Letter to David Bernhardt, Sec. of the Interior - Grijalva Haaland Letter to Bernhardt on Parks Closures and Coronavirus March 31 2020

Letter

Dear Secretary Bernhardt,

We write with serious concerns regarding your decision to keep national parks and other
public lands open during the coronavirus pandemic and ask that you take whatever additional
actions may be needed to protect public health and slow the spread of the virus.

Over the last several days, there have been numerous reports of crowding at popular national
parks and public land sites that prevented people from maintaining the social distancing called
for by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). While the Department of the
Interior manages a vast acreage of public lands, many of the highest visitation areas are
designed to direct visitors toward some of our country's greatest natural wonders, and many of
those places have recently seen unsafe crowd sizes.

Staff and visitor safety must be the number one priority for your Department, which is why we
were shocked to learn of recent news reports that suggest you denied the Superintendent of
Grand Canyon National Park's recent request to close the park.1,3 On a popular trail in the
Grand Canyon, a ranger had 600 contacts with visitors in just one day, putting the health of
that ranger and all of those visitors at risk. On March 30, 2020, it was confirmed that a resident
of Grand Canyon Village has the area's first confirmed case of COVID-19.3 Given these grave
public health risks, park management made the difficult decision to request closing the park.
The Navajo Nation, which is dealing with an outbreak of coronavirus, the Hualapai Nation,
and Coconino County all supported the request to close Grand Canyon National Park to protect
public health throughout the region. Unfortunately, by ignoring park management and key
local stakeholders, it appears that you have chosen to play politics with the health and safety of the
American public. We understand that closing an iconic destination like the Grand Canyon is not
an easy decision, but we implore you to do everything in your power to prioritize public health
and not interfere with locally informed decisions to close parks where appropriate.

As you know, impacts of the pandemic are not unique to Arizona and the Grand Canyon. In New
Mexico, the All Pueblo Council of Governors has asked groups of visitors not to visit KashaKatuwe Tent Rocks National Monument because of the threat posed to the nearby Cochiti
Pueblo. In Washington, DC, streets and Metro stations near the National Mall and Tidal Basin
had to be closed down to stem the crowds of people seeking to view the seasonal cherry
blossoms. Thousands of people are going into Zion National Park every day and many of them
continue to gather at Angels Landing, one of its more popular lookouts. While we recognize that
the National Park Service has closed a portion of Angels Landing trail due to crowding, the
closure of entire parks in other areas has been necessitated by the fact that social distancing just
isn't possible on many of our most visited public lands, despite people's best intentions.

Warnings on the National Park Service website and the closure of some park facilities have not
proven sufficient to protect public health, prompting grave concerns from federal employees and
the local communities nearest our public lands. Many parks are located in rural areas where an
outbreak would overrun community hospitals and their staff, making it imperative that we act
now to reduce risk.

At this unprecedented time in our nation's history, we must prioritize the health and safety of
visitors to national parks and public lands and the staff charged with the protection of these
natural resources during this crisis. We urge you to establish clear safety protocols for employees
and visitors guided by directives from public health experts to prevent the spread of coronavirus
on public lands, and to close parks and other public lands that are not able to meet CDC
guidelines.

Sincerely,