to support that we get now. We are grateful to 
Congress for the passage of the Great American Outdoors Act to 
address deferred maintenance. This much-needed funding infusion 
has helped us make meaningful progress in improving the 
condition of high-priority assets.
    While projects are underway, temporary closures will 
typically be required as we work to improve the facilities for 
visitors. Incidental road trail and facility closures in 
individual national parks have not resulted in significant 
reduction in total visitation across the National Park Service. 
Park facilities and staffing levels are challenged to keep pace 
with ever-increasing visitation.
    The NPS is employing a range of park-specific strategies to 
provide a welcoming and enjoyable environment while ensuring 
the protection of nationally significant resources. We have 
long managed access in backcountry areas by issuing trailhead 
and overnight permits, and as we test new ideas and planning 
tools we are conducting robust public and stakeholder 
engagement before committing to long-term implementation.
    Congestion can result in gridlock, visitor conflicts, 
safety issues, resource damage, and delays in emergency 
response. Timed entry systems spread visitation throughout the 
day, reduce lines at entrance stations and parking lots, and 
avoid impacts on resources. These systems allow visitors to 
better plan and have more enjoyable experiences, while often 
having the added benefit of expanding the economic benefits of 
parks to more local businesses and area attractions.
    The NPS wants visitors to have high-quality experiences 
wherever they go in the National Park System. The NPS is 
committed to finding innovative solutions, collaborating with 
communities, and making responsible choices to ensure future 
generations can enjoy and be inspired by the parks entrusted to 
our care. We appreciate your ongoing support as we endeavor to 
achieve these goals.
    Chairman Gosar, Ranking Member Stansbury, thank you again 
for this opportunity to appear today. I would be happy to 
answer any questions that you may have.

    [The prepared statement of Mr. Reynolds follows:]
    Prepared Statement of Michael T. Reynolds, Deputy Director for 
   Congressional and External Relations, National Park Service, U.S. 
                       Department of the Interior

    Chairman Gosar, Ranking Member Stansbury, and members of the 
Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to present the Department 
of the Interior's views on the visitor experience at national parks.
    National parks are among the most remarkable places in America for 
recreation, learning, and inspiration. These special places belong to 
all Americans. The National Park Service (NPS) is honored to care for 
all parks on behalf of the American people and to welcome them to 
experience the wonders of their National Park System. We also welcome 
international visitors, in keeping with our commitment to extend the 
benefits of natural and cultural resource conservation and outdoor 
recreation throughout the world.
    Visitor enjoyment is a critical part of the NPS mission. The NPS 
seeks to provide outstanding experiences for all visitors while 
upholding our mandate to conserve unimpaired each park's natural and 
cultural resources for the benefit of present and future generations. 
Fulfilling our mission and ensuring positive visitor experiences is the 
work of our 20,000 employees and thousands of volunteers, interns, 
fellows, and partners who are the heart of our agency. I want to 
acknowledge their accomplishments and thank them for their dedication.
    Significant investments from the Great American Outdoors Act, the 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Inflation Reduction Act, and recent 
emergency disaster supplemental appropriations have allowed the NPS to 
address critical needs in our national parks and enhance or recover the 
visitor experience. Yet, the NPS faces many of the same challenges and 
constraints that other federal agencies, cities, towns, organizations, 
and businesses face across the country. We rise to meet these 
challenges and work daily to sustain these remarkable places that the 
American people have entrusted to us. Indeed, many countries look to 
our leadership and to us as the model park system.
Responding to Road, Trail, & Facility Closures

    Whether due to natural disasters, significant weather events, 
public safety, seasonal wildlife protection, or infrastructure 
improvements, certain areas in national parks may be closed out of 
necessity. Our goal is to reestablish access as soon as possible where 
feasible or provide alternatives where closures are long-term or 
permanent.
    In years with heavy snowfall, mountain roads and facilities open 
later than they might in an average year. Deeper snowpacks provide 
needed drought relief but also require more time to clear. This past 
winter and spring, for example, the Tuolumne River basin in Yosemite 
National Park received 250% more snow than average. Crews and equipment 
worked exceptionally hard this year to clear Tioga Road while 
maintaining safety in avalanche hazard areas. The North Rim of Grand 
Canyon National Park saw over 250 inches of snow this past winter and 
reopened to visitors in early June with water conservation measures in 
place while the park repaired a break to the water infrastructure.
    Floods impact parks across the country every year. Notably, in 
Yellowstone National Park last year, record flooding events washed out 
portions of two major roadways, leaving the park headquarters and the 
park community of Mammoth Hot Springs isolated. The NPS and its 
partners worked quickly to ensure the safety of visitors, employees, 
and community residents, and to restore damaged roads, water and 
wastewater systems, power lines, and other critical park 
infrastructure. The park rapidly reopened areas when it was safe to do 
so and over 90% of the park was reopened just a couple weeks after the 
flood event. Thanks to the strong partnership with the Federal Highway 
Administration, the agencies were able to re-establish access for 
Yellowstone National Park visitors, employees, and gateway communities 
in under five months. It would not have been possible without the 
tremendous support from the Congressional delegations, governors, 
counties, communities, and other partners.
    Increased winter snowpack and spring rain have improved conditions 
slightly at Glen Canyon National Recreation Area and Lake Mead National 
Recreation Area, but declining water levels due to climate change and 
over 20 years of ongoing drought have reshaped these parks' shorelines. 
As Lake Powell and Lake Mead continue to recede, extending launch ramps 
and other infrastructure becomes more difficult and more expensive due 
to the topography and projected decline in water levels. The NPS 
recognizes the important role that launch ramps and marinas play in the 
economies of gateway communities and the numerous businesses that 
operate in and around both parks. Our commitment to understanding the 
impacts of climate change on park resources, infrastructure, 
operations, and visitor experiences is central to ensuring the safe, 
responsible, and long-term use and enjoyment of all the parks have to 
offer.
    We know one year of heavy snowpack alone will not sustain lake 
access into the future. To prepare for the possibility of continued 
rapid water level decline, Lake Mead National Recreation Area is 
preparing a Sustainable Low Water Access Plan, which is currently open 
for public comment. The NPS looks forward to the next phase of public 
and stakeholder feedback and engagement to develop a responsible and 
feasible plan to preserve both motorized and primitive recreational 
boating access to the lake.
    Besides heavy snow and ice, flooding, and drought, events that can 
damage park resources and facilities and leave them inaccessible to 
visitors include hurricanes, landslides, rockfalls, structural fires, 
wildfires, and beach erosion. The NPS appreciates the support of 
Congress in providing recent emergency supplemental appropriations to 
recover from the consequences of these disasters, but notes that these 
funds do not support proactive investments in infrastructure hardening 
or resiliency at a portfolio scale.
    The protection of natural and cultural resources is core to the 
NPS' legislative mandate. There are times when an area may be closed to 
visitor use to protect wildlife or culturally significant artifacts. In 
the spring, certain trails or rock-climbing routes may be closed to 
protect nesting peregrine falcons, such as at Joshua Tree National 
Park, Zion National Park, and Acadia National Park. At national 
seashores, certain dunes and beach areas may be closed to protect 
piping plovers or sea turtles from disturbance during vulnerable 
nesting periods. These federally threatened and endangered species are 
an integral part of what makes these places special and national 
seashores provide critical habitat for their survival.
    Closures or limited hours of visitor facilities due to staffing 
shortages is another access issue the NPS is working to address. Our 
existing staff is spread more thinly than in years past. Between FY 
2011 and FY 2022, the total number of NPS full-time employees decreased 
by approximately 3,400 or 15%. Capacity requirements of the NPS have 
increased significantly as Congress has authorized new parks and 
programs, as well as expansions of existing parks. The NPS is grateful 
for the $500 million available through FY 2030 that Congress provided 
in the Inflation Reduction Act to hire employees in the national park 
system; however, this will not fully or permanently restore lost 
capacity.
    Other factors also complicate this issue, including how NPS pay, 
benefits, and work environment compares to that in the local area. The 
NPS typically tries to hire approximately 7,000 seasonal positions 
annually to fill critical roles across the National Park System during 
the heaviest periods of visitation. The NPS is committed to using all 
available hiring authorities and pursuing strategic workforce planning 
and recruiting to fill these and other positions. In many parks, 
housing availability or affordability in the local area challenges 
their ability to recruit or retain employees. The FY 2024 President's 
Budget Request for the NPS includes an increase of $7.0 million, for a 
total of $14.9 million, to support improving the condition or quantity 
of park housing units.
    As we continue to welcome visitors to their national parks this 
summer and beyond, we strongly recommend they ``Plan Like a Park 
Ranger'' so that the only surprises are happy ones. A park visit begins 
with a trip to NPS.gov for ideas about where to go, what to see, and 
most important, to make sure that the areas visitors hope to see are 
open and accessible. Information about current conditions and timelines 
for facilities reopening can be found on each park's website and social 
media platforms. The NPS provides advance notice, when possible, of 
anticipated closures. We appreciate visitors' understanding and ask 
that they be prepared to adapt their plans, slow down on roadways, 
expect delays, and pack their patience.
Making Progress on Improving Facilities

