UPDATE | More Than 10 Percent Of National Park Service Workforce Has Left

By

Kurt Repanshek

Published Date

April 11, 2025

An estimated 12.5 percent of the National Park Service workforce has left under Trump administration early-out offers/Rebecca Latson file

Editor's note: This updates with division heads in Geologic Resources and Inventory and Monitoring still on the job.

An estimated 2,400-2,500 National Park Service employees, roughly 12.5 percent of the agency's entire workforce, have taken Trump administration offers to resign or retire, according to the National Parks Conservation Association.

Among those who reportedly took either the "fork in the road" offer, which allowed them to resign now but remain on the payroll through the end of the fiscal year, or take an early retirement buyout, were some of the heads of the Park Service's cultural and natural resources divisions.

“This is what we were most worried about," Kristen Brengel, NPCA's senior vice president for government affairs, said Friday afternoon during a phone call. "This is our worst fear coming true, that you’re going to lose very knowledgeable people who know how to protect natural and cultural resources.”

President Donald Trump since taking office in January has worked with businessman Elon Musk to downsize the federal goverment. At first the Park Service was forced to rescind offers for seasonal positions; on Valentine's Day some 1,000 NPS employees who were on probationary status were fired; while at the same time the administration encouraged federal employees to take the "fork in the road" offer. A Voluntary Early Retirement offer was added to the mix last week.

While the seasonal offers were later extended, and a judge ordered the probationary employees to be reinstated, a sizeable percentage of the Park Service workforce has left the agency since President Trump took office, and a reduction-in-force plan is thought to be looming.

According to NPCA's tracking, an estimated 1,100 employees took the latest "fork in the road" offer, which expired at midnight Wednesday; some 700 took that offer in February; and an estimated 700 took an early retirement package.

The advocacy group thought some division heads from the natural and cultural resource divisions had left the agency, though the Park Service has not responded to inquiries about that. The Traveler, however, has received confirmation that those in charge of Inventory and Monitoring and Geologic Resources were still on the job.

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