WWII Memorial shutdown controversy

Politics & Elections
41

It’s true they don’t get paid while the shutdown is on-going. But they ultimately are guaranteed to get paid, as are all excepted employees. Agencies incur obligations to pay for services performed by excepted employees during a lapse in appropriations.

In essence, it’s more accurate to say their paychecks will be late than to say they aren’t getting paid. The latter statement is technically true as far as describing the current state of affairs: right now, today, they are not getting paid. But the work they are doing today will unquestionably be paid work.

42

Park rangers do more than empty trashcans. They may not be standing there all the time but they’re still responsible for ensuring the safety of the visitors and that the laws are obeyed. In fact, let’s look at the text immediately following the part you quoted to see what happens when the federal employees are not there:

So it seems pretty obvious that they’re closing the national parks to prevent people from acting like eight year old brats when the teachers are away.

43

My guess is that the head rangers at these parks have some discretion in how in they choose to enforce the shutdown. At some places they close off pretty much any space accessible to the public, including overlooks. At other places they don’t feel it’s worth the effort.

44

Here’s another one.

45

My apologies for not making this clear. Thanks. At the same time, as excepted employees they continue to have life expenses like the rest of us who are furloughed but not deemed excepted.

The difference between us is excepted federal employees will be paid retroactively once this shutdown ends. However furloughed (non-essential) federal employees probably will not be paid retroactively. For clarity, Congress has no obligation to pay furloughed (non-essential) federal employees at all. That Congress did so after the 1995/96 furlough was generous on the part of Congress. The mood of the country is far different today. The mood of Congress is far worse today as well.

46

No *fucking *way, no way at all, will the Pubbies to needlessly insult and harm a wide swath of federal workers and contractors. That would be totally stupid and…hmmmm.

Only time will tell.

47

The point is to keep the memorials safe from the nutjobs who would deface them, the slobs that would defile them and the entitled who would hack off a chunk for themselves as a souvenir. Plymouth Rock is now only 1/3 of it’s original size: The Real Story Behind Plymouth Rock | HISTORY

In addition not all NPS campgrounds are administered by private concessions. Many are still run by rangers and volunteers. My husband and I are volunteer camp hosts at NPS and state campgrounds.

48

Even when you have a private concession or contract, the government still provides oversight - after all, you have the contract but they need to send someone to peek in once in a while to make sure you aren’t scamming the system or turning the Kettle Falls Hotel back into a whorehouse. When private organizations abuse contracts they have with the government, very bad press happens.

49

I don’t think you know what you are talking about.

The IRS collects fees to handle private letter rulings. I can’t get anyone to answer the phones there.

The SEC collects fees to handle no action letters. Noone is fucking answering the phones there either.

The FCC gets fees from leasing the airwaves and noone is there either.

For some reason, these agencies don’t get to treat this money like they own it. There are some exceptions but they are usually independent agencies that are not subject to the budget process like the federal reserve, I’m pretty sure the national parks service is not one of those independent agencies.

BTW, this Randy Neugeberger seems like a real charmer.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/10/04/support-all-around-on-back-pay-for-furloughed-feds/

50

You’re in the tri-state area, aren’t you Bricker? Why don’t you toddle on over and perform a few citizen’s arrests?

If you have to play hooky from work to do that, tell your boss I said it was okay. If he gives you any guff, just casually mention the name “Eulalie” (the knowing lift of a single eyebrow will greatly enhance the effectiveness of this approach).

51

Yep, decisions aren’t made based on whether the service is a government profit center, but whether it is essential - and that was determined by the courts. Nor were they made on whether the service is provided to the public.

Of all of the services the government provides, a few are obviously non-essential - providing parks and museums for families (or even veterans) to visit has got to be pretty high on that list. Protecting those parks from damage (since the long term purpose of those parks is to protect our national treasures) is not. Its way easier and cheaper to do the second if you just close them down and not provide the first essential service.

Honestly, the whole POINT of a government shutdown of this nature is to play chicken and piss off the public - then see who blinks first based off who gets the most blame. Its in the interest of both parties to be blaming the other for the veterans not being able to see the memorial - and neither party is really that interested in making sure their constituents get to SEE the Grand Canyon - it has far more value over the next few weeks as a PR stunt than as a Wonder of the World. Shutter the IRS so Damuri can’t get a private letter for his clients and only the few people waiting on private letters care - close the WWII memorial and you are in PR heaven.

52

Until someone hacks it. How long do you think that would take, when the whole world knows that there’s no one guarding the fort?

53

As a furloughed National Park Service Ranger a few answers for you.

One, all National Park Service sites, including World War II Memorial, were shut down. Currently, the Honor Flight vets have been let in by calling it a First Amendment activity, which I think was pretty quick thinking on someone’s part. Other visitors have been kept out.

Two, about 3,200 NPS employees were not furloughed. Those people are currently working, but not being paid now. 2/3 of those are Law Enforcement, EMS, and fire. This includes the Park Police who cover the DC area parks. So yes, there are armed Rangers at the World War II Memorial, as well as other NPS sites. These are not additional Law Enforcement rangers on duty but actually a reduced number of the normal amount due to the shutdown. However, since they are standing at the gates turning people away they are much more visible than usual.

Three, as for websites, at least in the case of the NPS this one I know exactly what happened since I manage two sites. We didn’t do anything to our individual park websites, instead a single master switch was thrown and all are redirecting to the main DOI website. This was done so that A: there was a single message going out, not 400+ versions of the message, and B: prevents visitors from misunderstanding out status and trying to ask questions or make reservations on-line where there is no one to reply to them.