    When Americans visit their parks, they expect to find high-quality 
facilities which enable a safe and memorable experience. Many of the 
roads, trails, restrooms, water treatment systems, and visitor and 
operational facilities in national parks are aging, obsolete, and 
strained by underfunding and use they were not designed to support. We 
are grateful to Congress for passage of the Great American Outdoors Act 
which established the National Parks and Public Lands Legacy 
Restoration Fund (LRF) to address the Department's deferred maintenance 
and repair backlog. The NPS is using this investment to accomplish 
much-needed asset maintenance, repairs, and replacement. Improved 
facilities will be more resilient, operate more efficiently, and better 
serve visitors. The NPS has prioritized 130 LRF projects that will 
improve the condition of roads, buildings, utility systems, and other 
assets in 176 parks located in 48 states, the District of Columbia, 
Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. While projects are underway, 
temporary closures will typically be required as we work to improve 
facilities for visitors.
    Hot Springs National Park received $16.7 million of LRF funding for 
roof repairs to the Buckstaff Bathhouse and structural and systems 
upgrades to the Maurice Bathhouse and the former Libbey Memorial 
Physical Medicine Center. These essential repairs include structural 
improvements and upgrades to electrical, plumbing, and fire suppression 
systems, which will provide employees and visitors with more 
accessible, safe, and energy-efficient facilities.
    Several miles of the Going-to-the-Sun Road in Glacier National Park 
will undergo rehabilitation as part of a $17.1 million LRF project. 
Work will include replacement of the current multi-span McDonald Creek 
Bridge with a clear-span bridge. The project also entails curve 
widening, milling, and repaving of the road segment, along with 
installing conduit for future fiber lines.
    At the North Rim of Grand Canyon National Park, water system 
improvements are part of a planned $180.1 million LRF project. The 
improvements would address frequent failures with extended periods of 
service outages and would result in a reliable water system to meet 
supply needs at the North Rim and in the cross-canyon corridor for a 
projected life span of up to 75 years. Feedback received during the 
public comment period will be used to refine the project proposal.
    Tuolumne Meadows Campground in Yosemite National Park will receive 
a major overhaul with $26.1 million in LRF funding. The project will 
rehabilitate and modernize the park's largest campground, which hosts 
more than 150,000 campers annually and which was built by the Civilian 
Conservation Corps in the 1930s. The work will enhance the visitor 
experience, fix structures damaged from heavy snowfall, and repair 
aging, inefficient infrastructure.
    At Lyndon B. Johnson National Historic Site, a $9.1 million LRF 
project will address repair work, structural concerns, code 
deficiencies, and deterioration of historic features in the Texas White 
House and the surrounding site. The work will ensure the long-term 
integrity of a critical park resource and allow it to be reopened to 
the public. The nearby communications building will be repurposed to 
provide essential restroom facilities and expand visitor amenities.
    The much-needed funding infusion from the LRF program has helped us 
make meaningful progress in improving the condition of high-priority 
assets, yet there remains an ongoing need for long-term maintenance, 
modernization, renewal, strategic evaluation of low-priority assets, 
and operations support. We recognize, even with this significant 
investment, the NPS has more assets than staff and funding to 
adequately operate and maintain them.
    The impact of appropriations for park facilities is measured in 
decades; therefore, it is critical that we adopt a sustainable mindset 
and business model that considers fiscal and staffing limitations for 
resource allocation to ensure the preservation and accessibility of our 
cherished national parks. That includes making strategic choices like 
decommissioning, closing, or removing lower priority structures. This 
will allow us to allocate funds and staff to protect priority resources 
while creating meaningful experiences for visitors that will be enjoyed 
by future generations.
    We will continue to seek funding through line item construction, 
Federal Highways, and other programs, to ensure facilities, including 
roads, trails, and natural and cultural resources are properly 
maintained and improved to meet code compliance for safety, 
sustainability, and accessibility for people with disabilities, and to 
meet current and future capacity needs.
    The President's budget request for the NPS for FY 2024 is $3.8 
billion. This request makes bold investments essential for the NPS's 
continued mission success in its second century while remaining 
committed to the daily mission of ensuring that the American public 
continues to have an enriching experience at each site.
Addressing High Visitation and Enhancing the Visitor Experience

    Incidental road, trail, and facility closures in individual 
national parks have not resulted in a significant reduction in total 
visitation across the national park system. In FY 2022, the NPS 
received 312 million recreation visits, up 15 million visits (5%) from 
FY 2021, which is nearly at pre-pandemic levels. Visitors may 
experience congestion at popular parks and at attraction hotspots and 
where entries and exits are limited. Crowding can also be felt at the 
most popular scenic viewpoints that are within one-quarter mile of a 
parking lot.
    For some parks, providing great experiences has become more 
challenging due to increases in the number of people visiting, changes 
to when and how visitors arrive, and evolving visitor needs and 
expectations, including how visitors want to engage in the parks. Some 
parks are finding the level of visitor demand to be significantly 
outpacing their ability to accommodate, resulting in the need to 
explore new management strategies. Park facilities and staffing levels 
are challenged to keep pace with this changing visitation, impacting 
the quality of the visitor experience, health and safety, and resource 
protection. These visitation changes are also felt outside park 
boundaries in adjacent lands, waters, and communities.
    The NPS is employing a range of park-specific strategies to provide 
a welcoming and enjoyable environment while ensuring the protection of 
nationally significant resources. In addition to using pilot projects 
and flexible planning tools to test ideas, we are conducting robust 
public and stakeholder engagement before committing to long-term 
implementation. Over the next few months, our expanded social science 
research will also provide us with visitor information at the park and 
bureau levels for visitor experience planning. The data will also 
enable the NPS to facilitate strategies to provide for more inclusive, 
diverse, and equitable visitation.
    Some strategies for managing use have been employed for decades. 
The NPS has long managed access in backcountry areas and wilderness, 
for example, by issuing trailhead and overnight permits. Permit systems 
for remote backcountry locations have helped preserve the qualities of 
solitude and minimize resource impacts.
    To address vehicular congestion, the NPS has invested in multimodal 
transportation options such as shuttles and multi-use paths where 
biking and walking are encouraged. We also strategically support the 
use of ride-hailing applications and micromobility options such as 
scooters, e-bikes, and bike-share where appropriate.
    Other managed access strategies, such as reservation and timed 
entry systems, are now in place or have been piloted at several parks, 
with each addressing specific park-level issues. Congestion can result 
in gridlock, visitor conflicts, crowding, safety issues, resource 
damage, and, of particular concern, delays in emergency response. 
Managed access strategies are intended to address the amount, type, and 
timing of access to an area to ensure desired conditions are met for 
high-quality visitor experiences and resource protection. For example, 
reservation systems spread visitation throughout the day, reduce 
queuing at entrance stations and parking lots, and avoid the cascading 
impacts on resource conditions, operational capacity, and visitor 
experience. These systems allow visitors to better plan and have more 
enjoyable experiences, while often having the added benefit of 
expanding the economic benefits of parks to more local businesses and 
area attractions that have historically seen less use.
    Comprehensive, reliable, and accessible traveler information plays 
an important role in enhancing recreational access to parks. The NPS is 
working on several technological advances that will improve the visitor 
experience in parks through enhanced trip-planning tools. In FY 2023 
and FY 2024, the NPS Transportation Planning Program and Federal 
Highways Administration Innovation and Research Council have funded a 
$500,000 research project to develop a recreational travel forecasting 
tool to be applied across a range of parks to assist visitors in 
advanced trip planning by informing them of where and when congestion 
occurs. Pilot tool development will occur at approximately 10 different 
parks of varying types. Meanwhile, expansion of wireless service 
coverage along transportation corridors would ensure visitors have 
increased access to these travel tools.
    Recreation.gov provides reservation and trip planning capabilities 
and features more than 110,000 individual sites and activities across 
4,000 recreation areas. The platform offers expanded features to 
improve the customer experience through visitor mapping and trip 
planning tools that allow visitors to discover locations and activities 
new to them, especially when their chosen sites are already reserved. 
The Recreation.gov mobile app offers visitors the convenience of making 
and managing reservations on the go.
    The NPS mobile app is another helpful tool visitors to national 
parks can use to assist them in their trip planning. The app ensures 
visitors have access to the most current information about the parks 
they visit. It currently offers interactive maps, tours, accessibility 
information, and more. The app is built to be used even in remote 
parks, where internet access may be limited by allowing visitors to 
download information to their phones in advance.
    The NPS wants visitors to have a high-quality experience everywhere 
they go in the National Park System. National parks are working to 
offer new ways for people to receive timely information to better plan 
and enjoy their trips. We cannot meet these challenges alone. The NPS 
is committed to collaborating with local communities, businesses, and 
nonprofit partners to find solutions that improve the quality and 
diversity of visitor experiences, address crowding and congestion in a 
thoughtful way, and maintain the tremendous range of benefits that 
national parks provide. Given the iconic and finite nature of these 
highly valued places, along with the complexity of providing inclusive 
and high-quality visitor opportunities, creativity, active 
collaboration, and shared responsibility will be essential for ensuring 
sustainable and effective strategies.
    Enjoyment of our parks and park resources by Americans and 
international visitors is a fundamental purpose of all national parks. 
We may face many challenges, but the NPS is committed to finding 
innovative solutions, and making responsible choices to ensure future 
generations can enjoy and be inspired by the parks entrusted to our 
care. We appreciate your ongoing support as we endeavor to achieve 
these goals.
    Chairman Gosar, Ranking Member Stansbury, thank you again for the 
opportunity to appear before you today. I would be happy to answer any 
questions that you may have.

