National Park Service Centennial Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, this year marked the centennial anniversary of the National Park Service and of that uniquely American notion that the most beautiful and historic lands should be set aside for the ``use, resort, and recreation'' of the American people, as the original Yosemite Grant Act put it, or, in the words of the Organic Act of 1916 that established the national parks, ``to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wildlife therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same.''

Yet, a century into this endeavor, the Park Service faces considerable challenges to achieving its objectives. The Park Service's original charge was to manage just 35 national parks and monuments.
Today it is responsible for more than 400 units across 84 million acres. This exponential growth has left many locations in disrepair, facing a growing backlog of deferred maintenance now exceeding $12 billion.

In addition to desperately needed maintenance, the Park Service also faces challenges with fee collection, technological upgrades, management of concessions contracts for visitor services, and, most disturbingly, a substantial decrease in overnight visitation. The decline has been particularly high among young people. Recent reports indicate that visits to parks by those 15 years of age and younger has fallen by half over the last decade.

The National Park Service Centennial Act provides the Park Service with new tools and authorities that it can use to maintain and improve the system. Provisions in this bill help reduce the Service's maintenance backlog by generating new revenue to pay for needed capital improvements and leveraging private philanthropic donations to amplify this effort. In turn, these funds will be used to enhance visitor services, provide WiFi and cellular access that young people demand, and expand the Volunteers-In-Parks and Public Lands Corps programs that are so important in welcoming the public to the public lands.

I believe the three greatest challenges to Federal lands management are to restore public access to the public lands, to restore sound management to the public lands, and to restore the Federal Government as a good neighbor to those communities directly affected by the public lands.

This bill does all three. It promotes public access and enjoyment of the parks by promoting the expansion, modernization, and improvement of visitor services and amenities. It promotes good management by placing priority and generating funds necessary to address the growing maintenance backlog. It repairs the relationship between the Federal and local governments by giving local officials a say in future historic designations.

I can't think of a better way to celebrate the last century and to begin the next century of our National Park Service than to restore the vision of its founders. Mr. Speaker, this bill does so, and I urge its adoption.

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