The National Park Service is this nation's most popular federal agency. Period.
What other agency is able to boast of a 96% satisfaction rate with its public? Consistently. Year after year, decade after decade. Americans love their parks, and why shouldn't they? The parks represent the true treasure of the nation - the things we hold most dear. They have they been consistently underfunded over the years, both by Republican as well as Democratic administrations. It just baffles me.
They have really taken a hit in recent years. So it is high time to put things into perspective. I will attempt to do that below.
The Government Accountability Office recently released a report detailing the budget woes facing the NPS. You've probably seen this year's crop of newspaper articles and editorials bemoaning the plight of the parks. It's an annual tradition - as reliable an indicator of the arrival of spring as the cherry blossoms in Washington DC.
Things are more serious now than they have been in a long, long time. Possible ever. The administration never fails to note that the NPS budget has risen from $1.4 billion in 2001 to $1.7 billion in 2005, for an average annual increase of about 5%. Trouble is, that barely keeps up with plain 'ol inflation, and doesn't come close to keeping up with the increasing costs of health insurance, utilities, fuel, and everything else the NPS has no control over. So even though the numbers go up, the purchasing power of the money is going down.
Congress is aware of this, as is the administration. They funded and commented on the GAO report afterall. Yet year after year, there is handwringing in the White House and in the halls of Congress. That $1.7 billion budget is scrutinized and micromanaged, and the Director declares victory if the outcome exceeds inflation. Perhaps it is, in some small measure - compared to the outright cuts that occur with other agencies.
But wouldn't it be nice if Congress scrutinized the Defense Department budget to the same degree?
Somehow, I don't think they are.
Here's why I think that:
Remember this? Remember hearing about $9 billion that somehow "disappeared" in Iraq? I do. And being the math geek that I am, I am quick to realize that the money we literally LOST over there would have been enough to run the entire National Park Service for FIVE FRIGGIN' YEARS!
And they have the nerve to put the puny little $1.7 billion budget of the NPS under a microscope, and wring their hands and complain of deficits, as if our parks (and all the other discretionary parts of the US budget) are somehow the main cause of the problem?
Do you know how much money we have blown in Iraq to date? If you go here you can instantly find out.
Quick answer: as of today, we're up to $277 billion.
Roughly $10 billion PER MONTH is going into the Iraq war effort.
Every month, we burn through enough money over there to run the parks - our most popular institution - for FIVE YEARS.
You could DOUBLE the annual NPS budget with the money we spend in a WEEK in Iraq.
Think about that!
Wanna get really creative? With the money we spend in about 4 months in Iraq, you could create an endowment that could perpetually run the NPS off-budget for eternity.
So the next time you hear about the cost of some Republican-sponsored atrocity (almost always measured in billions of dollars), divide it by 1.7. It will give you the number of years we could have funded the most beloved of all our government agencies - the keeper of the crown jewels - with that same money.
277 divided by 1.7 equals 162.9.
In Iraq, we have pissed away nearly 163 years worth of National Park Service budgets. Think about that the next time you read about Congress scrutinizing the NPS budget.
And weep at the injustice of it all.