President Donald Trump's administration abruptly fired 1,000 employees from the agency last week, accounting for about 5 percent of its workforce. The park service has long struggled with declining employment even before the mass cuts, but the sudden purge is unlike anything seen before.
The number of federal employees lost overnight is equivalent to the total drop in workers over the past decade. From January 2014 to January 2023, the number of full-time employees working for the agency fell from 19,894 to 18,864 — a decrease of 1,030 — according to the most recent data from the National Parks Conservation Association.
"The loss is crushing," says Tracy Coppola, Colorado senior program manager of the conservation association. "Parks were already suffering. ...What more can they take?"
With 1,000 fewer employees, Coppola says park visitors could soon see less maintenance of public lands, long lines, dirty or closed bathrooms, and fewer or no education and enrichment from park staff like guided tours, trail recommendations and interpretation services.
In addition to eliminating those full-time workers, the Trump administration ordered, then reversed a freeze on hiring thousands of seasonal employees to the National Park Service. This move disrupted the hiring process as national parks attempted to prepare for the busy summer season, with seasonal employees receiving emails saying their job offers were rescinded. Adding to the confusion, the Department of Interior is reportedly trying to backtrack on the cuts, now offering parks additional seasonal employees to help make up for the 1,000 layoffs.
While park advocates say the Trump administration's reversal is a win, more seasonal employees cannot fill the hole left by firing year-round workers, and the constant changes in direction leave them worried about the stability of these roles in the future: "The administration has created a widespread culture of fear," Coppola says.
"All of this is coming at the worst possible time," she adds, noting that the busy season coincides with the start of wildfire season, leading to safety concerns regarding the potential reduction in public lands maintenance. “It will be very visceral, the impact of decreased staff. I don't think you will have to be a park expert to see it firsthand. It will be really apparent."
The cuts are part of Trump's effort to dramatically decrease government spending with his newly-formed Department of Government Efficiency led by Elon Musk. In the month since Trump took office, more than 200,000 federal jobs have been eliminated at over a dozen agencies.
Colorado Democrats have publicly denounced the federal layoffs. U.S. Senator Michael Bennet introduced a budget amendment on February 21, including funding to reinstate the 1,000 national park employees and the 3,400 U.S. Forest Service workers who were also fired, at least 150 of whom were in Colorado.
“We ought to double down on the Forest Service’s mission, investing in wildfire resilience, watershed health, recreation management, rooting out waste, and cutting red tape," Bennet said on the Senate floor. “Instead, President Trump and Musk’s actions to eviscerate the federal workforce take a torch to that approach and tear at the fabric of our community. It's an insult to Colorado and all Americans.”
U.S. Senator John Hickenlooper and 21 other senators sent a letter to Department of the Interior Secretary Doug Burgum urging him to address the staffing shortages at the National Park Service on February 7.
“Americans showing up to national parks this summer and for years to come don’t deserve to have their vacations ruined by a completely preventable – and completely irresponsible – staffing shortage," the senators wrote. "And local economies don’t deserve to have their livelihoods destroyed for political gain."
Without the necessary staff, Coppola says public lands operators will face tough decisions such as cutting the hours, and possibly days, that they can be open.
For small historic sites and recreation areas also impacted by the federal layoffs, just losing one employee can take a devastating toll, she says. But national parks will feel the pain as well. Yosemite National Park, the sixteenth largest national park, has halted its campsite reservations amid the staffing chaos.
National Parks in Colorado
There are four national parks in Colorado: Rocky Mountain, Great Sand Dunes, Mesa Verde and Black Canyon of the Gunnison. They collectively received nearly 5.5 million visitors in 2023, with over 4.1 million coming from the Rocky Mountain National Park alone.Visitation to national parks in 2023 was up nearly 16 percent from 2010, and up nearly 40 percent from pandemic lows in early 2020. In 2023, Rocky Mountain National Park was the fifth most visited park in the country. If demand continues to increase, the parks will soon be tasked with accommodating more visitors than ever before, with an unprecedented lack of staff.
A similar scenario has played out before during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020, there was an all-time low number of 18,060 full-time park service employees, as national parks simultaneously saw a record surge in visitation following temporary closures at the beginning of the year. The result was damaging to the natural environment, including more litter, trampled vegetation and abandoned campfires.
"COVID was a really hard time, but it wasn't like a thousand people got fired in a day," Coppola says. "I have never seen anything like this before, and people who have been around longer than me feel the same. It's unexplored territory. It is massive across the board."
Coppola fears that if the visitors' experience is diminished, they will stop coming to the national parks, which could hurt support and funding for the parks in the long run. It would also cause widespread economic harm.
The National Park Service delivers a $15 boost to the nation’s economy for every dollar invested, according to the National Parks Conservation Association. In addition, national parks drive the economies of nearby communities; in 2023, park visitors spent $26.4 billion in regions near national parks, supporting 415,400 jobs. Not to mention the impact on the local housing industries caused by firing workers and freezing seasonal hirings.
"This is all being done under the guise of saving our economy, saving expenses. ...It's an ironic goal," Coppola says.
She hopes national leaders will listen to the backlash regarding the firings, fearing for the future of national parks if this becomes the new norm.
"The impacts of this are so wide and so devastating that you can't be partisan about this," Coppola adds. "Parks are our nation's storytellers. Parks are the face of our country. Unfortunately, they're going to be reflecting chaos."