Four, as for privately run campgrounds being closed. Those campgrounds are concessions within the park boundaries - just like many restaurants, hotels, shops, and recreational vendors. Their contract clearly states that when the park is closed, they need to close. If you think about it, it would be ridiculous to close the park, but then allow people in to camp there. A similar situation would an individual store owner within a mall - if the mall rules are we close at 10PM, then you need to close at 10PM. Sucks for the campground owners, but they signed the contract. Also, yes a small piece of the money earned by those concessions does go to the government, and we appreciate it - but those feed don’t come anywhere close to covering the costs of running a park.

Five, the major duties of the National Park Service are to protect, preserve, and interpret the resources of the National Parks. Those duties, as well as the boundaries of the parks themselves, are determined by Congress. When Congress decides to not fund the Park Service, the only option as the stewards of these national treasures is the lock the gates. I can assure you that if we didn’t lock down when there was no staff around, there would be people with metal detectors and shovels digging up battlefields, and trails being hacked across sensitive landscapes. Huge amounts of time are spent preventing people from doing stupid things - either trough malice or ignorance. And much of our budget goes to repairing damage to these sites.

54

Thanks for telling us that. The level of ignorance about this is really heavy and it’s nice to have someone who knows what they’re talking about.

55

Thanks a lot for posting this - I wish the media would bother talking to people like you who can speak to what’s actually going on. Instead the vacuum gets filled with this kind of nonsense from shameless partisan hack Jonah Goldberg:

For the sake of discussion, can you speak to the specific charge that the WWII Memorial is in normal times an open-air monument with effectively no restrictions on visitation, and that therefore the shutdown in itself should not prevent people from visiting it? Just trying to understand the mechanics of how these agencies function.

56

Don, a worthy contribution with a minor flaw: you are not quite explicit enough in what is a quote from Mr. Doughy Loadpants and run the risk of autoslander by allowing the reader to confuse his words with your own. One can, of course, click the link unless they, like myself, are mindful of a careful regimen of mental hygiene.

A quibble, to be sure, but still…

57

“Unofficial goon squad of American liberalism?”

Yet no mention of jackboots?

58

I don’t work in DC, nor do I have any of the budget numbers in front of me so I can’t speak with any authority on the cost factors. I would ask though, who says it is costing more to keep the vets out than what it costs for normal operations? They are not bringing in extra security during the shut down, there is actually a reduced number of staff on duty at this time. Now, they are more visible in that instead of being in offices, or scattered across the entire National Mall, the rangers that are on duty now are posted in front of the sites to keep people out. I concede there is some expense to having to put up barricades, but I am sure a single liability lawsuit would outweigh those costs.

Why keep people from visiting? Well just a few months ago, someone splattered paint on the Lincoln Memorial. If the place were left open unattended, similar acts could occur. Also, not for nothing, but the idea of letting large numbers of elderly people wander around an area which includes a fairly large water feature is a liability suit waiting to happen. And who will respond when Grandpa D-Day goes into cardiac arrest due to all the excitement? The park police are the first responders for those sites.

As to Claude Moore Farm - they, like the campgrounds and whatnot are located on Federal land. Yes they are privately funded, but part of the attraction they are selling is publicly owned, and the government has decided to close public property. In many ways, they are in the same boat as a concessions seller at a stadium during a strike. Not their fault that they can’t open for business, but nobody goes to the stadium to buy food, they are there to see an event.

I don’t disagree that this is all politically motivated, and that it is stupid. Heck, it looks like now there is a good chance you are going to pay for me to sit home for a while. But in the end, a major charge of the National Park Service is to protect America’s crown jewels for the enjoyment of all in perpetuity. And while the enjoyment of some is currently being curtailed, that sadly has to be sacrificed in order for the NPS to protect those resources as best we can while over 85% of our staff is currently prohibited from working.

I am sure that you lock the door of your home when you are not there. Congress has informed the Park Service they cannot be at work. Therefore, we are required to lock the door for now to protect what is inside the parks.

59

Y’know, that’s one of many things that I find very, I don’t know, I’d say funny if it weren’t so stupid, about the whole thing.

That those stalwart champions of fiscal responsibility say they’re for small government but then make a big flap about curtailment of some of its nonessential activities. Sure, close the IRS and the FCC but here’s a specific CR to leave open the Cornpone’s Rout Memorial.

As **WreckingCrew **points out, protection of the property for posterity, and of public safety (essential) take priority, to the point of being done with delayed pay, over recreational enjoyment (nonessential). It’s not the agency’s fault that when operating normally you hardly even notice them around.

60

Not that anyone cares what Peggy Noonan, the over the hill pioneer of the Obama Fictionalization genre, has to say about this, but I am interested in knowing precisely why she is wrong here:

“But the White House this week has made an equally dramatic and consequential mistake, and it is balancing out the Republicans’ mistake. The Democratic mistake is the punitive, crude, pain-bringing shutting down of things that everyone knows don’t have to be shut down—the World War II memorial, the Iwo Jima memorial, parks, landmarks, etc. All this is part of a strategic decision to cause and ratchet up pain for normal citizens. That pain, the White House thinks, will make people hate the shutdown and therefore make them hate the Republicans who summoned it.”

As far as I know, there is zero evidence that anyone in the executive branch engaged in any picking and choosing over which specific programs would be shut or kept open in the shutdown. (The irony here, of course, is that Noonan, Krauthammer, et. al. were the very ones having fits over the “lawlessness” of the employer mandate delay, and now they want Obama to step in and arbitrarily decree that certain government programs be exempted from the shutdown.) So Noonan is probably saying something that isn’t true. But the more interesting question to me is, could her charge even possibly be true? Does Obama have the legal authority to keep things like the WWII Memorial open if he wanted to?