Sierra Club Statement as Interior Department Doubles Down on Billion-Dollar Cuts to NPS

WASHINGTON, DC – During a Senate Committee on Energy & Natural Resources hearing today, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum restated his department’s intentions to cut nearly a billion dollars from the National Park Service’s operating budget – a cut that could eliminate the budget and staffing for roughly 350 NPS sites. 

Burgum stated the department did not yet have a list of what NPS sites were being looked at for reduction or offloading to the states, but separately stated the department was looking at Alaska, Idaho, Nevada and Utah for potential public lands sales. Burgum also stated a desire to prioritize maintenance for existing public lands over expanding federal lands, with the budget including cuts to programs like the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Donald Trump signed the Great American Outdoors Act into law during his first term which funded maintenance and permanently authorized and funded the Land and Water Conservation Fund, to ensure the federal government could continue to establish parks, playgrounds, battlefields and historic sites.

Already this year since the start of the current administration, NPS has seen massive staff cuts and even threats to offload NPS sites to states.

In response, Jackie Ostfeld, Sierra Club Outdoors for All campaign director, said: 

“Secretary Burgum has shown in his testimony that the administration is determined to fund tax cuts for Donald Trump’s billionaire friends and corporate polluters on the backs of taxpayers and our public lands. The impacts from these cuts to the National Park Service and the Land and Water Conservation Fund will be felt by thousands of staff, our environment, and future generations who will find it that much harder to safely, widely and fully enjoy our forests, monuments, and trails.”