Top National Park Service officials like to tout the $30 billion economic might of the National Park System, but there's a new number that won't get the same bandied about treatment: $2.5 million.

That's the fee the Park Service, through the National Park Foundation, is getting from Budweiser in return for promoting the beermaker's brand across the 407 units of the National Park System for the coming year, allowing them to stage a number of concerts (their Made In America concerts, perhaps, led by Jay Z) with a National Park System backdrop, and agreeing to waive a decades' long prohibition against partnering with an alcoholic beverage manufacturer.

If you were to ask who got the better deal, you'd have to give the edge to Bud.

After all, Anheuser-Busch, Bud's parent, spends $1.5 billion a year on advertising, netted a $46.3 billion profit last year, and probably didn't blink when told a 30-second spot on this year's Super Bowl telecast ran about $4.5 million (though AB probably got a discount for buying more than one commercial.).

When you consider that American Express signed a four-year, $5 million deal to help celebrate the National Park Service's centennial and support volunteerism in the parks, that REI -- a retailer of outdoor clothing and gear that meshes with outdoor adventures in national parks -- without being specific, said it has agreed to a partnership deal that will generate "multi-millions" of dollars for the parks, and that Subaru -- an environmentally sensitive automaker -- already has donated $3 million, you have to wonder how AB's $2.5 million deal was reached. 

Is the funding scenario facing the National Park Service so dire that it needs to scratch out a longstanding prohibition against encouraging the consumption of alcohol?

What is so great about Budweiser -- a brand that, its officials admit, also is struggling to connect with millennials -- that convinced the Park Foundation to agree to such a discount, an incredible one conceded for a coast-to-coast, border-to-border industry -- national parks -- that generates $30 billion a year in economic output?

For an agency, the Park Service, that can point to a higher annual visitation (292.8 million in 2014) than that of the NFL, MLB, and NASCAR combined (94.7 million), shouldn't that centennial sponsorship fee have been higher, much higher?

Perhaps the National Park Foundation should have set a floor of $5 million, or $10 million, for partners who would share in the glow of the National Park Service's centennial. With what we know about the deal with Bud, it seems as if the parks were undersold.

Beyond that, there's the matter of compatability. Is there a strong rationale for this deal, or was income the bottom line?

In OKing the waiver to Director's Order 21, which since the late 1980s prohibited the National Park Service from entering into corporate campaigns with alcohol products, Park Service Director Jon Jarvis agreed that there was value in "aligning the economic and historical legacies of two iconic brands."

But what is that value? How does Budweiser's historical legacy compare with the Park Service's? 

At a time when date rape on college campuses is a serious issue and has spawned the slogan, "No Means No," what value comes to the Park Service from a corporate entity that endorsed an ad campaign that dubbed Bud Light "the perfect beer for removing ‘no’ from your vocabulary for the night.”

The campaign sparked outrage on Social Media channels and endless stories in the media that tried to dissect the thought process that went into the slogan. This from an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the hometown newspaper for AB's U.S. headquarters:

But Jennifer Pozner, executive director of the Brooklyn-based advocacy group Women In Media & News, said the Bud Light message is damaging.

“The idea that any alcohol company ... was this clueless about the role alcohol plays in a large number of sexual assaults is unthinkable in 2015,” Pozner said.

“It’s not a gray area, especially when you are in an industry that is endlessly criticized for the role your product plays in assaults. I think what they’re trying to do is position Bud Light as a beer for bad boys.”

It’s not the only time the campaign has landed Bud Light in hot water.

Last month, A-B issued an apology after it tweeted: “On #StPatricksDay, you can pinch people who don’t wear green. You can also pinch people who aren’t #UpForWhatever,” with a photo of five young women below the message.

Is that the kind of "innovation and ingenuity in advertising and marketing" the Park Service was seeking when Director Jarvis waived DO21 for this partnership? How can we ensure that the same type of insensitive marketing won't happen where parks are concerned ... or that the concerts don't become keggers in our national parks?

Are there no deep-pocketed corporations in America that offer a better fit? What about the airlines that transport visitors to parks? Google, Apple, and Facebook all have extremely deep pockets, and are trendier with millennials than Bud.

And, unlike Bud, likely wouldn't require a waiver of Park Service policies to partner.