                                 ______
                                 

Questions Submitted for the Record to Michael Reynolds, Deputy Director 
    for Congressional and External Relations, National Park Service

Mr. Reynolds did not submit responses to the Committee by the 
appropriate deadline for inclusion in the printed record.

            Questions Submitted by Representative Westerman
    Question 1. An efficient, timely contracting process is important 
to maintaining the continuity of visitor services and high-quality 
visitor experiences in our National Parks. We understand that 
concession contract award decisions and announcements are often taking 
longer than anticipated, with extended periods between the submission 
of proposals and selection decisions and announcements.

    1a) Please identify and explain any factors that are contributing 
to the length of concession contract award processes and any delays in 
those processes, including specifically for time periods after offers 
have been submitted.

    1b) Please provide the Committee information on the duration of 
contracting processes for concession contracts, including specifically 
identifying amounts of time between proposal due dates and the 
selection announcements.

    1c) In these processes, how much have the actual time periods 
between proposal due dates and selection announcements differed from 
the projected time periods between those milestones?

              Questions Submitted by Representative Gosar


    Question 1. The National Park Service has an active lease with 
Oregon Inlet Marinas, LLC (Lessee) in the Bodie Island District of Cape 
Hatteras National Seashore, the term of which is 20 years, currently 
set to expire on December 31, 2038. It has come to my attention that 
the Lessee has an interest in extending the term of the lease, and all 
parties are currently satisfied with the performance of the Lessee. In 
addition, the Lessee is interested in providing additional capital 
improvements to the property, which would be mutually beneficial to 
both the Lessee and the National Park Service. However, the local 
superintendent has stated that he does not have the authority to extend 
the current lease, despite the fact that leases, in a number of cases, 
have been granted for up to 60 years within the National Park System. 
Please provide a detailed explanation for any reason the lease may not 
be currently eligible for an extension, as well as options for working 
with NPS and the Lessee to find a mutually beneficial path forward.

             Questions Submitted by Representative Collins


    Question 1. How is the National Parks system currently using 
public-private partnerships, with both community organizations and 
private businesses, to address their maintenance backlog?

    Question 2. What are the biggest barriers to expanding the use of 
public-private partnerships for maintenance within the National Park 
System?

    Question 3. What can be done to streamline the approval process for 
individuals who would like to repair a picnic table or trail shelter 
for example in one of their local National Parks?

