Meeting Tomorrow's Conservation Challenges
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The National Park Service is entering its second century of existence, what needs to be done to ensure that the National Parks preserved well in the 21st century?
Conservation Challenges
Just as the National Park Service faces conservation challenges unimagined a century ago, so too have its management obligations grown complex beyond the provisions of its founding. Fresh attention is needed to developing leadership, building scientific and scholarly capacity, capitalizing on innovation, and strengthening the management and governance of this dynamic institution. |
Investing in the Future
The National Parks are greatly admired and the National Parks Service is arguably the most popular agency in the federal government, but funding is fundamentally inadequate. Annual Parks Service appropriations are approximately 2.5 billion, an amount that cannot possibly stretch across the distance of public expectations and Park Service needs. The agency faces a backlog of deferred maintenance, and that needs to change |
The Parks as Partners
When it created the National Park Service in 1916, Congress demanded preservation of the parks “in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” At that time, parks’ legal boundaries themselves seemed the most important protectors—fending off timber barons, mining companies, and an army of hucksters ever ready to surround a national treasure with a sprawl of shoddy tourist attractions. The Park Service was expected to fulfill its mission by managing resources and uses within those boundaries. Today many of the most serious threats to our parks come from beyond their borders. We know that we can no longer draw a line on a map and declare a place protected.
When it created the National Park Service in 1916, Congress demanded preservation of the parks “in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.” At that time, parks’ legal boundaries themselves seemed the most important protectors—fending off timber barons, mining companies, and an army of hucksters ever ready to surround a national treasure with a sprawl of shoddy tourist attractions. The Park Service was expected to fulfill its mission by managing resources and uses within those boundaries. Today many of the most serious threats to our parks come from beyond their borders. We know that we can no longer draw a line on a map and declare a place protected.
The National Park System Advisory Board recommends that the National Park Service:
- Embrace its mission, as educator, to become a more significant part of America's educational system by providing formal and informal programs for students and learners of all ages inside and outside park boundaries.
- Encourage the study of the American past, developing programs based on current scholarship, linking specific places to the narrative of our history, and encouraging a public exploration and discussion of the American experience.
- Adopt the conservation of biodiversity as a core principle in carrying out its preservation mandate and participate in efforts to protect marine as well as terrestrial resources.
- Advance the principles of sustainability, while first practicing what is preached.
- Actively acknowledge the connections between native cultures and the parks, and assure that no relevant chapter in the American heritage experience remains unopened.
- Encourage collaboration among park and recreation systems at every level-Federal, regional, state, local-in order to help build an outdoor recreation network accessible to all Americans.
- Improve the Service's institutional capacity by developing new organizational talents and abilities and a workforce that reflects America's diversity.
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As a nation, we protect our heritage to ensure a more complete understanding of the forces that shape our lives and future. National parks are key institutions created for that purpose, chapters in the ever-expanding story of America. It is the founding mission of the Park Service to insure that these special places will never be impaired, and will be available forever to inspire and inform future generations.
This report has attempted to illuminate the multi-dimensional mission of the Park Service and suggest how the organization might prepare for the future. It builds on Park Service mandates and the demonstrated importance of parks in society. It emphasizes the considerable potential of the Park Service to contribute to education and enlightenment. It acknowledges new strategies to sustain natural systems and endorses the growing involvement of scientists and scholars in all aspects of Park Service work. It recognizes efforts underway to integrate living cultures into park life, and supports the collaborative work of building an exemplary nationwide outdoor recreation network. The National Park System Advisory Board applauds the accomplishments of the Park Service in these and other areas in recent years. But more can be done. The National Park Service has a twenty-first century responsibility of great importance. It is to proclaim anew the meaning and value of parks, conservation, and recreation; to expand the learning and research occurring in parks and share that knowledge broadly; and to encourage all Americans to experience these special places. As a people, our quality of life-our very health and well-being-depends in the most basic way on the protection of nature, the accessibility of open space and recreation opportunities, and the preservation of landmarks that illustrate our historic continuity. By caring for the parks and conveying the park ethic, we care for ourselves and act on behalf of the future. The larger purpose of this mission is to build a citizenry that is committed to conserving its heritage and its home on earth. |
Goals
Building Pathways to Learning |
Bringing America's History Alive |
Protecting Nature, Protecting Ourselves |
Pursuing and Teaching Sustainability |
Nurturing Living Cultures and Communities |
Promoting Outdoor Recreation |
Shaping the Future National Parks Service |
Ensuring Institutional Capacity |