It’s a pivotal period for state parks
Century-old systems and their keepers face modern issues
Glaciers in Alaska. Dinosaur fossils in Montana. Hoodoo rock formations in Utah. Redwoods in California. Bison in South Dakota. Native American burial mounds in Wisconsin. Military forts in Delaware.
Across the country, 9,095 state parks span 19 million acres and boast an abundance of natural and cultural riches that can rival those in the national park system, according to 2019-2020 data from the National Association of State Park Directors. They also highlight local history and are often more accessible. “One of the best benefits that state parks provide in Texas or any other state is that they’re a nice, affordable outdoor getaway,” said Rodney Franklin, state parks director for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. The Texas state parks system will celebrate its centennial next year.
“Instead of flying to Arizona to visit the Grand Canyon, I can go somewhere nearby,” said Margaret Walls, an economist and senior fellow at Resources for the Future, a Washingtonbased independent nonprofit research organization focused on environmental and natural resource issues.
Each state park system is different — some are more developed than others — but together they serve a unique public lands purpose. And many systems are at a milestone: a centennial celebration, give or take a few years. These anniversaries are highlighting how pivotal a time this is for state parks, which are grappling with challenges that include decades of underfunding, surging visitation numbers, pandemic closures, exclusionary histories and climate-change-fueled catastrophes that will affect their survival even beyond the next century.
When I met Chris Havel, associate director for the Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, at Tumalo State Park near Bend in March, he was on his way to a birthday party. Oregon’s state park system, which includes 254 properties over 122,847 acres, turns 100 this year.
“While some people will travel hours to get to their favorite park, for most people, it’s a halfhour away,” Havel said. Tumalo State Park is no exception: It’s a short bike ride from my Bend home. Such easy access has allowed some parks to build devoted visitor bases that support the parks by participating in conservation and funding programs.
Belle Isle — a 987-acre island in Detroit and part of Michigan’s 103-year-old state park system — is only a half-hour from Swathi Ravi and her family, who visit about once a month. “Belle Isle is a beautiful place, and it’s special for so many people,” she said. During the summer, her family picnics under the trees on the beach, and her 2-year-old daughter splashes in the water.
The parks in California’s 95-year-old system make up the largest and most diverse recreational, natural and cultural heritage holdings of any state agency, including 279 parks scattered over 1.65 million acres of protected land, 15,000 campsites, 5,200 miles of trails, 3,195 historic buildings and more than 11,000 known archaeological sites. California’s Yosemite Valley and Mariposa Grove became the first state park when it was established in 1864.
The 98-year-old New York state park system is home to standouts such as Niagara Falls, the United States’ oldest state park, and Letchworth, the Grand Canyon of the East.
“Nearly all of the state’s most sublime landscapes and cultural resources are under state or local jurisdictions,” said Erik Kulleseid, commissioner of the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. So, the state parks you’re seeing are the
very best of what New York has to offer.”
Just as each state park system varies, so do their funding sources. But research by Walls has shown that, since the 1990s, general fund revenue for state parks has declined overall. Today, funding comes mostly from user fees and dedicated state sources such as lottery revenue and taxes. The federal Land and Water Conservation Fund now provides about $330 million annually to states, some of which may go to state parks. And state-directed pandemic recovery dollars under the Biden administration’s American Rescue Plan have buoyed some systems; Michigan is using $250 million of its relief to modernize its 103 state parks and create a new one — an investment it estimates will yield $1 billion in economic benefits.
Legislative support also helps other state systems. A $50 million package is funding crucial state park upgrades in Oregon. Over the past decade, New York has invested more than $1.5 billion in its state parks and is planning another $200 million for each of the next five years — an age-appropriate gift for the system’s 100th birthday in 2024. And California’s $1 billion Outdoors for All budget package includes more than $500 million to increase state park access by centering investments in underserved communities.
“Overall, state parks are under-resourced compared to their operating costs,” Walls said. Decades of funding shortages have caused ballooning repair needs and have further complicated challenges such as increased visitation, climate change and an overdue reckoning with access and equity.
“We’re still advocating for state parks and for their funding to remain as sustainable and predictable as possible, which allows us to plan for the future and be strategic about our dollars,” said Franklin, who is also secretarytreasurer for the National Association of State Park Directors.
At the same time that parks are dealing with reduced funding, however, they’re also dealing with increased visitation. People made more than 786 million visits to state parks from July 1, 2019, to June 30, 2020, according to the National Association of State Park Directors. (In comparison, the National Park System’s 423 units received 297.1 million visits in 2021.)
Notwithstanding pandemic-related closures that dampened visitation across the country, New York, Texas and Oregon all reported record-smashing 2021 visitation. That’s part of a national trend of increasing visitation, which can cause overcrowding, safety issues, and wear and tear.
“Some facilities have been loved to death,” said Franklin, citing the system’s backlog of upgrades, maintenance and repairs of decades-old infrastructure.