                                 ______
                                 

    Dr. Gosar. Thank you very much for your testimony, Mr. 
Reynolds.
    We will now go to our Members for 5 minutes, and the first 
one out of the gate is Mr. LaMalfa from California.
    Mr. LaMalfa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate being 
able to sit in on the Committee today.
    Director Reynolds, thank you for your time in addressing us 
here. In my own district, and there might be an example of 
others around the country, as well, but we have Lassen National 
Park there, the volcano. And what we find is that the phone 
lines have been down for quite a while, at least April, perhaps 
longer. And that is not to be unexpected from the amount of 
snow we had this year and such, that there would be issues like 
that. What we have is there is no other phone number listed on 
the park's website that is working or available, even including 
the fire and law enforcement, except for 911.
    So, the only option available for visitors to inquire is 
through email, which, you know, the email response is, ``We 
will get back to you ASAP,'' so we have been getting some 
dissatisfaction from our constituents on that. How can we 
improve? Because I can't imagine this is really making a 
positive experience for our folks there, with just that level 
of communications. And then take that into what it means for 
public safety, as well, if you would.
    Mr. Reynolds. Is that a question, sir?
    Mr. LaMalfa. Well, I mean, do you believe that is going to 
be a positive experience for people to not be able to have 
really timely communication as we are here in the summer 
season, and, you know, ``Beach Boys all summer long,'' or 
almost.
    And then what about the public safety concerns for those 
that you really can't communicate with them in real time?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes. Thank you, sir, for bringing that to our 
attention. I will personally reach out to the superintendent 
and find out what the status is of their phone systems.
    We pride ourselves on our interpretive rangers, our 
facilities, our 800-plus visitor centers throughout the System, 
we try to be open, as I mentioned in my testimony, for a high-
quality experience. So, there must be something uniquely 
happening around Lassen.
    To your point, their winter was severe this year, and I 
know they had trouble opening roads and getting facilities 
online. We will double check on that, but I wasn't aware that 
the phone lines were that impacted.
    Mr. LaMalfa. I mean, does this underline, though, a public 
safety concern if there is really no live communications there 
for them?
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, the rangers are, as you know, on radio 
dispatch 24/7, in contact with locals, and I would think they 
have mitigated those. But yes, we would want to make sure that 
911 and any phone system is there.
    Mr. LaMalfa. Do you have a system of oversight that should 
be catching this sort of thing so that there is not a long lag?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, we do. Our regional directors are our 
accountable folks that have to make sure the superintendents 
are adhering to these things, and we can double check with 
those folks and report back to you all.
    Mr. LaMalfa. OK, all right. And in the park near 
Whiskeytown, we had what was known as the Carr Fire back in 
2018, 5 years ago. There are three really good hikes that are 
available in that area, and two of the most popular trails 
remain closed still 5 years later.
    And the kicker is that neither one of them was in a real 
severe burn area of that park. There wasn't that big of an 
effect on those by what the fire did. So, do they evaluate the 
timeliness of that, and then the superintendent there, do they 
evaluate the ability of the superintendent to efficiently 
reopen a park like that?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, there would be an evaluation. This will 
be something else we can follow up on in terms of status for 
you. I know that park--well, you know better in your district--
was really impacted by the Carr Fire, almost everything, 
facilities, roads, trails. So, they were replacing facilities 
over the last couple of years, and the trails may be in 
somewhat of a priority that we can identify for you when they 
are going to be completed and/or reopened.
    Mr. LaMalfa. I mean, 5 years, though, that is quite a 
milestone in the amount of time for having two of the main 
trails still not available.
    Whiskeytown, during and after COVID, it did have a record 
amount of visitation, but they were forced to use only a 
handful of the trails. So, we have to do better on that time-
wise. We know when the trails are left unused for years, not 
maintained, and they become overgrown, then that just more than 
quadruples the cost of the work it takes to re-establish them.
    We have a lot of volunteers out there that want to help, 
that want to do this, and be part of it. How can we have more 
local partnerships and more folks that can be engaged in this, 
and not find closed doors or closed gates in order to help?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, we are very fortunate to have nearly a 
half million volunteers throughout the NPS system. So, I can 
only imagine that that park has those relationships, and are 
leveraging them. And this would be something else that we could 
check on.
    Mr. LaMalfa. But they are finding frustration in not being 
allowed to do that timely, again, we are 5 years in.
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, that would be something that we would 
be happy to check in on and ask why there is a roadblock to 
using, we use volunteers a lot, particularly for trail 
building, particularly for resource help, perhaps replanting 
trees.
    Mr. LaMalfa. Yes, it is a beautiful thing, so we need to 
take advantage of it. If there is an issue at the local level, 
we need to know and if it is individuals that are somehow 
roadblocking it, then we need to change that.
    I have to yield back. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, I appreciate it.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman. The gentlelady from 
Nevada, Ms. Lee, is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chair, thank you, Ranking Member 
Stansbury, and it is nice to see you, Mr. Reynolds, thank you 
for your work.
    When the President established Avi Kwa Ame National 
Monument earlier this year in my district, he directed the 
Department of the Interior to evaluate opportunities to locate 
a visitor center or other visitor information facilities. He 
also specified that the National Park Service and the Bureau of 
Land Management shall manage the monument cooperatively, with 
NPS retaining primary authority over the portion of the 
monument within the Lake Mead National Recreation Area.
    Could you please update us on the status of the Park 
Service's work with the BLM to prepare an agreement to share 
whatever resources are necessary to manage the monument?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, thank you for bringing that up, and we 
are so proud to be a part of your district now with this new 
monument.
    We started off the first thing with a new cooperative 
agreement where we invited the tribes to the table. And that 
process is underway, as you know. We are having planning 
conversations with BLM about locating facilities, about how we 
are going to be working together in this kind of partnership 
approach.
    And I don't have the fine details on deadlines, but we can 
easily make a phone call back to you to make sure you are 
updated.
    Ms. Lee. Yes, that would be great, thank you.
    Mr. Reynolds. But you haven't missed anything. We are just 
getting everybody's feet on the ground, but particularly 
consulting with the tribes because of the very unique nature of 
this site, as you know, and leveraging Lake Mead and the other 
existing parks around to help us get things up and running.
    Ms. Lee. Absolutely. With respect to the visitor center, 
other facilities, to what extent is the Park Service involved 
in the development, and do you have any idea of potential 
location? Is there any discussion of areas where you are 
looking at?
    Mr. Reynolds. I am not aware of that, and I apologize that 
I wouldn't know exactly. But I do know that most of that area 
was intended to be managed as wilderness, so there are probably 
a few places that they have already pre-identified. BLM will 
have a lot of lead on some of that is my understanding, but we 
are going to be active participants in the cooperative 
selection of that and development of it.
    Ms. Lee. I would love a follow-up on the status. That would 
be great.
    Mr. Reynolds. We will do that.
    Ms. Lee. Thank you. Also, I want to talk about the Lake 
Mead National Recreation Area. Quite like Mr. Gosar's statement 
with Lake Powell, we have witnessed many closures of boat ramps 
over the past year.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Ms. Lee. In fact, at this time last year there was only one 
remaining boat launch open. And now, given the banner snowpacks 
in the West, things have turned around entirely with all of the 
boat ramp launches open, at least partially reopened, with the 
sole exception of Boulder Harbor.
    How long does the Park Service anticipate conditions will 
allow these to remain open, do you have any idea?
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, this is the hard part, right, with 
climate change. We are so fortunate this year that the water 
levels are high. We are engaged in a low-water planning process 
that your office, I know, has also engaged with us about, as 
well as your constituents. And we are also awaiting, I believe, 
a Bureau of Reclamation study or EIS on water management that 
will help us understand the long-term predictability.
    But I will assure you that we are very committed to being 
there, to providing recreation, to keeping as many of these as 
we can.
    The disaster supplemental has been extremely helpful in 
getting, as you mentioned, some of the other boat ramps 
reopened, and that is what we are planning in the future as 
these studies kind of come together, how we prioritize and how 
we can design them to basically flow with the water, if you 
will, up and down the shore.
    Ms. Lee. Yes, with Lake Mead being one of the most visited 
National Recreation Areas in the country, it was quite, let's 
just say, very disruptive to our economy and our community.
    In fact, I am aware that many of your excellent front-line 
staff members bore the brunt of many people's frustration, and 
were unfairly burdened with that. So, what are you doing to 
better manage expectations moving forward, and how can we help 
with that to protect your front-line workers?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, first of all, thank you to you and your 
staff's help and support, both funding politically, and just in 
our communications. But what we can do is keep you at the 
table, and the leadership in the community, as well.
    We really encourage people to be checking those websites, 
which I know sounds like a simple thing, but we are upgrading 
our ability to really give much more real-time information. The 
park leadership is strengthening, and right now we have a very 
good person there that is leading a team that is very focused 
on this. So, they will be even more transparent, I guess you 
can say, about the day-to-day operations, particularly the way 
things change fast at Lake Mead.
    Ms. Lee. Absolutely. Well, thank you, and we look forward 
to working with you.
    And having been through the process of closing, I hope we 
can work together to prevent that, should the drought continue 
in that manner in the future. Thank you.
    Mr. Reynolds. Right. Enjoy this year. Thanks for mentioning 
the staff.
    Dr. Gosar. We are going to go to the gentleman from 
Minnesota, and then we are going to take a little short recess. 
They called votes.
    So, Mr. Stauber, you are recognized.
    Mr. Stauber. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair and Ranking 
Member Stansbury, for holding this hearing, as well as allowing 
me the opportunity to waive on.
    Minnesota's 8th Congressional District is home to some of 
the most beautiful landscapes you can find in our country. It 
is home to two very important properties in the National Park 
System, Voyageurs National Park and the Grand Portage National 
Monument.
    Voyageurs National Park is a crown jewel in our National 
Park System that showcases our iconic northern Minnesota 
landscapes. Each year thousands enjoy the outdoor recreation 
opportunities that exist in every season, and Voyageurs 
National Park is also unique within the National Park System, 
as it is largely made up of lakes, streams, and wetlands, 
rather than land.
    Deputy Director Reynolds, first off, thanks for your 
support and service to our National Park Systems throughout 
your career. I appreciate that. I want to ask you something. To 
whom do our national parks belong to?
    Mr. Reynolds. The people, right?
    Mr. Stauber. Do you believe our national parks and the 
National Park System policies that govern these parks should 
serve the best interests of the American people?
    Mr. Reynolds. Of course.
