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Park Partners Invest Heavily In National Parks, Corporate America Not So Much

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Published Date

April 27, 2015
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Washington's National Park Fund provided $18,300 to help the Park Service repair the Sahale Arm Trail in North Cascades National Park/NPS

Skim down through the list of centennial projects (attached below) that will help paint buildings, repair trails, restore fisheries, help giant sequoias thrive, involve youth in the parks, and you have to give thanks to park friends groups.

Corporate America? Not so much.

Corporations, outside of the Disney Worldwide Conservation Fund, are largely missing from the ranks of organizations stepping up to help the National Park Service maintain "America's best idea."

While the National Park Service is bringing $10 million to the FY2015 Centennial Challenge Project List, groups such as Friends of Acadia, the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation, the Back Country Horsemen, National Parks of Lake Superior Foundation, Save Historic Antietam Foundation, the Knoxville Arabian Horse Club, Buffalo National River Partners, and Friends of Cape Cod National Seashore combined contributed more than $15 million to the needs in the parks.

Among the projects funded with these grants, Yellowstone National Park and the Yellowstone Park Foundation will improve the connection from Gardiner, Montana, with the park'™s iconic Roosevelt Arch entry. The $2 million project with $1.5 million from the Foundation and $500,000 of federal funds, will improve the road, parking, walks, signage and pedestrian areas to meet modern road and accessibility standards.

Cuyahoga Valley National Park, with $183,403 of federal funds and $198,687 from the Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park, will build the park'™s first off-road single-track bicycle and hike trail. The East Rim Trail, a 21st century recreation opportunity, will become part of a network of major regional long distance bicycle and hiking trails including Summit Metro Park'™s Bike & Hike Trail, the Towpath Trail, the Buckeye Trail, and the Cleveland Metropark'™s Emerald Necklace Trail.

The Grand Teton National Park Foundation will provide a $23,000 match with $23,000 of centennial challenge funds to address deferred maintenance on the T.A. Moulton Barn and the Reed Moulton Barn, two iconic barns in the Mormon Row Historic District in Grand Teton National Park.

Projects at a glance:

- Number of projects: 106
- Number of projects with a total cost of $1 million or more: 7
- Largest project: $5.2 million to rehabilitate and restore the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoias at Yosemite National Park (in partnership with the Yosemite Conservancy)
- Smallest project: $6,999 to raise the sunken walks at the Raspberry Island Light Station of Apostle Islands National Seashore (in partnership with the National Parks of Lake Superior Foundation)

 

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Comments

Submitted by ecbuck on April 28, 2015 - 8:20am.

but that is just assuming.

No Rick, it is not assuming.   As my link demonstrated, corporations have been quite generous. 

http://www.nationalparks.org/about-us/our-partners

And that is but one example. 


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