David Vela appears headed back to Washington, D.C., to be acting deputy director at the National Park Service/NPS file
Editor's note: This corrects that there are three deputy directors, notes that Vela is replacing Ray Sauvajot, who is returning to his regular job with the arrival of Vela, and includes Lena McDowall as deputy director in charge of management and administration.
David Vela, once nominated to be director of the National Park Service but never confirmed by the Senate, is heading to Washington, D.C., just the same to serve as the agency's acting deputy director of operations.
His appointment, effective April 15, gives the Park Service three deputy directors -- one of them "acting" -- but no confirmed director more than halfway through President Donald Trump's term.
Vela's appointment was announced to Park Service employees on Friday in an email from P. Daniel Smith, who was brought out of retirement by former Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to serve as the Park Service's director, though without that official title; instead, Smith is listed as a deputy director.
The third deputy is Lena McDowall, who oversees management and administration.
While Vela, Grand Teton National Park's superintendent, was nominated last summer to be the agency's director and went through a hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the nomination never went before the full Senate before the 115th Congress adjourned in December. He has not been renominated.
In his all-employees email, Smith, officially a deputy director "exercising the authority of the director," said that the Park Service stands to benefit from Vela's "leadership in building a next generation workforce that will protect our national treasures and serve all who will come to enjoy the parks as we chart a path forward for a second century service."
Ray Sauvajot, the agency's associate director for natural resource stewardship and science, had been serving as an acting deputy director, but is returning to his regular role with the arrival of Vela.
Vela is not a newcomer to the Park Service headquarters. He worked there as the agency's associate director for workforce, relevancy and inclusion before moving to Grand Teton as superintendent in 2014. While in Washington he oversaw Park Service programs including human resources, learning and development, equal opportunity, youth, and the Office of Relevancy, Diversity & Inclusion. Prior to that, he was director of the agency's Southeast Region based in Atlanta.
As acting director of operations, Vela likely will be leaned on to help fill vacancies at the top of the Midwest, National Capital, and Intermountain regional offices of the Park Service. They have been filled with acting directors since last year when the Trump administration shook up the Park Service hierarchy with a series of moves.
The administration sent Midwest Region Director Cam Sholly to Yellowstone to serve as superintendent, asked then Intermountain Region Director Sue Masica to succeed Sholly at the Midwest office, (a move she declined and instead retired), and sent National Capital Director Bob Vogel to run the Southeast Region office after Stan Austin was transferred across the country to the Pacific West Region office as director.
While Zinke and Smith wanted Yellowstone Superintendent Dan Wenk to move to Washington to fill the National Capital job, Wenk opted to retire. Also retiring rather than take a directed assignment reportedly to the Intermountain Region to succeed Masica was Lake Mead Superintendent Lizette Richardson.
Vela also will be tasked with improving employee morale across the National Park System and continuing the effort to greatly reduce the presence of harassment and discrimination -- whether sexual or related to age, gender, race, or religion -- in the employee ranks.
That morale recently got a jolt when Christine Lehnertz, sent to Grand Canyon National Park by then-Park Service Director Jon Jarvis to battle harassment issues there, was given a temporary assignment while the Interior Department's Office of Inspector General looked into claims that she had created a hostile atmosphere and spent wildly in having housing for a deputy superintendent renovated.
Those allegations were completely refuted by the OIG, but Lehnertz decided to retire rather than return to the park where her accuser remained.
Comments
The Trumph Administration is causing chaos within the national park system. Everything that is possible is done to lower the morale of our employees and degrade the resources In order to combat this chaos we need an educated work force. We need to put history back into the parks
None of this recent activitity is of any surprise to historians. In various forms and guises, they have seen all of these problems before. After all, every park comes with a history. Then let's see that visitors learn it, whether the park be Gettysburg or Yellowstone. The Park Service should start with every employee, including everyone working for the concessionaires. It's not just a job, folks. It's a calling. If you just want a job, McDonalds is hiring, and there should be plenty of openings at Burger King. In the parks, you work for generations yet unborn, and their legacy begins with your knowing that.
Start with your park's administrative history. You say your park doesn't have one? Then get an M.A. and write it as a thesis, or perhaps the dissertation for your Ph.D. Every park should have an up-to-date administrative history. How did we get this park? What is its mission? Where have we failed the public in the past? And believe me, we are always failing the public. That is what an administrative history is meant to correct for the future.