    Mr. Stauber. Do you believe the policies that govern our 
national parks should enable or limit access for Americans?
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, I think the policies need to follow the 
law for what the park was set up to do, and to meet the mission 
of the Organic Act, which is to provide for future generations 
for enjoyment, right? We have the word ``enjoyment'' in the 
Organic Act.
    Mr. Stauber. I can't read between the lines. Do you believe 
the policies that govern our national parks should enable or 
limit access for Americans?
    Mr. Reynolds. I think that we should be able to have parks 
open and as accessible as possible.
    Mr. Stauber. I agree.
    Mr. Reynolds. Within the law.
    Mr. Stauber. I agree. I have, unfortunately, heard time and 
time again from my constituents that the National Park 
Service's policies in Voyageurs National Park, along with other 
parks around this country, limit their use and enjoyment of 
these incredible resources. The policies in place hinder our 
way of life in northern Minnesota, and limit our ability to 
recreate responsibly in the lands and waters at Voyageurs.
    This April, the National Park Service proposed a frozen 
lake surface access and use plan for Voyageurs National Park, 
which does not have the best interest of my constituents, and 
it impedes their access to this sacred public space that they 
have enjoyed for decades. I have heard from many constituents 
who are angry, upset, and frustrated about the plan as written, 
and I stand with the constituents.
    The proposed plan, as written, would block how my 
constituents have responsibly recreated in the park for many, 
many years, limiting access to the park via snowmobiles, 
tracked ATVs, or small SUVs outfitted with tracks.
    As you just stated, the National Park Service policy should 
enable and expand access, not limit it. I fear that this 
proposed plan is simply an attempt by this Administration to 
keep our public lands off limits. I have a couple of questions.
    The public comment period on the frozen use plan at 
Voyageurs National Park closed on June 3. When does the 
National Park Service plan to finalize its plan?
    Mr. Reynolds. I will follow up with a date because I 
actually don't know that, just to be honest with you. But I do 
know that if it was just June 3, it is a few months for the 
staff and the contractor, whatever. So, we will make sure that 
Voyagers is telling everybody what their status is.
    Mr. Stauber. Fair enough. Thank you.
    Mr. Reynolds. But I think you haven't missed anything yet.
    Mr. Stauber. I appreciate that. Will a final plan go into 
effect before this upcoming winter?
    Mr. Reynolds. I will also confirm that. But I would guess 
that you are cutting it pretty close, and we would need more 
time than that. But we will talk to the park and----
    Mr. Stauber. Can you commit that the Park Service plan will 
not limit access to my constituents?
    Mr. Reynolds. I don't know those particulars. I do know 
that there are safety concerns that the park was concerned 
about, you know, the weight of certain vehicles, or where the 
vehicles could go. But I don't think that there was a 
particular stance taken on prevention.
    Mr. Stauber. OK. With the last 30 seconds, I respectfully 
request that you provide a full response back to this Committee 
in writing, as you just alluded to, and I appreciate that.
    Our northern Minnesota economy is largely based on outdoor 
tourism, and the recreational multi-use of our public lands and 
waters at Voyageurs National Park has been an economic driver 
for our communities for decades. I will continue to do all that 
I can to ensure it remains that way, and access is available 
for the folks.
    I look forward to receiving your full and complete response 
to these questions, and I implore you to respect the desires of 
the constituents that I serve, and ensure the finalized frozen 
use plan at Voyageurs National Park does not limit our access 
to recreate within the park, and it supports our way of life.
    I yield back, thank you.
    Mr. Reynolds. Thank you for bringing it up.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman. The gentleman, the 
Ranking Member from Illinois, Mr. Quigley, is recognized for 5 
minutes.
    Mr. Quigley. This morning I wasn't on the Committee, and I 
am now the acting Ranking Member. What a country.
    [Laughter.]
    Mr. Quigley. Director, thank you for your service. Let me 
ask you a few quick questions. Volunteers are great. They do an 
amazing job. But there are limits of what they can do, correct, 
working in the parks?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Mr. Quigley. And they have to be managed, as well, with 
hired personnel, correct?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, for safety reasons.
    Mr. Quigley. So, let's talk just for a minute about the 
problems with retaining and obtaining personnel. I have been to 
the national park tours that I led in the last 8 years. One of 
the things that I would talk to you a lot about is housing, 
right? And given the proposed cuts that we are talking about in 
appropriation bills, this can only exacerbate the problem.
    Can you tell us a little bit about why the housing crunch 
among workers is an issue, and how serious a problem it is?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, Congressman, thanks for bringing that 
up. I really appreciate it. It is probably one of the No. 1 
worries and concerns coming to us from park employees and our 
superintendents.
    Part of it is what is happening in the nation, there are 
general housing shortages everywhere, probably in some of your 
communities, as well, or affordability issues if they are on 
the market. And that is what we are experiencing. Many of our 
parks are in beautiful places that people want to live in, so 
the housing shortage and/or affordability is what is impacting 
us.
    We have about $7 million geared toward housing with some 
requests, I think, to bump that up to $14 million in the coming 
years to try to really invest in developing either housing or 
some agreements with private-sector for housing. That is 
something else we are interested in: leasing. We are trying to 
reinvest in our housing allotment or convert buildings to 
housing as we can. Or, as I mentioned, I am thinking of a 
couple of parks that are working on something with the local 
community.
    Mr. Quigley. But it is an issue for retaining and obtaining 
new personnel to do all the things we are talking about, 
including access to the parks.
    Mr. Reynolds. That is right.
    Mr. Quigley. I was in Denali on one of these climate tours 
recently, and there is no access to half the park because of a 
landslide taking out the only road there. I appreciate and 
respect that we are very concerned about access to our national 
parks, but the problem up there is the permafrost is melting, 
the land is moving much, much faster than it was. We are 
talking 15.5 inches a day. No road can withstand that. This is 
all because of the aspects and reactions to climate change.
    So, if you can, reference what other issues involving 
climate change affect access, safety, and the cost of running 
the national parks.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, it is getting more complicated. We are 
seeing increased fires, which we have all experienced the smoke 
from our neighbors to the north this year in Canada. We are 
seeing sea level rise or we are seeing storms that are strange, 
right? There are heavier rains than we have seen in certain 
locations, or windstorms and damage. So, yes, costs are 
definitely impacted.
    The disaster supplementals, as you showed in the chart, are 
going up each year as we deal with either drought in the West, 
or an overabundance of water in the East, or a storm impact. 
And what you are describing at Pretty Rocks is a geologic 
phenomena that we are struggling with.
    Mr. Quigley. And a $100 million bridge to get to half the 
park.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, very, very expensive, but as you say, it 
is a huge park, and there is only one way in and one way out, 
as they say.
    Mr. Quigley. Sure. And access generally, not talking about 
one particular park, you mentioned reasons why there might be 
limited access to areas of our national parks. Safety is 
certainly one of them. I would imagine that areas that are 
being restored, or particularly sensitive and fragile, for lack 
of a better word, are protected and limited access, at the very 
least, to give them a break and a chance to restore themselves. 
And because, as you said, it is not just the weight of some 
vehicles, it is the destructive capabilities of those vehicles 
in areas that are particularly fragile.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, thank you. And we pride ourselves on 
working as hard as we can, as I mentioned a few minutes ago, to 
maintain the use and aspect and enjoyment of parks. But we also 
equally are supposed to be preserving them, and conserving them 
for future generations. So, sometimes management decisions are 
made. That is often why certain permits in the backcountry 
might limit how many people per day we allow in a certain area, 
because they have measured it through science with trampling or 
loss of vegetation, things like that.
    And some of those things adjust, but superintendents, as a 
general rule, try to not block off entire portions of parks.
    Mr. Quigley. And issues with access to the parks, just how 
much of that do you think is related to shortages in personnel?
    Mr. Reynolds. We are managing with what we have, but we are 
down about 15 percent in the last numbers I saw from a few 
years ago. Since 2011, I think, we are down about 15 percent.
    Mr. Quigley. What I am hearing is that there are not people 
who can man the front gate in some cases.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, as with many American companies and/or 
government agencies, we don't have as many applicants for 
certain jobs. There is a lot of competition. We have a 
recruitment team now that the Park Service didn't used to have 
that is working really hard to find really smart, capable, 
diverse people to get back out there.
    Mr. Quigley. Thank you, sir.
    Mr. Reynolds. Thank you.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman.
    Mr. Reynolds, would you be able to stay for a little while?
    Mr. Reynolds. Sure.
    Dr. Gosar. We are going to take a quick recess. There are 
105 votes left, so I will be back.
    Mr. Reynolds. See you soon.
    [Recess.]
    Dr. Gosar. The Subcommittee will resume. The gentlelady 
from New Mexico is recognized for her 5 minutes.
    Ms. Stansbury. All right. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I think it is worth noting for the public, since we are 
back here, that the reason we had to go recess is actually 
because the Majority could not succeed in passing an 
appropriations bill, so they just brought a CRA to the floor to 
try to wipe out two endangered species, including bats and the 
lesser prairie chicken. So, it is unfortunate that this is the 
state of our nation and affairs, but here we are, on the last 
day of voting before recess.
    Mr. Reynolds, we do so appreciate you being here today. I 
would like to ask a few questions about climate change, about 
the current challenges that the Park Service is facing 
generally, about tribal co-management, and about how you are 
using the Inflation Reduction Act funds.
    But I wonder, sort of big picture, could you talk to us a 
little bit about what do you see as some of the biggest 
challenges right now that the Park Service is facing, and how 
can we here in Congress help address that?
    Mr. Reynolds. Thank you for that question.
    I mentioned housing, which is in a broader category of one 
of our No. 1 priorities. The director's No. 1 priority is a 
thriving workforce. So, I think any suggestions that you either 
hear from constituents or our employees that come to you, we 
would be all ears. We are trying to empower, diversify, provide 
housing, as we discussed earlier, before the break, and try to 
deal with workloads, which have been something that comes back 
in our employee viewpoint surveys.
    The other thing that we are very focused on is climate and 
the impacts, but also being able to maintain good visitor 
experiences as the environments are changing, right? So, it 
factors into our GAOA investments. And it is a question, if you 
will, in design review, as is accessibility and things like 
that.
    The other I would say this way. The love and use of our 
parks, I am trying to come up with a term that is not 
``overcrowding,'' but we have this very strange dilemma in that 
many parks are exceeding, as I am sure you are aware, record-
breaking visitation, places like Zion National Park, and yet 
there are 426 units in the National Park System now, some of 
which are under-utilized. So, we are also very focused on how 
to steer the American people to, as you said earlier, the full 
American story, which is represented in the System.
    So, I think dealing with how to have a quality visitor 
experience and take care of the resource in these very heavily-
visited places, how to get folks to really understand their 
parks is another one.
    Ms. Stansbury. Thank you. Yes, and certainly I know in New 
