Grand Canyon National Park Superintendent Christine Lehnertz/NPS

An investigation has cleared Grand Canyon National Park Superintendent Christine Lehnertz of any wrongdoing in managing the park, but it has placed the National Park Service in a hard-to-defend position by leaving her accusers in the park.

Lehnertz's attorney, Kevin Evans, has said she won't return to the park until the agency ensures that similar unsubstantiated attacks don't follow her return.

“Chris cannot go back to the park right now because she is not safe there,” Denver-based attorney Kevin Evans told Outside Online last week. “We need assurances that she will have protection if these kinds of malicious accusations are filed against her again by subordinates."

The blade does indeed cut both ways.

Employees should be able to anonymously bring matters of concern to higher-ups for investigation. But at the same time, those accused of wrongdoing without any hard, substantial evidence and then cleared of the allegations shouldn't have to endure the same venomous environment.

"It puts you in a 'damned if do, damned if you don't position' where no matter the decision (or lack of it) you are condemned and whistleblowers now can exercise extraordinary power," said Rob Arnbarger, who himself was a superintendent at Grand Canyon during his long Park Service career. "Don't get me wrong. There needs to be an environment where employees have the capacity to stop unethical practices and managers removed when these practices continue. That needs to be encouraged.

"However, the hidden problem with this is that it also creates an environment where some employees use this to their advantage when they, themselves, are the problem and a senior manager moves aggressively to solve that problem only to face an allegation and investigation that may, in fact, clear them ... but in reality hamstrings them from ever solving the problem, or others that rear their ugly head," he added. "You get allegations and investigations that do nothing but handicap a manager from making difficult decisions. It is a nearly impossible situation to be in. The problems at Grand Canyon, and other parks, need to be eliminated by aggressive leaders. But, in doing that, it is obvious that there are people in the right place and time who seek an entirely personal agenda using this against the leader as an opportunity to try to protect themselves. How in the hell can you lead in an environment like this?"

A heads-down atmosphere has enveloped the National Park Service in recent years. Anonymous allegations are too easy to toss around, cause much disruption, and potentially ruin careers while investigators delve into them. Is there substance to the accusations? Or are they just vindictive missives intended as retribution for a bad performance review? 

It took more than a little time and much intestinal fortitude -- guts -- for those surrounded for years by the sexual harassment cesspool that enveloped the Grand Canyon's River District to come forward. And it took a letter to then-Interior Secretary Sally Jewell to bring much-needed light and action to the sordid situation. Park Service managers, including the Grand Canyon superintendent at the time, David Uberuaga, and the Intermountain Regional director above him, Sue Masica, were aware of the allegations. And did nothing, according to those on the ground.

A lengthy investigation by Interior Department's Office of the Inspector General found credence in the allegations. It was seen as a pivotal moment in the workplace atmosphere in the park, and even the National Park Service. The River District office was disbanded, Uberuaga headed off into retirement rather than take a reassignment to Washington, and then-National Park Service Director Jon Jarvis promised a zero-tolerance approach for combating sexual harassment. But his words didn't seem to cleanse the agency of discrimination and harassment, as cases continued to crop up across the park system.

Lehnertz arrived at Grand Canyon, as the park's first female superintendent, from Golden Gate National Recreation Area in the midst of all this. Her task was to right the park's moral compass. It wasn't expected to be as an easy task, and it hasn't been.

"The sexual harassment at Grand Canyon National Park and Cape Canaveral National Seashore means that some of our NPS colleagues have suffered immeasurable harm, and the outrageous misconduct of a few park employees has driven dedicated professionals away from federal service," Lehnertz wrote in a 2016 email to announce her departure to her staff at Golden Gate, where she was superintendent. "We can't wait another moment for this to change dramatically, or for the NPS to honestly, directly, and completely address these issues."

In September 2016, shortly after settling in at Grand Canyon, she told me that she had found the park's employees to be "resilient" and committed to the mission at the park.

"Taking care of one another has been a theme that I’ve heard, things like, 'We have a ton of work to do, and we’re serious about it, but we also are concerned about burnout, and I see it in my colleagues,'" she added. "Those kinds of things tell me that folks here aren’t going to sit back with anything. That they’re going to stay engaged, that they want to be the strongest park possible, and so you have to keep a spotlight on things like sexual harassment that are challenges until we’re the best park in the nation preventing sexual harassment.”

One of those employees, at least, apparently didn't buy into his new boss's views or vision, or maybe he just didn't like her gender. Last fall, Lehnertz found herself facing allegations that she was bullying, had created a hostile atmosphere with a brusque management style, and had spent recklessly on housing to be used by a deputy superintendent. She was temporarily reassigned somewhere in the park system, left to wonder what had befallen her.

And then the OIG staff exonerated her of all charges. In doing so, it created a portrait of one of her accusers as determined not to follow her directives and even impede them. Were the allegations a bald-faced attempt to have Lehnertz reassigned or fired? Read the report and draw your own conclusions. 

As we said in 2016 after Jarvis announced his zero-tolerance plan, today’s Park Service managers have to follow a plethora of Office of Personnel Management rules, and deal with labor unions, when it comes to disciplining their employees. While those rules were established to protect employees and keep a good employee from being arbitrarily fired or reassigned due to political pressure, they can also impede attempts to discipline or remove employees. Where's the protection for the managers?

When the Traveler reached out to Park Service officials in the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters to ask what repercussions those who brought the allegations against Lehnertz might face, the question was met with silence. 

Though we can only hope, for Lehnertz' sake, that the individual(s) are reassigned to another park, that would only move the problem, not deal with it.