The Alaskan Huskies howled around 8 p.m. after eating dinner. Then there was silence under the stars on a winter night in Denali National Park and Preserve’s backcountry in Alaska. Moments later a pack of wolves bayed. The quiet returned momentarily. Again, the dogs responded with howls. Back and forth, the animals continued their conversation for several minutes.

“It was kind of a surreal experience,” said Mitch Flanigan, assistant manager of the park’s kennels until he was fired on February 14. He had developed a rapport with the 31 dogs used to transport scientists and their gear on sleds into the wilderness the past seven years — two winters as an intern followed by five summers as a seasonal park ranger. After landing his first permanent position in December, he was put on a year-long required probationary status. 

Approximately, 1,000 National Park Service employees lost their jobs on Valentine's Day as part of the Trump administration’s effort to reduce the number of federal employees. Flanigan had hoped to have a lasting career, like all the employees the Traveler spoke with last week.

“The department determined that you have failed to demonstrate fitness or qualifications for continued employment because your subject matter knowledge, skills, and abilities do not meet the department’s current needs, and it is necessary and appropriate to terminate, during the probationary period, your appointment…” wrote Lena McDowall, deputy director of management and administration, in a memorandum to Flanigan and all the other fired workers.

“This guy has a resume longer than my leg. He just happened to get a promotion in the last year. I’ve worked with him for two summers. I honestly don’t know what the team is going to do without him,” said Kristin Jenn. 

Mitch Flanigan, who worked with the sled dogs at Denali National Park, was among the Park Service employees fired because they were still on probation/Courtesy of Mitch Flanigan

Jenn joined the Park Service after a 17-year-long successful career in the travel industry leading guests on tours to national parks in the United States and Canada.

“As much as I loved the company I worked for and enjoyed waking up in a new park every other day, my soul wasn't being fulfilled. I decided I wanted the second half of my career to matter on a soul-deep level, so I decided to become a public servant and put on the green & gray uniform as an interpretive national park ranger,” Jenn wrote in a Facebook post.

On January 10, the disabled Iraqi war veteran was offered a permanent position. She completed paperwork and was awaiting her start date when she learned her job was rescinded two days after President Trump’s inauguration.

Jenn refuses to name the park offering her a position — she’s hoping she will eventually get to work there and does not want to be blackballed.

On February 27, U.S. District Judge William Alsup ordered the Office of Personnel Management to rescind directives to more than two dozen agencies, including the Park Service, to fire employees. The court ruling responded to a lawsuit filed by the American Federation of Government Employees and other organizations, including the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks.

The Park Service did not immediately respond to the Traveler’s request asking the agency’s plans following Alsup’s order.

Phil Francis, chair of the executive council of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, said in an email, “We look forward to seeing what happens next, not only the rulings from Judge Alsup but also the actions of the Congress who will determine  in the next couple of weeks whether the National Park Service will be able to continue its work to protect and conserve the natural and cultural resources of our parks and serve the American people.”

All the canned employees the Traveler spoke with mentioned their termination letters deemed them poor performers despite evaluations saying the opposite. They’re now scrambling to secure other jobs with state parks, outfitters, and educational institutions, among other possibilities. They also are writing appeals to members of Congress and other officials, filing for unemployment, and hoping they are reinstated in their dream jobs.

Nathaniel Bauder, whose job duties included keeping the landscape at Gettysburg National Military Park looking as it did during the Civil War, was among the 1,000 employees fired on Valentine's Day/NPS file

Nathaniel Bauder sought to work for the Park Service his entire life. He began as an intern in 2019 at Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania. Bauder holds a master’s degree in public history and cultural resource management, which he earned to help him land a GS-5 position as a maintenance worker earning an annual salary ranging from $48,000-$62,000.

Bauder was one month shy of completing his probationary period when he received the message he was fired.

“It’s really a major blow. You finally get into a permanent position, and you think this is going to be my 30-year career. This is not just a job, it’s my career,” said Bauder.

He loved everything about the job.

“I was a landscape preservationist on the battlefield. So, we’d be doing hazardous tree removal and maintaining the cultural landscape to appear as it did during the battle, maintaining fences, and doing monument preservation work. I was also a collateral duty wildland firefighter and responded to wildfires both in eastern Pennsylvania as well as prescribed burns across the region,” he said.

Since last April, Bauder and other colleagues ran the park’s popular bed-and-breakfast operation, which involved two Civil War battlefield houses and farms that rented from $250-$400 per night.

“Since our terminations, the program has been eliminated,” he said.

Bauder learned about the Park Service as a boy visiting parks on family vacations.

“Every single place that I’d go I’d ask the park ranger, how did you get here? What did you go to school for? And those conversations were the basis of my career aspirations, where I went to school and what I majored in,” said Bauder.

Similarly, Stephanie Komives’ career ambitions were inspired by a park ranger she met at Zion National Park in Utah. She was inspired by listening to the ranger discuss "the love she had for nature, bringing that to light and that it’s not just about economics. It’s also about taking care of each other and taking care of our own people in our own lands.

She left the park determined to make a career in conservation, and studied sustainability. Three months before her probationary period was to end, she too lost her job as a recreation technician with the U.S. Forest Service at Pisgah National Forest in North Carolina.

At Great Basin National Park in Nevada, the Great Basin National Park Foundation has stepped in to provide $25,000 to support five employees terminated during their probationary period.

“We’re providing a bridge opportunity. We’re paying them and they are continuing to help with park operations for a limited period of time between what happened to them and when they can become seasonal rangers,” said Aviva O’Neill, the organization’s executive director.

It’s unclear if or when terminated employees will have their jobs reinstated.

However, an unnamed Park Service spokesperson said in an email, “The National Park Service is hiring seasonal workers to continue enhancing the visitor experience as we embrace new opportunities for optimization and innovation in workforce management."