Mexico we struggle with that challenge. There is a double-edged 
sword in that having that Federal recognition and protection of 
these beautiful and important places brings greater attention 
and protection, but also brings, as you stated, over-love of 
some of those spaces, and we are certainly struggling with that 
in some of ours.
    In terms of the challenges that climate change poses 
specifically for parks, obviously, this summer the Southwest 
has been covered in a heat dome. We are having historic fires 
in Canada that have brought smoke descended down across all of 
the United States and, of course, the historic drought and 
climate and water challenges that Representative Lee talked 
about across all of the West.
    As the Park Service is thinking about modeling, looking at 
the science, and then your mandate, what do you see are the 
biggest challenges and opportunities to really address these 
challenges going forward?
    And what will you need to manage our parks in a time of a 
changed climate?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, thank you for that. It, of course, 
varies depending on the environment we are talking about. But 
if I can think of some high-priority areas, we will need to 
make sure we are held accountable, if you will, to design as we 
invest in things that will be resilient.
    So, we were talking to Representative Lee about her 
district's issues, and Representative Gosar's issues at the 
Lakes. When we put in a new boat ramp, obviously, really think 
ahead with our planning and our science teams and work with our 
partners in our communities about what does a resilient dock 
system look like to maintain access when it goes up and down? 
Because some of our science folks are telling us it is not 
necessarily a linear progression with climate change. You might 
have one year that is just heavy snow, you might have another 
year of heavy drought. So, I think that is something that we 
are looking at.
    And then, on a resource side of things, we have a lot of 
conversations with our science teams about whether and how we 
deal with different species, right, that might be falling out 
of their range, and how to deal with investing in the right 
landscape treatments for fire.
    So, those things come to mind as huge challenges right now.
    Ms. Stansbury. Thank you. And I know we mentioned it just a 
moment ago, but the Inflation Reduction Act, of course, was the 
largest investment in climate change accompanying the 
Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and the significant downpayment 
that we have made in our national parks, alongside, of course, 
the LWCF funding that we made permanent a few years ago is 
really crucial to the future and climate resilience of these 
special places.
    So, we appreciate your stewardship.
    With that, I yield back.
    Dr. Gosar. Thank you. I just warn the gentlelady to be 
careful what she asks for. When you start throwing first rocks, 
they always come back to bite you. So, just be careful.
    The gentleman from Montana is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Rosendale. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank 
you, Representative Stansbury, also, for holding this hearing.
    The National Park Service across this country has faced 
severe overcrowding and visitor experience issues due to the 
lack of staff and inadequate management of our parks since the 
COVID-19 pandemic first took off in 2020. As the recreational 
visits begin to climb back up to pre-COVID numbers, these 
issues are becoming more and more glaring.
    The current infrastructure in the parks cannot handle this 
renewed influx of people, and we need proper management 
techniques applied by the parks to make sure that no one's 
visitor experience is hampered by the overcrowding. There is 
more to the numbers of visitors going to the park. It is about 
the experience. And I think that you probably recognize that.
    However, at the same time, my office has received many 
reports, even from fellow members of the congressional body, of 
issues they have had trying to book and register for their 
national park visits, especially at Glacier National Park in my 
home state. While timed entry is vital to allow my constituents 
and tourists to enjoy their time at the parks, the process 
should serve as something other than a roadblock or a deterrent 
from anyone coming or booking a trip.
    I asked the National Park Service and the Deputy Director, 
who is here today, to come up with a comprehensive plan that 
can effectively deal with these overcrowding problems, while at 
the same time providing an easy, streamlined process that 
people of all ages and walks of life can understand and use.
    This current overcrowding not only has harmful effects on 
the visitor experience, but also on the wildlife that calls 
these parks home. We have heard reports from Yellowstone where 
there are bear sightings in parking lots and other parts. We 
have seen wastewater systems collapse due to the over-use, 
sending sewage into the rivers and streams where the fish 
reside. These issues are all result of overcrowding, and we 
must solve this issue while maintaining open and accessible 
parks for all who are interested.
    I know this is no easy task, but with the help of these 
agencies' highly-qualified civil engineers, a practical and 
reasonable solution may be found. I look forward to hearing the 
testimony of the Deputy Director today, and hope that we can 
find some bipartisan solutions to these issues plaguing our 
parks today.
    Mr. Reynolds, are there any civil engineers currently 
working or employed by the Department focusing on lowering the 
congestion across the Park System?
    Mr. Reynolds. We do have a collection of civil engineers. 
They tend to work on our sewer treatment facilities, or our 
drainage, and things like that. I don't actually know if there 
is a civil engineer working on the overcrowding side, but there 
are transportation planner/engineers, there are specialists in 
visitor use management, and then there are contractors that we 
bring in to do that. So, we are looking at those.
    And I know you know the Glacier situation very well, but we 
have a lot of expertise, both in-house and out-of-house, 
beginning to help us with those planning efforts.
    Mr. Rosendale. I work very closely with Superintendent 
Sholly down in Yellowstone. He is doing an incredible job down 
there, and we were able to get the park opened back up on the 
north side, the north entrance, in record time after the floods 
last year.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Mr. Rosendale. What I also know is that going down into the 
park, two things. No. 1, wastewater systems are really, really 
being strained down there. And then No. 2, housing for the 
staffing is an incredible challenge.
    I know housing around the country is always a big issue, 
and the cost of it, and they are building some housing units on 
the park, and nice units, so that they actually can attract and 
retain the employees that they need.
    But I am really concerned with those wastewater projects 
and potable water projects. Having a development background 
myself, I know that they take a lot of time, and it is very 
expensive. So, do you have civil engineers looking specifically 
at that?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, absolutely, and I want to thank you very 
much for the support through the Great American Outdoors Act. 
It has been the big boost that we needed to take on those 
treatment plants.
    Superintendent Sholly and his team have put forward a lot 
of top priorities. There are at least three that I can think of 
off the top of my head that have to do with their wastewater 
treatment plants: Mammoth, Old Faithful, those areas. And as 
you would know as a developer, sir, these are things no one 
wants to deal with, but they are some of the most expensive and 
some of the most important resource preservation things you can 
do, especially with overcrowding. So, they are a top priority. 
They are in the funding stream, and they are in development 
now.
    Mr. Rosendale. And then it has also been my experience 
that, if you can start putting some even minor amenities in 
different locations around the park, then you are able to draw 
some of the visitors to these other areas instead of having 
them all concentrated in the typical areas that they have been 
accustomed to going to.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, that is true. We have this phenomena of 
social media helping to amplify certain places and people show 
up. I am just going to say counter that. It is not that, but we 
need to add to that, right, to let people understand the other 
gems that they can visit.
    Mr. Rosendale. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Chair, I see my time is expired.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman. I am going to recognize 
myself for 5 minutes.
    Just last year in June, Secretary Haaland issued Order No. 
3407, directing the Department of the Interior agencies to 
phase out the procurement, sale, and distribution of single-use 
plastics by 2032. What is the current status of the National 
Park Service's efforts in developing this plan?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. It is in various 
stages. We have started it where we can. Our concessionaires, I 
must throw them a compliment, the private sector is stepping 
up, discussing things with our business services folks about 
how best to change their products to be non-plastic oriented, 
recyclable, compostable, things like that.
    So, I don't know if I have an exact percentage for you, but 
we could follow up and give you that.
    Dr. Gosar. That would be great.
    Mr. Reynolds. But we are in that early planning and 
implementation phases.
    Dr. Gosar. How much money did the National Park Service 
spend toward the effort through Fiscal Year 2022?
    And what is the highest projected spending for Fiscal Year 
2023?
    Mr. Reynolds. Is that in our overall budget, do you mean?
    Dr. Gosar. How much in this plastics recycling?
    Mr. Reynolds. Oh, that. I will have to follow up on an 
answer for that.
    Dr. Gosar. Did you have an estimate for the total cost of 
this transition near the 10-year implementation period?
    Mr. Reynolds. I am not aware that we have one, but I am 
sure we do somewhere, and I can get it to you.
    Dr. Gosar. It would be nice to see if we had a policy to 
see where we were heading, nice to know where we are going.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Dr. Gosar. As you know, the state of Arizona has 22 
national parks, Mr. Reynolds, with an average of over 10 
million visitors per year coming to our parks. The economic 
impact is over $1 billion per year. One of the things that 
visitors enjoy in the parks, and particularly those who are 
either short on time or who have physical disabilities at being 
able to see the parks, and this is our air tours.
    Air tours are a great way to see the parks, especially for 
those who have mobility issues. Recently I have been hearing 
from the air tour operators on issues about the Park Service. 
Specifically, the Service has not been listening to the advice 
of the National Parks Overflight Advisory Group. I am 
particularly concerned about the upcoming discussions related 
to the air tour management plan, and efforts to shut down air 
tours completely in some national parks.
    Mr. Reynolds, yes or no, can I get a commitment from you to 
work with the Committee on this effort?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, we are working with many parks on the 
air tour management plans, as you have indicated. We will 
continue to work closely with you or whoever can step up 
through the public process.
    Dr. Gosar. Can I get a yes or no on a commitment for the 
Park Service to seek the counsel of the National Parks 
Oversight Advisory Board, particularly as it relates to the 
economic impact to these gateway communities?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, we will talk to any of the oversight 
folks, along with the FAA, who is our prime partner in this.
    Dr. Gosar. Thank you very much.
    The Grand Canyon currently has $829 million in deferred 
maintenance and repairs, which has become a great challenge for 
the staff who run the park, and impacts overall visitor 
experience. For the second-most visited park in America, with 
an outrageous $829 million in deferred maintenance outstanding, 
do you agree that it should be a priority for the Park Service 
to resolve some of the issues at Grand Canyon Park ASAP?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, we are working very hard. As I mentioned 
earlier, along with sewage treatment plants, the Grand Canyon's 
problem, as you know well, sir, is the water supply itself. So, 
we have obligated a project, thanks to GAOA and rec fee money, 
to get that water system fixed, $180 million.
    Dr. Gosar. Well, that is one of the things I really wanted 
to hit was the water supply on that issue.
    I want to come back to the overflight aspect. How receptive 
would you be to that board in regards to their plans?
    Mr. Reynolds. I am not super familiar with the board and 
its makeup, but we would listen, and are trying to be as 
transparent as we can in the planning efforts. So, I can't see 
