The National Park Service (NPS) laid off some 1,000 employees on Feb. 14, just weeks before the start of the busy season in many of the country’s 63 national parks. The layoffs, which targeted probationary workers, are part of a broader effort by President Trump and advisor Elon Musk to downsize the federal workforce.
NPS officials have asserted that the agency is already understaffed, the number of full-time employees having dropped by about 15% between 2011 and 2022, forcing some visitor facilities to close or limit their hours. NPS administrator Michael Reynolds stated in a 2023 release, “Our existing staff is spread more thinly than in years past. Between FY (fiscal year) 2011 and FY 2022, the total number of NPS full-time employees decreased by approximately 3,400 or 15%.”
While NPS has yet to confirm the exact number or types of jobs lost at specific national parks, individuals affiliated with some of the parks have spoken out in recent days, beginning to paint a picture of the losses. Nate Vince, who said he was Yosemite NP’s only locksmith, wrote in a now-viral Instagram post that he was terminated on Valentine’s Day, losing his housing along with his job, with what he said are potentially dangerous repercussions. “Yosemite National Park [is] the size of Rhode Island and has more locks than a small city, and without a locksmith, I’m deeply concerned for the safety and security of the park and people in it,” Vince wrote.
Organizations that work directly with NPS have also felt the repercussion of the layoffs, Eric Stiles, the president and CEO of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC), a nonprofit that works with the NPS and USDA’s forests, stated, “I can’t tell you what summer visitors at Acadia [NP]’s experience is going to be like. I can’t tell you if the campgrounds are going to be open. I can’t tell you if the reservation system for Cadillac [Mountain] is going to be up and running. I can’t tell you if trails are going to be closed,” Stiles shared in an interview conducted by NPR.
In protest of the layoffs and its potential environmental consequences, fired Yosemite workers positioned an upside-down U.S. flag on Saturday near the Horsetail Fall, an area where crowds of nature enthusiasts and photographers typically gather to witness Yosemite’s annual firefall. “We were already unstaffed,” said Olek Chmura, a laid-off Yosemite employee who didn’t participate in the protest. “And it’s not even the peak travel season.”