Nor should administrative histories be limited to individual parks. The system itself needs many such histories, broadly targeted to system issues. Can anyone doubt the importance of the role of concessionaires in park history? They have power. They have money. How does that influence the parks for good or ill? Where is the comprehensive history of the relationship between the National Park Service and the concessionaires? Here again, there is no such history, and some employee'with proper incentive from the agency'just might take the initiative to write it.
And fee policy. The last time the Service completed a history of that was in 1982. An update is long overdue. After all, fees now stay with the parks. Consider the 'backlog' again. Can it truly be erased just by changing the fee structure? We simply don't have enough history to guide us. We are still blindly looking forward without honestly looking back.
How far can higher fees go towards erasing the Park Service's maintenance backlog?/Kurt Repanshek
Nor does it end with fees and parks. Key documents such as the organizational charts and lists of all National Park Service Management personnel have not been updated since the late 1980s. See Organizational Structure of the National Park Service 1917 to 1985. Another key document, Historic Listing of National Park Service Officials.
And let us not forget the directors. At one time they were inclined to write useful and important books, or extensively shared their career findings with professional historians. The lessons a director learns are invaluable. The last to detail his experiences in a book was James Ridenour. The Service should commission a history of the management decisions and operational successes/failures of every director that ever served.
So, too, the National Park Service Thematic outline was last updated in 1987. Perhaps it is time for a new update. I am not referring to the 1994 thematic outline, but to the original thematic outline that dated back to 1929 when it was first conceived, History and Prehistory in the National Park System and the National Historic Landmarks Program.
An educated and informed employee work force is the best way to protect our national parks.
Every employee should be given a copy of the following books and told to read them.
1. The relevant administrative history'or its equivalent'of the employee's current park.
2. Alfred Runte, Yosemite: The Embattled Wilderness (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1990).
3. Lary M. Dilsaver, editor. America's National Park System: The Critical Documents. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1997
4. Polly Welts Kaufman, National Parks and the Woman's Voice: A History. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, updated ed., 2006.
5. Horace M. Albright as told to Robert Cahn. The Birth of the National Park Service: The Founding Years, 1913-33. Salt Lake City: Howe Publications, 1985).
6. Richard West Sellars, Preserving Nature in the National Parks: A History New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997).
7. Alfred Runte, The National Parks, The American Experience. 2010
It is up to the park history program to take the lead in this matter and promote the creation of an educated work force in todays national parks. It is time for the Chief Historian of the National Park Service to weigh in on these issues and champion the promotion of an historically literate work force.
A great comment, Harry, and thank you for mentioning my books. I would add Wilderness and the American Mind by my former mentor, Roderick Frazier Nash. It is not about the national parks per se, but still with much on their establishment and policy. Now the bigger problem: Even academics have forgotten these books in the rush to teach critical theory. As for the Chief Historian of the National Park Service, well, we both know what happened there. But we can hope, right? In history these days, it's about all we have left. Someone still cares and reads books, and yes, books that make a difference.
there seems to have been a sad trend at the Grand Canyon Park-15-year sexual harassment & hostile work environment for women. So a prime candidate is brought in to turn things around & she too has been forced out for basically the same reasons- that 12.5 yrs before Trump. It's not Trump who like chaos, it's most likely lazy long time beauxrats who know how to play the game well but not good enough at their job to be a leader -- so they get their power by "stirring the pot" & watching those around them "stew in their own" frothy broth. even If there were an appointed -confirmed Director - how long would they last - as long as the pot stirrers wanted.
Ill be curious how long approval for this post will take
Really appreciable your reply except the part about Trump. Those before you worked with a lot less. Shiftinbig your focus from blame to taking responsibility for proactive steps -such as getting excited about history again can only be good for your visitors & your spirits.
The Office of Relevancy, Diversity, and Inclusion? That sounds like a real efficient use of limited resources.
There is something really disturbing about a the perpetual vacancies of the directors of the NPS, BLM and USFWS. By now it is obvious failing to fill these positions is intentional. No in the Trump administration will provide a truthful answer so we are left to presume it is intended weaken the agencies. This probably makes it easier to push through the administration's anti-environment agenda.
I doubt it will ever even be submitted to the GOP-led Senate for confirmation.
David Vela will have a very tough time improving employee morale with the current administration running things.