why we wouldn't want to work with them.
    Dr. Gosar. I think that they have felt like they have come 
up with some rather interesting solutions, and yet have not 
been heard. So, I thought it would be very interesting to see 
how you could work with them, to see how this works. I mean, a 
lot of these people only go over the airspace. They are from 
somewhere else, they are from Ms. Lee's district, they may have 
their outfit over at McCarran Airport, and they fly over there, 
and they keep their trash all the way to when they come back to 
McCarran. So, I think it would be a great thing.
    I am running short of time. Do you want a quick second 
round?
    Mr. Rosendale. I could ask a couple of questions.
    Dr. Gosar. You are recognized for 5 minutes, Mr. Rosendale.
    Mr. Rosendale. Mr. Reynolds, what type of feedback are you 
receiving, and how are you collecting it in regards to the 
staggered attendance through Glacier Park and some of the other 
parks?
    Mr. Reynolds. As you know, sir, we have started the pilot 
programs, and I think Glacier needs to move in next to more 
formal planning, which would involve some public involvement.
    They have gotten positive comments about the overall 
experience they have. As you mentioned in your earlier remarks, 
there have been some frustrations about ordering, but the park 
has responded to those. I will give you a quick example.
    They have been watching the feedback to the point where 
they changed on the fly how the tickets were allocated. And 
they also have changed the hours so that you can come into 
Glacier if you perhaps are on a road trip, and you didn't 
realize you needed a reservation, or you don't have online 
access, you can come in before 7 or after 3, which, actually, 
are some pretty decent times, especially if you are just trying 
to go to the Sun Road. So, they are trying very much to work 
with people on it.
    And, again, it is not about prevention. It is trying to 
make these experiences work and to try to give people, I guess, 
more certainty that they would also then spend time in the 
community.
    Mr. Rosendale. It is about the experience, exactly. But 
what I am trying to get at is how are you collecting the 
information from the visitors.
    Mr. Reynolds. Right. We are doing online input, we are 
taking any comments that are dropped off at a visitor facility. 
We have open comment periods, much like you would see in a 
planning or NEPA process.
    Mr. Rosendale. And do you have anyone who is taking this 
data and organizing it, and establishing some kind of matrix 
that says we have a problem with the hours, we have a problem 
with the amount of time that we are allowed to spend, we have a 
problem with the advance notice that is required? Is somebody 
evaluating that, and actually creating a matrix?
    Mr. Reynolds. The short answer is yes, absolutely. And we 
will be able to share that with the public.
    Mr. Rosendale. OK, because that is the only way we are 
going to be able to measure results and find out what the 
traveler's experiences are like.
    Mr. Reynolds. Agreed.
    Mr. Rosendale. What other methods are being used to manage, 
or stagger attendance times or days around the nation?
    I am familiar with Glacier, but are other park systems 
using different types of staggering?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, there is a whole series of different 
strategies.
    Arches National Park in Utah has something similar about 
timed entry, whereas before they were just shutting the gate 
down once the parking lots and the roads were completely 
packed. So, that has been well received, actually, by the Moab 
community, as well, because people know they are going in at a 
certain time, so they are spending money in the restaurants, 
they are hanging out doing other activities in town.
    And I mentioned earlier the social media and Web space. We 
have a program called Plan Like a Park Ranger, where we try to 
encourage people to know a list of things that they can do 
outside the park, in the community, as well as other parks in 
the zone, which you are rich of in Montana, right?
    Mr. Rosendale. Yes, we are.
    Mr. Reynolds. There are different places to go.
    Mr. Rosendale. Thank you.
    Mr. Chair, I see my time is expired. I yield back.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman. The Chair of the Full 
Committee, Mr. Westerman, is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Westerman. Thank you, Chairman Gosar, and thank you to 
Deputy Director Reynolds for being here today.
    National parks are obviously very important to all of us. I 
happen to live in Hot Springs National Park, which is a source 
of pride in Arkansas. It was the first land ever set aside as 
in reserve by the Federal Government.
    And I will commend the Park Service employees there for 
their work to keep the park healthy, and actually do some 
active forest management on the park just to keep the threat of 
catastrophic fire down, and to do controlled burns, and to 
really be good stewards of the park, as well as the Buffalo 
National River, which is in my district, which was the nation's 
first Wild and Scenic River. And I know all Members probably in 
Congress can talk about parks in their state, or their favorite 
places to visit.
    But I know in the Wildland Fire Strategic Plan for 2020 
through 2024, you state the goal of using active management 
techniques to protect National Park Service structures and to 
reduce the risk of communities and assets. Could you provide an 
update to the Committee on progress made regarding the 
deployment of active forest management techniques since the 
issuance of the Wildland Fire Strategic Plan?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, I think I can offer a couple of things.
    We have been able to up the acres that we treat and that 
can be, as you know, sir, different kinds of activities. You 
can clear brush, have active forest management, controlled 
burns, those kinds of things. So, we have gone from a little 
over 200,000 acres this year, up from about 170,000. We have 
gone up to about 268, I think.
    Mr. Westerman. Good. How about your workforce? How much has 
it increased under the plan?
    Mr. Reynolds. I will follow up and get you a note on that. 
We have been doing better. There has been support for wildland 
firefighter pay. There have been those kinds of issues. I 
haven't heard of any major problems with staffing this year 
yet.
    Mr. Westerman. Let's talk a little bit about maintenance 
budget, and maintenance backlog. For years, I have heard the 
Park Service come before the Committee and say, ``If we only 
had more money, we could fix all these problems with the 
outdated buildings and trails in the parks. If we had more 
money, we could hire more employees.'' But over the last few 
years, Congress has made historic investments in the Park 
System, yet it seems that these problems, if they are 
improving, they are not improving very quickly.
    And kind of to add insult to injury, the Park Service 
requested an increase of 8 percent in discretionary funding for 
Fiscal Year 2024.
    Can you explain why last year the Park Service reported a 
dramatic increase in the deferred maintenance backlog, and what 
concrete plans does the Service have to reduce the backlog, 
other than just continuing to ask Congress for more money?
    Mr. Reynolds. We very, very much appreciate the investments 
that have been made between all of the various funding sources, 
and they are putting them to very good use as quickly as we 
can.
    There is at least $1.2 billion obligated right now, a 
couple of years into the GAOA work. And the plan is very much 
on a public-facing website. We can give you that link, or 
constituents that link. And we have plans up through at least 
Fiscal Year 2024 that I am aware of, park priorities and 
investments that we are going to use this money.
    The deferred maintenance number is very difficult to 
explain and understand sometimes. There were some very large 
changes in how that number was measured as part of the big 
increase. But we are hoping to eliminate about $3.6 billion in 
deferred maintenance, hopefully, in the next 2 years. These 
projects take anywhere from 1 to 5 years to complete, and we 
won't change the DM number until that project is fully 
completed.
    So, I realize that patience is thin, but we are really 
working fast, and I think we could make a really good case if 
you would welcome us to come up and brief the Committee at some 
point about what these plans look like, if we haven't already 
done so with your staff.
    Mr. Westerman. Yes, I would like to get more information on 
that, as well.
    In the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, there was a half-
billion dollars given to the Park Service specifically for 
hiring additional employees. How many employees have you hired 
to date?
    Mr. Reynolds. I know that some parks actually have started 
the hiring process. We created a hiring team. I can confirm 
that number. I don't have it handy with me, but I can just go 
to HR and get you that number. I think that it has started, and 
it is underway. And the parks are putting proposals in through 
their regional offices, and we are approving those as quickly 
as we can.
    Mr. Westerman. Do you know how much of the $500 million you 
have left?
    Mr. Reynolds. I don't, but we can let you know that.
    Mr. Westerman. And I do appreciate the Park Service's 
efforts to work with us on our bipartisan bill on the giant 
sequoias in Sequoia National Park. Hopefully, we will get that 
bill on the President's desk sooner than later.
    And Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Mr. Reynolds. Thank you.
    Dr. Gosar. I thank the gentleman, and I recognize myself 
real quick for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Reynolds, you have only been in your position as head 
of the Congressional and External Affairs for a little over a 
year now. You have had every job in the Service, from a ranger 
to a regional director to acting director at one point. I read 
you are actually a third-generation National Park Service 
employee. Tell me, what do you think personally the Service 
could do, from your vantage point, to be more efficient and to 
reduce wasteful spending?
    Mr. Reynolds. I am glad that you are asking a question 
about the Park Service growing and changing and being a better 
agency. It is something that we talk about and strive for. And 
I think, if you have spent time with some of our folks, I know 
there are different views of government these days, but the 
people that I have known for 38 years, there are always a 
couple, but most of them, of the 20,000, 19,998 of them are 
some of the most dedicated people possible.
    I think one of the things we can do is very much help the 
employee's life, be invested in and to be appreciated. This is 
true of any business that you are running. But I think for a 
long time we have asked our folks to do some sacrifices because 
they loved the work so much. So, I think that having a very 
healthy, diverse, invested, skilled staff and supported and 
empowered by good leaders, by an appreciation from Congress is 
something that we keep striving to do.
    I also think that that will then get to any kind of waste 
and fraud issues if you have well-trained, good people running 
your system. So, we are really investing in that.
    I also think that listening to the American people and 
involving them, and continuing to be approached about how these 
parks fit their lives is something else that we can do that 
helps to be less wasteful, right? Because we are fitting the 
bill about what the people want.
    Dr. Gosar. Would something like the bison issue on the 
Grand Canyon, as you probably know, there were no historical 
bison in that area, and these aren't really bison, they are 
buffaloes. Some creative programs that you work with the state 
of Arizona to allow the culling of that herd, where they could 
pay money to an agency like the Arizona Game and Fish so they 
could actually take a tag, are those some of the programs you 
would be looking for?
    Mr. Reynolds. We welcome partnerships where it makes sense, 
and where we can legally support something like that.
    And I recall those dilemmas. I recall the superintendent 
getting engaged with the state, and it seemed to get a lot 
better after they all came together.
    Dr. Gosar. Well, I think there is room for improvement, and 
I think that this is just the start of a dialogue. I thank you 
very much for your answers.
    I am going to see if the Vice Chair wouldn't mind taking 
the Chair. I am going to see if I can catch a flight.
    I yield back to the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Collins.
    Mr. Collins [presiding]. The Chair will recognize Mr. 
LaMalfa for 5 minutes.
    Mr. LaMalfa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Resuming where we were a little while ago, talking about 
utilizing volunteers and keeping the trails open, we get a fair 
amount of questions up in my area about the status of the 
trails when they fall into neglect and you get behind, next 
thing you know, you get a memo that says we can't recapture the 
trail, it will be too expensive, which is a de facto closure of 
the trail. And a lot of people feel like it is done fairly 
deliberately because there seems to be more and more exclusion 
from Forest Service lands for hiking, hunting, even off-road 
vehicles and such.
    So, can you disabuse that assumption that folks contact me 
about?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes. The good news about the break, sir, is I 
was able to look something up with the staff. There are about 
75 percent of the trails open, so a quarter of the trails, I 
guess, at Whiskeytown are still struggling, probably from 
post----
    Mr. LaMalfa. Are you talking Whiskeytown there?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, sorry.
    Mr. LaMalfa. OK, yes, all right.
    Mr. Reynolds. But there should be no on-purpose actions, if 
you will, to keep something closed. And there should be an 
accountability about why something is closed. Is it a resource 
problem? Is it the fire damage? Is it a lack of funding or 
safety?
    So, we will be happy to follow up with you all and with 
that park to find out what might be happening. But there 
shouldn't be actions to keep something closed just to keep it 
closed without justification.
    Mr. LaMalfa. I would hope not. Again, we have a volunteer 
force that is just raring to go on that. I know that personally 
about Whiskeytown. So, if we can reach that 100 percent open 
milestone, that will be really great.
    Let me continue here on the issue with concessionaires. So, 
parks often are in very remote areas, there are a limited 
amount of concessionaires that are either allowed to have the 
contract or that take them. So, pretty much you are looking at 
monopolies in a lot of these cases here in the park's lands.
    So, people, they are reporting that what they are finding 
out is that, in order to visit these public lands, it is about 
as costly as, approaching even Disneyland they might say. Now, 
maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration, but it is getting very 
costly for folks because of what the concessionaires seem to be 
able to get away with, and which really kind of comes down to 
kind of an elitist way of doing business.
    And it pushes people to actually go to the Forest Service 
and BLM lands, instead of the national parks, which is what 
they are set aside for, is that purpose, especially. What is 
the quality control that we are looking at for concessionaires 
on how they are performing, on what they offer?
    And then is the pricing commensurate with normal people, 
not like baseball game $12 beers, and stuff like that?
    Mr. Reynolds. Right. We have concessions management 
specialists. If the park is large enough, there is usually a 
concessions division that does the accountability. There are 
inspections. And in order for their contract to be either 
renewed or continued, these things have to happen.
    And we can make those reports available, if there is a 
particular problem area that you are hearing about, to talk to 
you about what the concessions team is doing.
    And yes, prices have gone way up, and there is a constant 
conversation with concessionaires with pricing approvals. But 
the Park Service does have an opportunity to ask them about 
pricing and to regulate that.
    Mr. LaMalfa. OK. Because it hits hard. We heard for a long 
time how it is low income. Well, these days, with inflation, 
middle-income people are starting to feel like low-income 
folks. And these things hit really hard, the price of 
everything, the fuel to get there, the meals you might get on a 
restaurant along the way, everything is so much higher. So, we 
need to find how we can keep the concessionaires being 
competitive with what people's perception is.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Mr. LaMalfa. When we are looking also at a massive influx 
of international visitors to our parks, they hit Yosemite very 
hard, and they are welcome and such, but have you considered a 
raised entry pass price for international visitors to help 
carry that additional burden, something a little more in line 
with that load in order to have American citizens be able to 
have a better shot?
    Mr. Reynolds. I don't believe we have any consideration of 
that at this point.
    Mr. LaMalfa. OK. Maybe that is something you should take 
back, and we can talk with you about that, too, if you would.
    There is a push for pay increases of 5 percent for Park 
Service employees. Do you think that is actually enough, or 
such that it will make more employees want to be there? We are 
dealing with that with Forest Service, as well.
    Mr. Reynolds. I think some pay gap resolution, as I 
mentioned earlier, would be very helpful where we can, and of 
course----
    Mr. LaMalfa. OK. Maybe we should look toward housing being 
more affordable. That might be incentive.
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes.
    Mr. LaMalfa. All right, I am being told no, the gentleman 
from Georgia. I yield back.
    [Laughter.]
    Mr. Collins. Mr. Rosendale, 5 minutes.
    Mr. Rosendale. I won't need 5.
    Mr. Reynolds, I have one last question for you. When we 
start talking about the experience at the park, it is also very 
critical that you feel safe in that environment.
    And Montana just experienced yet another death of a camper 
from a grizzly bear attack. The population of grizzlies in 
Montana right now far exceed 2,000 between the Yellowstone 
population and the greater northern continental divide 
population. What additional steps are you taking to protect 
visitors as the grizzly bear populations grow, and the 
endangered species protections have rendered many of them 
completely fearless of humans, and very habituated, causing 
danger to the campers?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, I was very sorry to hear about that 
tragedy, and we continue, with our bear management folks, with 
our rangers, to try to help people understand how to be bear 
safe in these environments, and we work with the partners up in 
that area, of course, in Montana.
    As you know well, it is a whole combination of landowners, 
right? The Forest Service, the Park Service.
    So, we are working hard to basically keep an education 
program going with the visiting public, but also to manage 
these bears if they do become habituated or they are in town 
and in communities and that kind of thing, removals or whatever 
actions need to be taken.
    Mr. Rosendale. What kind of actions are you taking with the 
visitors? What kind of additional education are you sharing 
with them?
    Mr. Reynolds. Yes, as far as I know, we still have, for 
instance, in the evening, in the campground, you might have a 
roving ranger or a volunteer a lot of times that comes around, 
and we will talk to people about the hygiene of their camp, 
perhaps, or how they are going to store their food that night.
    The more we can personally touch people, rather than just 
hand them a pamphlet at the entrance gate, the better.
    Mr. Rosendale. Thank you very much.
    Mr. Chair, I yield back.
    Mr. Collins. The Chair recognizes Ms. Stansbury for 5 
minutes.
    Ms. Stansbury. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am just going to 
make a brief remark.
    I do want to thank you, Deputy Director, for being here 
today. I had hoped to take a moment before the Chairman had to 
leave for his flight to address a comment that he made directed 
at me about a comment that I made.
    And one thing I do appreciate is the bipartisanship of my 
colleagues who are here, my friendship with all of you, our 
professionalism. And we really are a model for the American 
people. The behavior that we engage in here on this dais has 
impacts and implications for people out there, especially young 
people who watch us. So, I just wanted to raise that, and that 
I appreciate you all.
    I appreciate the comments about bipartisanship, but I do 
not appreciate the comments that were made by the former 
Chairman that were a bit threatening. So, with that, Mr. 
Chairman, I do yield back and thank you again.
    Mr. Collins. All right. The Chair will now recognize myself 
for maybe 5 minutes.
    Mr. Reynolds, these questions are really not coming from 
me, they are coming from my chief of staff, who is a big hiker. 
So, he enjoys the outdoors, and he makes it a point whenever we 
are not here, he is usually somewhere in the woods, hiking. And 
he was actually my GC on my campaign, so we had talked about 
this a little bit during the campaign. So, I know a little bit 
about what he is talking about, just enough to probably mess up 
the question how he would want to ask it.
    But could you please speak, and you may have addressed this 
earlier, can you please speak about the use of public-private 
partnerships to address the maintenance backlog facing the 
National Park System?
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, sure. As you know, Mr. Chair, a lot of 
our projects, our maintenance backlog, will be contractors. And 
that is probably not what you are asking. But I just wanted to 
point out that it is the private sector that basically 
implements our construction, building, and the on-the-ground 
projects, supervised by us.
    In public-private partnerships we have a philanthropic, the 
National Park Foundation. We also have hundreds of other 
friends, organizations helping most parks nowadays, especially 
bigger parks. And we welcome and are trying to be as innovative 
as we can, working with those boards and those donors to match 
money. So, the Centennial Match process is really helpful with 
that, where we can put up 50 percent of the money that they 
would raise. Apparently, that is really great for fundraising, 
for donors.
    So, we work a lot with our philanthropic organizations. 
They can do a lot of things, sometimes, quicker and faster for 
us, for the American people. And then we can, as part of a 
donation, perhaps they can purchase a piece of land for us and 
donate it over. So, we do utilize the public-private 
partnerships a ton.
    We also have the ability through general agreements to work 
with somebody, perhaps to share housing, as I mentioned 
earlier.
    Mr. Collins. How do you use the philanthropic partners with 
Great American Outdoors Act projects?
    Mr. Reynolds. We are just in the planning stages of a lot 
of them. So, we haven't gone all the way, but we ask them a lot 
of times to help us add onto a project.
    I often joke about it as gunmetal gray if you have ever 
seen U.S. Government desks, right? We use the basic investment 
money to fix that sewer treatment plant that we were talking to 
Congressman Rosendale about, and then the philanthropic 
organization adds something that might be a really nice 
addition for the visitor experience, and they can fundraise for 
it, and sometimes build it with us, or donate something to us 
that adds to the experience that we wouldn't be able to build 
with public funding.
    Mr. Collins. Right. I know my wife and I, we have had a 
home in Gatlinburg for years, until recently, and she has been 
a Friend of the Smokies forever.
    Mr. Reynolds. Great organization.
    Mr. Collins. Yes, they always have different projects or 
things going on.
    What can be done to streamline the approval process for 
individuals who would like to, say, repair a picnic table or 
trail shelter, for example, in one of the local national parks 
they live around?
    Mr. Reynolds. Well, we want to try to empower each park 
unit to deal with a project of that kind of scale. So, what I 
would recommend is the organizations that want to do something 
like that, go ask for an appointment with the superintendent, 
and talk to them directly about what they are trying to do, and 
then they can work with us. We want to welcome, as I said to 
Mr. LaMalfa, as much help as we can, and as much as we can 
manage.
    Mr. Collins. Right. And I think that is pretty much what he 
was getting at when we were talking earlier, my chief, I think 
he was out hiking and there was a shelter and picnic table, and 
there was a local Boy Scout group that actually had wanted to 
repair it, but they couldn't get permission to do it.
    Mr. Reynolds. Interesting.
    Mr. Collins. And it was rather confusing when people were 
willing to donate supplies and labor.
    Mr. Reynolds. I am happy to look into that particular 
subject if it is still burning. But I would guess that somehow 
the right connections haven't been made because the parks would 
probably welcome that kind of help.
    You asked me how we use the philanthropic organizations. We 
can insert them into that process right away with perhaps the 
Eagle Scout or something, and they can help host it, or help 
facilitate it.
    Mr. Collins. Right, OK. Well, those are all the questions I 
have. I don't think we have anybody else lined up, do we?
    OK, I want to thank Mr. Reynolds for his valuable testimony 
and the Members for their questions.
    The members of the Committee may have some additional 
questions for the witness, and we will ask you to respond to 
those in writing. Under Committee Rule 3, members of the 
Committee must submit questions to the Subcommittee Clerk by 5 
p.m. on Tuesday, August 1. The hearing record will be held open 
for 10 business days for these responses.
    If there is no further business, without objection, the 
Subcommittee stands adjourned.

    [Whereupon, at 4:16 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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